Food and Feeding 225 



covered It. Where the bears have been Httle hunted it 

 is a comparatively easy matter to secrete one's self near 

 one of these caches and shoot the animal v^hen he returns 

 to feed. This is usually either late in the evening or in 

 the early morning, say up to two hours after daylight. 



I have already described how a grizzly bear dragged 

 a bull elk carcass up an incline so steep that it was next to 

 impossible for a man to climb up or down without hang- 

 ing to the bushes for support. The elk's body could not 

 have weighed less than five or six hundred pounds, yet 

 the bear seemed to have transported it with ease, and, 

 after placing it behind a large tree and in under the low- 

 hanging branches, he dug out a hole in the side of the 

 hill and, dragging up logs and brush, covered the carcass 

 completely. The reader is also reminded of the game we 

 played with the grizzly on Wilson's Creek, when every 

 night he stole the body of our dead horse, and every day, 

 with infinite labor, and only by bringing elementary me- 

 chanics to our aid, we brought it back to its original 

 position. 



It is often affirmed that the grizzly carries such a bur- 

 den by either grasping it in his arms and walking off on his 

 hind legs, or by "throwing it over his shoulder" (Heaven 

 only knows how this operation would be performed), 

 and so making off with it. The notion is of one piece 

 with that that the grizzly embraces his enemies and hugs 

 them to death. As a matter of fact, he carries anything that 

 he can so carry in his jaws, and burdens that are too great 

 for that, he either grasps with his teeth and, turning his 

 head sideways, drags along with him or, turning squarely 

 toward his find, backs away and drags it after him. 



