42 The Grizzly Bear 



habits of the savage, but seems never to have developed 

 them, at least not tow^ard his master. He was never 

 chained, slept for the most part in Adams's company, and 

 v^hen at last the ultimate test of allegiance was unex- 

 pectedly presented to him, he took sides unhesitatingly 

 with his adopted master against his own relations. Adams, 

 while accompanied by Ben Franklin, was attacked by a 

 wounded grizzly. Ben instantly joined in the fight, and, 

 though himself badly bitten, saved his master's life. From 

 that time on he was the apple of Adams's eye, his insep- 

 arable companion, and of all living beings on earth the 

 best beloved. 



One is reminded of a quaint story, quoted by several 

 of the early commentators, of a grizzly bear once domes- 

 ticated by a tribe of northern Indians. On the occasion 

 of a visit from members of another tribe, the bear's owner, 

 for a joke, ordered the bear to get into one of the canoes 

 belonging to the visitors. The bear obeyed, but the 

 owner of the canoe, resenting the intrusion, struck him, 

 and, "since the bear had come to be regarded as one of 

 their family" by the hosts, the blow was the cause of an 

 intertribal war. 



Ben accompanied his master on several of his later 

 trips, and more than once, suffering from blistered feet, 

 limped after the outfit in improvised moccasins. On one 

 occasion it was only by the most heroic devotion that 

 Adams rescued him from the desert, where the bear had 

 fallen exhausted, and lay, bending imploring eyes upon 

 his master, as he left to search for water and help. We 

 have no record of the manner of Ben's death, but one can 

 well imagine, after reading Mr. Hittell's book, with what 



