MORE ABOUT BEARS IN THE ROCKIES 247 



the goat removed and partly buried. When at last the culprit, 

 a large silver-tip, was found, he at once attacked the man, and 

 was killed only after a desperate fight. The hunter holds a 

 wounded bear in the greatest respect. He knows by experience 

 how dangerous an animal he is, and never goes without his 

 faithful dogs, who are only too keen to tackle any bear, however 

 big. On the other hand, my hunter of 1898, also with a very 

 large experience, did not believe in bears attacking, and the few 

 I have seen wounded certainly did not. But in hunting bears, 

 as all other dangerous game, there is one golden rule which 

 should never be forgotton Take the greatest care that you 

 place your first bullet in a vital spot ! 



Roosevelt, in his " Life of a Ranchman," thinks that the 

 grizzly's character has lately changed. Constant contact with 

 rifle-carrying hunters for a period extending over many genera- 

 tions of bear life has taught the grizzly that he is his undoubted 

 overlord as far as fighting goes. Roosevelt has only known 

 one instance of a grizzly turning on a man when unwounded 

 and suddenly come upon and cornered. He gives two instances 

 from personal knowledge where a man has been killed by a 

 grizzly : (1) Wounded bear charged, gun missed. (2) Man 

 nearly stepped on an unwounded bear, there was no time to 

 fire rifle. ''Any of the big bears we killed on the mountains 

 would, I think, have been able to make short work of either 

 lion or tiger." 



Another man with large experience says : " Grizzlies are 

 not as savage as they were years ago when men were armed 

 only with a single-barrel small-bore rifle, muzzle-loader. The 

 dangers of bear hunting have greatly decreased with modern 

 rifles." 



The stomachs and bowels of bears towards the end of autumn 

 shrink greatly, and before laying up the former are only about 

 the size of two fists, while in summer they resemble that of 

 a cariboo distended with grass. The digestive apparatus seems 

 to prepare itself gradually for the long winter fast. The only 

 authority apparently who notices this is T. G. Wood in his 

 " Natural History." He is one of the few who agree with 

 my hunter in that bears do not lose fat during hibernation ; but 

 he makes the extraordinary statement that grizzlies can climb 

 trees ! There seems but very little doubt that bears on leaving 



