NOTES ON THE GRIZZLY BEAR 179 



found the Barren Ground grizzly about one hundred 

 miles east of the eastern end of Great Bear Lake. 



There has been much talk in the Colorado mountains, 

 and in a few other localities, about the " silver-tip " and 

 the " grizzly," and several times I have been asked to 

 state the characters of each. Like the continuous and 

 ever-tiresome " ibex," — which will not down, — there is 

 nothing in this question. A " silver-tip " is a Rocky 

 Mountain grizzly, no more, no less. The two are one 

 and indivisible, but the coat of the animal varies all the 

 way from the gray-washed " bald-faced " grizzly to the 

 darkest of the dark-brown individuals, which in Novem- 

 ber are sometimes of a dark chocolate-brown color. 



I have tried in vain to find constant characters in the 

 claws of grizzly bears, but each time I have concluded 

 that I had found out something that was constant, im- 

 mediately the old material has been discredited by new, 

 and I now am as far as ever from a permanent conclu- 

 sion. Some grizzlies have very long claws, that are 

 strongly curved, and again others have claws that are 

 rather short and blunt. They vary greatly, according to 

 conditions, and the uses to which they have been put. 



To-day there is in the United States only one locality 

 wherein wild grizzlies exist in any number, and that is 

 the remote fastnesses of the Bitter Root Mountains of 

 Idaho, known as the Clearwater country. Mr. W. H. 

 Wright knows where there are bears, but the mountains 

 are so steep, and the brush so thick, it is not every sports- 

 man who can get a shot, even when grizzlies are seen. 

 Of course every one knows of the tame grizzlies of the 



