Trail and Camp-Fire 



case, and so neglected to preserve many notes 

 and specimens that to-day would be of very 

 great interest. 



J. C. Merrill. 



THE BEAR S DISPOSITION 



My own experience with bears tends to 

 make me lay special emphasis upon their vari- 

 ation in temper. There are savage and cow- 

 ardly bears, just as there are big and little 

 ones ; and sometimes these variations are very 

 marked among bears of the same district, and 

 at other times all the bears of one district 

 will seem to have a common code of behavior 

 which differs utterly from that of the bears 

 of another district. Readers of Lewis and 

 Clarke do not need to be reminded of the 

 great difference they found in ferocity be- 

 tween the bears of the Upper Missouri and 

 the bears of the Columbia River drainage 

 system ; and those who have lived in the 

 Upper Missouri country nowadays know how 

 widely the bears that still remain have altered 

 in character from what they were as recently 



as the middle of the century. 



230 



