210 SPOFwT IN NORTH A5IERICA. 



are so difficult to kill. The stratagem which has 

 served its turn once, may, the next time it is em- 

 ployed, betray the hunter into the embraces of the 

 bear ; and this enormous brute, whose strength will 

 enable it to catch up a horse and carry it off to 

 devour it, makes but short work of a single man if 

 it gets hold of him. 



Grizzly bears (like lions and tigers) usually 

 hide themselves during the day, and they betake 

 themselves to caves during the winter, when the 

 soundness of their slumbers is in proportion to the 

 intensity of the cold. They conceal themselves in 

 these retreats about the end of autumn, and only 

 quit them when the snows of winter are melted, and 

 spring has caused the herbage to burgeon on the 

 prairies. It sometimes happens that one of these 

 caves is inhabited by two bears, but the case is a 

 rare one, for the unsociable temper of these crea- 

 tures is proverbial in the States ; usually they prefer 

 a solitary life. 



The trapper discovers the lair of the bear either 

 by his own instinct or by the knowledge which he 

 has of the forest, and when once the animal is dis- 

 covered, it must be attacked in its cave, without 

 hesitation and without fear. The first thing the 

 trapper does when he is about to attack the bear in 

 his den, is to examine all around the cave which he 

 is about to penetrate. By this means he ascertains 

 whether it is a sociable brute or a solitary one, for 



