111.] THE POLAR BKAR. 107, 



dreadfully among the reindeer in northern Europe has ever, at 

 least during the last fifty years, been common on Spitzbergen. 



The Polar bear occurs principally on coasts and islands which 

 are surrounded by drift-ice, often even upon ice-fields far out at 

 sea, for his best hunting is among the ice-floes. Now he is 

 rather rare on the south-western coasts of Spitzbergen and 

 Novaya Zemlya which are almost free of ice during summer, 

 but more common on the northern parts of these islands, which 

 are almost always surrounded by ice. Thus for instance during 

 my many landings at Horn Sound, Bell Sound, Ice Fjord, Fore- 

 land Sound, and King's Bay, on the west coast of Spitzbergen, 

 I have never seen a single bear. On the other hand, bears 

 were seen at nearly every resting-place during the boat voyage 

 I made in 1861 wdth Torell in Hinloopen Strait and along the 

 shores of the most northerly islands on Spitzbergen, also during 

 the sledge journey which Palander and I made in the spring of 

 1873 round North East Land. The Polar bear is besides found 

 everywhere along the north coast of Asia and America, 

 apparently in greater numbers the farther north we go. 

 Sometimes too, first on ice and then swimming, he has 

 reached the north coast of Norway, for instance, in March 

 1853, when, according to a statement in Tromsoe Stiftstideiide 

 (No. 4 for 1869), a Polar bear was killed in Kjoellefjord in East 

 Fin mark. 



The bear is not difficult to kill. When he observes a man he 

 commonly approaches in hope of prey, with supple movements, 

 and in a hundred zigzag bends, in order to conceal the direction 

 he intends to take, and thus keep his prey from being frightened. 

 During his approach he often climbs up on blocks of ice, or 

 raises himself on his hind leg^s, in order to o-et a more extensive 

 view% or else stands snuffing up the air with evident care in all 

 directions, in order, by the aid of smell, which he seems to rely 

 upon more than sight, to ascertain the true kind and nature of 

 the surrounding objects. If he thinks he has to do wdth a seal, 

 he creeps or trails himself forward along the ice, and is said 

 then to conceal with the fore-paws the only part of his body that 

 contrasts with the white colour of the snow — his large black 

 nose. If one keeps quite still, the bear comes in this way so 

 near that one can shoot him at the distance of two gun-lengths, 

 or, what the hunters consider safer, kill him with the lance. 

 If an unarmed man falls in with a Polar bear, some rapid 

 movements and loud cries are generally sufficient to put him to 

 flight, but if the man himself flies, he is certain to have the 

 bear after him at full speed. If the bear is wounded, he 

 always takes to flight. He often lays snow upon the wound 

 with his fore-paws ; sometimes in his death struggles he scrapes 

 with his fore-feet a hole in the snow, in which he buries his head. 



