THE FEAR OF MAN 201 



kinds the notes of explorers who have pushed into 

 the few regions of earth where animals were numerous 

 but man had not trodden, and the results of the very 

 latest experiments of to-day in districts where the 

 killing of animals has been absolutely prohibited. In 

 other words, we must compare the behaviour of the 

 creatures in the Arctic seas in the days of Willoughby 

 and Barents, or in the voyage of Weddell to the 

 Antarctic, with the latest reports from Yellowstone 

 Park. The results show a striking agreement in the 

 demeanour of the beasts when first confronted with 

 the new creature, man. Few of them exhibited fear, 

 so far as the records show. When Barents's crew were 

 on their first voyage a polar bear, who probably had 

 never seen men before, took one of the crew who 

 was lying down by the back of the neck, and after 

 dragging him some way, bit the top of his head off. 

 Even now the polar bear is the least shy of his race, 

 though so constantly hunted. 



The general tendency of wild animals kept in large 

 reserves and never molested points to the same con- 

 clusion, though for obvious reasons none of the most 

 dangerous carnivora can be maintained in such places. 

 The fear of man is lost, by creatures wild and free but 

 unmolested, so quickly as to be matter of surprise 

 to those most conversant with animals in captivity. 

 Reports published in the United States newspapers 

 dwell repeatedly on the loss of the fear of man by all 

 animals in Yellowstone Park, where the deer (both 

 wapiti and black-tailed deer) come to the houses to be 

 fed, and even eat the flowers from the window-boxes. 



