A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 



77 



wishing to kill creatures needlessly, or without a good 

 object; but with bears, my experience has been that 

 chances to secure them come so seldom as to make it very 

 distinctly worth while improving any that do come, and 

 I have not spent much time watching any bear unless he 

 was in a place where I could not get at him, or else was 

 so close at hand that I was not afraid of his getting away. 

 On one occasion the bear was hard at work digging up 

 squirrel or gopher caches on the side of a pine-clad hill; 

 while at this work he looked rather like a big badger. 

 On two other occasions the bear was fussing around a car- 

 cass preparatory to burying it. On these occasions I was 

 very close, and it was extremely interesting to note the 

 grotesque, half-human movements, and giant, awkward 

 strength of the great beast. He would twist the carcass 

 around with the utmost ease, sometimes taking it in his 

 teeth and dragging it, at other times grasping it in his 

 forepaws and half lifting, half shoving it. Once the bear 

 lost his grip and rolled over during the course of some 

 movement, and this made him angry, and he struck the 

 carcass a savage whack, just as a pettish child will strike 

 a table against which it has knocked itself. At another 

 time I watched a black bear some distance off getting 

 his breakfast under stumps and stones. He was very ac- 

 tive, turning the stone or log over, and then thrusting his 

 muzzle into the empty space to gobble up the small creat- 

 ures below before they recovered from their surprise and 

 the sudden inflow of light. From under one log he put 

 a chipmunk, and danced hither and thither with even 

 more agility than awkwardness, slapping at the chip- 



