28 The Grizzly Bear 



vided with bows, arrows, etc., fell upon the following plan, 

 in which they also succeeded, viz. : Knowing of a large, 

 high rock, perpendicular on all sides and level on the top, 

 in the neighborhood of where the naked bear kept, they 

 made ladders (Indian ladders), and placing these at the 

 rock, they reconnoitred the ground around, and soon 

 finding a fresh track of the animal they hastily returned, 

 getting on top of the rock and drawing the ladders up 

 after them. They then set up a cry similar to that of 

 a child, whereupon this animal made its way thither and 

 attempted to climb the rock, the Indians pouring down 

 their arrows in different directions, all the while upon him. 

 The animal now grew very much enraged, biting with its 

 teeth against the rock and attempting to tear it with its 

 claws until at last they had conquered it." 



The next mention made of the new bear occurs the 

 following year, in 1815, in the second American edition 

 of Guthrie's Geography where, upon information fur- 

 nished by Brackenridge from the Lewis and Clark journal, 

 George Ord, the naturalist, described and formally named 

 the grizzly bear. 



There were two words, similar in sound, but differing 

 in signification, which had been impartially applied to 

 this animal; one of them was grisly, and means "savage- 

 looking, fear-inspiring, terrible, horrid"; the other was 

 grizzly, and means "grayish, or somewhat gray." If one 

 may judge from the context of Lewis and Clark's notes, 

 they used the latter word with the latter meaning, but 

 Ord evidently inclined to the belief that the first word 

 had been used both with reason and intent, and he there- 

 fore gave to this species the name of Ursus horribilis. 



