Jungle By-Ways in India 



wind blowing from his direction to your own, since 

 his powers of sight are poor, as also those of hearing. 

 His one good sense is that of smell, which is acute. 



Whether the bear is timid or brave I will leave 

 to the individual experiences of sportsmen to 

 decide for themselves. Bruin behaves in such 

 very different fashions on different occasions that 

 for the life of me I would not like to set down here 

 an opinion on his character in this respect ; for 

 in many cases it would certainly be an aspersion 

 to call him a coward. 



I fancy, to a very considerable extent, his actions 

 and attitude depend largely upon the mood in 

 which one comes across him. The meekest and 

 most timid man when irritated and annoyed 

 shows moments of unexpected bravery, and 

 Bruin, so far as my experience goes, is very often 

 irritated and annoyed. Such a little thing puts 

 him out ! 



For instance, as we have seen, he does not like 

 being suddenly met on a path and asked to get 

 out of the way ; nor is he partial to being hooted 

 at and forced to take a different road home in 

 the morning to his accustomed one (after all, 

 many of us are like this ourselves !) ; and he likes 

 very much less being disturbed by crackers and 

 squibs during his midday siesta chez lui. 



I have no doubt that on the whole he is a more 

 or less peaceably inclined, sedate old gentleman 

 if allowed to have things his own way, but when 



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