418 



INTRODUCTION TO ZOOLOOT. 



II. Ursidoe. — The Bears are remarkable for their great 

 strength, their ponderous body, and their peculiar gait. The 

 food of the American Black Bear is principally vegetable ;* 

 that of the Polar Bear is flesh, mostly that of the Seals. The 

 Brown Bear {Fig. 327) is found in the mountainous parts of 



Fig. 327.— Brown Beak. 



the Continent of Europe, and was formerly a native of Britain. 

 The remains of two other species have been discovered in Eng- 

 land, as well as in other parts of Eui-ope, in a fossil state ; one 

 of them, the Great Cave Bear, must have been of gigantic size. 

 The Badger (^Meles taxus) is, in these countries, the only 

 surviving representative of the present family. Fossil remains 

 of the Badger have been found in the same localities as those of 

 the Great Cave Bear above mentioned ; and the species appears 

 to be identical with that existing. There are even grounds for 

 attributing it to a still higher antiquity, and for believing it to 



■ The fondness of this animal for honey is so well known, that 

 "Washington Irving, in his Tour on the Prairies, introduces one of the 

 rangers as expressing himself in the following graphic, thougli not very 

 elegant phraseology : — " The bear is the kuowingest varment for finding out 

 a bee-tree in the world. They'll gnaw for days together at the trunk, 'till 

 they make a hole big enough to get in their paws, and then they'll haul out 

 honey, bees and all. " 



