206 FOREST LIFE IN ACADIE. 



The animal presently rose from his hitherto recumbent 

 position and sat up, munching his mouthful of beech-nuts 

 with great apparent satisfaction — a magnificent specimen, 

 and black as a coal. 



"We should now have fired, but at this juncture, as luck 

 would have it, a red fox, which our tracks below had 

 probably disturbed, raced up behind and induced us to 

 look round. The bear at once sank quietly down behind 

 the log, and, worming along, bounded over a precipice into 

 a thick spruce swamp before we were aware that we w^ere 

 discovered. This fox must have been his good genius. 



Notwithstanding the value of the skin and the standing 

 grievance between the settler of the back- woods and the 

 black bear, the latter is apparently increasing in numbers 

 in many parts of the Lower Provinces. In Nova Scotia 

 there is no bounty on their noses, though the wolf (a rare 

 visitor) is thus placed under a ban. In Anticosti bears 

 are exceedingly numerous, and a well-organised bear 

 hunt on this island would doubtless show a wonderful 

 return of sport ; but then — the flies I 



THE CANADA POECUPINE. 



{Erethizon dorsatus, Cuvier.) 



This species is common in the woodland districts of 

 Eastern North America, from Pennsylvania to the Arctic 

 Circle. West of the Missouri, according to Baird, it is 

 replaced by the yellow-haired porcupine (E. epixanthus). 



A cave-dwelling animal, choosing its residence amongst 

 the dark recesses of collocated boulders, or the holes at 

 the roots of large trees, it spends much of its time abroad. 



