BIG GAME OF NORTH AMERICA 369 



furnished me with the length of eleven American grizzly skins 

 in his warehouse at one time 87, 89, 90, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 

 98, 101 and 103 ins. respectively. On the day these parti- 

 culars were furnished I myself put the tape over a grizzly skin 

 in Sir George Lampson's possession which measured 9 ft. from 

 the eyes to the tail. 



III. BLACK BEAR ( Ursus americanus) 



I have said so much incidentally about the black bear 

 while writing of his congener the grizzly, that I have very little 

 left to say of him in the proper place. A recent American 

 authority describes this bear's habitat as being confined now- 

 adays ' to some portions of the various ranges of mountains 

 south of the St. Lawrence river, the Great Lakes, and (east of 

 the Mississippi river) to parts of those portions of the Mis- 

 sissippi river and its tributaries which are yet unsettled,' and 

 to ' the dense thickets of the Colorado, Trinity, and Brayos 

 rivers.' Colonel G. D. Alexander should have bethought him 

 of those countries west of the Rockies (Alaska, British Columbia, 

 Washington Territory, Vancouver Island, and Oregon) which 

 are at present the principal stronghold of Ursus americanus ; 

 and as I am informed the chief source from which the fur-traders 

 draw their supplies of black bear skins. Unfortunately for 

 the black bear, the price of his hide has gone up lately in the 

 fur market. Ten years ago $15 was a long price to pay for 

 a bear's skin ; this year a trader out here paid as much as $35 

 for one. Whatever the ultimate result of this rise in value may 

 be, the immediate consequence of it has been to show the 

 world what a vast number of bears can be killed in America 

 if they are wanted. 



Here are some statistics of recent crops of bear in America 

 which speak for themselves. 



The Hudson Bay Company, of course, draws all its supply 

 of hides from this continent, and I am assured that the same 

 maybe said (with scarcely any allowance for Russian, Norwegian, 



I. B B 



