464 OUR ARCTIC PROVINCE. 



the warmer weather of summer subdued their temper, we never 

 could coax one of these animals to show fight. Its first impulse 

 and its last one, while within our influence, was flight males, fe- 

 males, and cubs all, when surprised by us, rushing with one ac- 

 cord right, left, and in every direction, over the hills and far away. 



After shooting half a dozen, we destroyed no more, for we 

 speedily found that we had made their acquaintance at the height 

 of their shedding-season, and their snowy and highly prized winter- 

 dress was a very different article from the dingy, saffron-colored, 

 grayish fur that was flying like downy feathers in the wind, when 

 ever rubbed or pulled by our hands. They never growled, or ut- 

 tered any sound whatever, even when shot or wounded. 



Here, on the highest points, where no moss ever grows, and 

 nothing but a fine porphyritic shingle slides and rattles beneath our 

 tread, are bear-roads leading from nest to nest, or stony lairs, which 

 they have scooped out of frost- splintered debris on the hill-sides, 

 and where old she-bears undoubtedly bring forth their young : but 

 it was not plain, because we saw them only sleeping, at this season 

 of the year, on the lower ground ; they seemed to delight in stretch- 

 ing themselves upon, and rolling over, the rankest vegetation. 



They sleep soundly, but fitfully, rolling their heavy arms and 

 legs about as they doze. For naps they seem to prefer little grassy 

 depressions on the sunny hill-sides and along the numerous water- 

 courses, and their paths were broad and well beaten all over the 

 island. We could not have observed less than two hundred and 

 fifty or three hundred of these animals while we were there ; at 

 one landing on Hall Island there were sixteen in full sight at one 

 sweep of our eyes, scampering up and off from the approach of the 

 ship's boat. 



Provided with more walrus-meat than he knows what to do with, 

 the polar bear, in my opinion, has never cared much for the Seal 

 Islands ; the natives have seen them, however, on St. Paul, and its 

 old men have their bear stories, which they tell to a rising genera- 

 tion. The last "inedvait" killed on St. Paul Island was shot at 

 Bogaslov in 1848 ; none have ever come down since, and very 

 few were there before, but those few evidently originated at and 

 made St. Matthew Island their point of departure. Hence I desire 

 to notice this hitherto unexplored spot, standing, as it does, two 

 hundred miles to the northward of St. Paul, and which, until 

 Lieutenant Maynard and myself, in 1874, surveyed and walked 



