Old Ephraim, the Grisly Bear. 283 



the bushes in a berry patch, gathering the fruit with half- 

 luxurious, half-laborious greed, sitting on their haunches, 

 and sweeping the berries into their mouths with dexterous 

 paws. So absorbed do they become in their feasts on the 

 luscious fruit that they grow reckless of their safety, and 

 feed in broad daylight, almost at midday ; while in some 

 of the thickets, especially those of the mountain haws, 

 they make so much noise in smashing the branches that 

 it is a comparatively easy matter to approach them un- 

 heard. That still-hunter is in luck who in the fall finds 

 an accessible berry-covered hill-side which is haunted by 

 bears ; but, as a rule, the berry bushes do not grow close 

 enough together to give the hunter much chance. 



Like most other wild animals, bears which have known 

 the neighborhood of man are beasts of the darkness, or 

 at least of the dusk and the gloaming. But they are by 

 no means such true night-lovers as the big cats and the 

 wolves. In regions where they know little of hunters 

 they roam about freely in the daylight, and in cool 

 weather are even apt to take their noontide slumbers 

 basking in the sun. Where they are much hunted they 

 finally almost reverse their natural habits and sleep 

 throughout the hours of light, only venturing abroad 

 after nightfall and before sunrise ; but even yet this is not 

 the habit of those bears which exist in the wilder localities 

 where they are still plentiful. In these places they sleep, 

 or at least rest, during the hours of greatest heat, and 

 again in the middle part of the night, unless there is a full 

 moon. They start on their rambles for food about mid- 

 afternoon, and end their morning roaming soon after the 



