224 REV. G. S. DUBBIE ON INFLUENCE OF CIVILIZATION 
The formidable weasel (Gulo borealis), the Wolverine (for 
some reason, which is not manifest, called “Glutton” by the 
people of every country it inhabits), was found in Kurland 
as recently as 1816, but has gradually vanished from all 
the forests south of Archangel, so that European examples 
are seldom seen even in the best zoological gardens. 
The family Urside has two representatives in Europe.* 
The common so-called Brown Beart became extinct in 
Germany before the beginning of the present century, but 
it is still abundant in many parts of Europe. It has 
already been mentioned that this animal clings tenaciously 
to its habitat; and it often suddenly reappears in localities 
from which all suspicion of its presence has fled. The 
preservation of so large and formidable a creature in such 
regions as the Alps and Pyrenees may be explained by two 
circumstances. In the first place, the bear subsists chiefly 
on vegetable food, and, consequently, savage and unreliable as 
it always is, it is much less aggressive than the wolf and the 
majority of the Carnivora; in the second place, though it 
does not actually hybernate, it keeps itself concealed during 
the greater part of the winter, the season in which wild beasts 
are most easily destroyed. As early as the beginning of 
the eighteenth century, bears were rare in Germany, and 
the Saxon princes, who employed them for sports of a more 
or less serious nature, had to import them from other coun- 
tries, chiefly from Poland. In the Grisons Canton they 
committed great ravages in 1837. In 1857 they were again 
troublesome in the same region. In 1856 three large bears. 
and two smaller ones killed a hundred sheep there in a single 
week. In 1858 the flocks of the Grisons again suffered 
severely, and 8 bears were killed in 1861, 4 in 1862, 
4 again in 1863, and only 1 in 1864. There is, however, 
good reason to believe that bears still haunt lonely spots in 
the Southern Alps, for as recently as 1896 two were killed 
in the Brenta district of the Tyrol. 
In 1856 one was captured in the Bohmerwald; and in 
* We agree with those naturalists who distinguish the Arctic fauna as. 
inhabiting a region not strictly included in Continental Europe. 
+ In certain districts of Russia it is commonly black ; and in Western and. 
Central Asia yellow and nearly white varieties occur. 
