34 THE BLACK BEAR OF PENNSYLVANIA 



and the lives of our pioneers, and with the immense 

 amount of folk-lore that has clustered about him. 

 Candlemas Day, the day of the bears, has now be- 

 come ground hog day in the greater part of Pennsyl- 

 vania, due to Bruin's own transference of the perqui- 

 site of sensing the weather to his miarmot friend- 

 see the story as related by old Mr. Middleswarth in 

 the writer's "Juniata Memories," (1916). To students 

 of Zoology bears are always interesting, especially in 

 Pennsylvania 1 , where the two more or less mythical 

 species, "the 'hog bear" and "the dog bear" will 

 always give rise to discussion, like the Indian legend 

 of "the naked bear," a ferocious kind of "Musquaw," 

 destroyed at an early day. The color phases ranging 

 from pure white to piebald, bla'ck and brown, and 

 fulvous red, cause much speculation as to varying 

 types or sub-species. Miss Blackmail, in her history 

 of "Susquehanna County," tells of a white bear killed 

 in that County in 1802, and another white bear was 

 taken in an animal drive in what is now Snyder CountH 

 at a still earlier period. Leroy Lyman, noted Potter 

 County hunter, killed several black bears, with dis- 

 tinct tinges of brown or red, on breasts, shoulders and 

 bellies. 



These skins were on exhibition at his late home near 

 Roulette, being admired by many persons. S. N. 

 Rhoads in his "Mammals of Pennsylvania and New 

 Jersey," mentioned several "red" bears killed in 

 Ly coming and Sullivan Counties, one as late as .1882. 

 The last red bear and perhaps the finest one of all 



