254 THE BOOK OF THE ANIMAL KINGDOM 



POLAR BEAR.— The picture depicting a pair of Polar Bears (Fig. 

 200) at the London Zoo is of interest because it is one of the last 

 taken showing these two animals in their old home. Sam and 

 Barbara, as they are popularly known, have recently been transferred 

 to much improved quarters, where they provide a fund of interest and 

 amusement to visitors. Quite a number of incidents might be 

 mentioned concerning these two well-known inmates of the Regent's 

 Park collection, not the least exciting of which was the breaking of 

 a padlock and their subsequent escape and recapture two or three 

 years ago. Not long since Barbara gave birth to two cubs, but 

 although Sam was temporarily removed and every precaution was 

 taken, the young ones were not reared. 



Reaching a length of as much as thirteen feet, and a weight of 

 1,600 lb.; clad in a warm coat of yellowish-white, and with a 

 mobility of body and a silent footfall, the Polar Bear is always a 

 favourite beast in a Zoological Garden. But in its native home on 

 the coasts and islands of the Arctic Ocean, it must present a fine 

 sight to those who have the good fortune to observe it amid the 

 splendours of ice-bound Polar Seas. 



How well provisioned this fine beast is against the fierce Winter 

 cold which it encounters in its own wild haunts ! It has thick, 

 shaggy fur, between the hairs of which there are large air-spaces. 

 What purpose, then, do these serve? Air being a bad conductor of 

 heat, the animal is thus well served by these air-spaces, and a thick 

 layer of fat beneath the skin also affords protection, fat also being 

 a bad heat conductor. 



Its whitish coat assists the Polar Bear to secure food, for, by 

 means of it, it is better able to creep towards its prey unobserved, 

 being protected by its harmony with the surroundings of snow and 

 ice ; and the hairy covering on the soles of the feet ably assists it in 

 securing a firm and silent foothold on even the most slippery ice. 

 It is a good climber, feeding not only on the few kinds of mammals 

 that inhabit its Arctic home, but also birds, their eggs and young. 

 Beyond this it also partakes of a vegetable diet, such things as 

 grass, berries, lichens and mosses being consumed, "which, during 

 the short Summer of the Arctic North, grow upon the thawed 

 surface layers of the soil." 



But in those desolate regions the Polar Bear often experiences 

 considerable difficulty in supplying its bodily needs from the few 

 other animals which eke out an existence in a land of perpetual 



