SUMMER SPORT IX NOVA ZEMLA. 71 



make such speed, but take her at an advantage, for 

 we have to doe with a cruell, fierce, and ravenous 

 beast.' Whereupon three of our men went forward, 

 the beare still devouring her prey, not once fearing 

 the number of our men, and yet they wore thirtie at 

 the least. The three that Avent forward in that sort 

 Avere Cornelius Jacobson, William Geysen, and Hans 

 Van Miflen, William Barentz' purser ; and after that 

 the sayd master and pylat had shot three times, and 

 mist, the purser, stepping somewhat further forward, 

 and seeing the beare to be within the length of a 

 shot, presently levelled his piece, and discharging it 

 at the beare, shot her into the head, between the 

 eyes, and yet she held the man still fast by the necke, 

 and lifted up her head with the man in her mouth ; 

 but she began somewhat to stagger, wherewith the 

 purser and a Scottish man drew out their curtel-axes 

 and strooke at her so hard that their curtel-axes burst, 

 and yet she would not leave the man. At last Wil- 

 liam Geysen went to them, and with all his might 

 strook the beare upon the snout with his piece, at which 

 the beare fell to the ground, making a great noise, and 

 William Geysen, leaping upon her, cut her throat." 



This graphically described tragedy is unique of its 

 kind, so far as I know ; for though a man here and 

 there may have been killed at long intervals of time, 

 yet this sometimes fierce, but always eccentric animal 

 is not, as a rule, looked upon with much fear. He 

 is so easily duped into approaching quite close to the 



