OLD EPHRAIM, THE GRISLY BEAR. 65 



lap up the small tribes of darkness which 

 swarm under the one and in the other. It digs 

 up the camas roots, wild onions, and an occa- 

 sional luckless woodchuck or gopher. If food 

 is very plenty bears are lazy, but commonly 

 they are obliged to be very industrious, it be- 

 ing no light task to gather enough ants, 

 beetles, crickets, tumble-bugs, roots, and nuts 

 to satisfy the cravings of so huge a bulk. 

 The sign of a bear's work is, of course, evi- 

 dent to the most unpractised eye ; and in no 

 way can one get a better idea of the brute's 

 power than by watching it busily working for 

 its breakfast, shattering big logs and upsetting 

 boulders by sheer strength. There is always 

 a touch of the comic, as well as a touch of the 

 strong and terrible, in a bear's look and ac- 

 tions. It will tug and pull, now with one paw, 

 now with two, now on all fours, now on its 

 hind legs, in the effort to turn over a large log 

 or stone ; and when it succeeds it jumps round 

 to thrust its muzzle into the damp hollow and 

 lap up the affrighted mice or beetles while 

 they are still paralyzed by the sudden ex- 

 posure. 



The true time of plenty for bears is the 

 berry season. Then they feast ravenously on 

 huckleberries, blueberries, kinnikinic berries, 

 buffalo berries, wild plums, elderberries, and 

 scores of other fruits. They often smash all the 

 bushes in a berry patch, gathering the fruit with 

 half-luxurious, half-laborious greed, sitting on 

 their haunches, and sweeping the berries into 

 their mouths with dexterous paws. So absorbed 

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