264 The Grizzly Bear 



mule meat, and he will climb trees, rob bird's nests, and 

 eat the eggs there." Also that "he will climb a fruit- 

 tree, strip whole branches of ripe fruit with his huge paws 

 and claws, and then on the way home will finish off the 

 meal with a toad or a lizard." This gentleman also says 

 that "a grizzly loves to feed on ants." But then, perhaps 

 startled over finding himself so well within the bounds of 

 fact, adds that "he knocks the top off an ant hill, buries 

 his nose in the interior, and by a few inward breaths like 

 a suction pump, draws every vestige of life from the great- 

 est hill." 



Another writer, a State Senator by the way, tells of 

 shooting a grizzly four times through the heart and hav- 

 ing it still chase him over down timber and bad going, and 

 only fall dead as it was about to fell him. And he goes 

 on to tell of a grizzly bear in the San Bernardino Moun- 

 tains that used to come once a week, climb a live-oak tree, 

 walk out along a horizontal branch over a high-fenced 

 pigpen, drop in, steal a little pig, push the gate open (it 

 opened out), and go home. 



One frequently, in the mountains, sees a great fir- 

 tree growing among the rocks with only a thimbleful of 

 earth within reach. If one follows up the published liter- 

 ature on the grizzly bear, one is likely to see that misin- 

 formation has the knack of flourishing upon an equally 

 small store of fact. 



