THE NEW YEAR, i8g6 469 



ever. As I approached the place where I thought it must 

 be lying, I caught sight of the 'dead bear' far ahead, 

 trotting pretty briskly along the shore. Now and then 

 it stopped to look round at me. I ran out on to the ice, 

 to get outside it, if possible, and drive it back, so that 

 we should not have so far to drag it. When I had kept 

 on at this for some time, and was about on a level with 

 it, it began clambering up the glacier and under some 

 ragged rock. I had not reckoned on a ' dead bear ' 

 being able to do this, and the only thing was to stop it 

 as soon as possible; but just as I got within range it 

 disappeared over the crest. Soon I saw it again, a good 

 deal higher up, and far out of range. It was craning its 

 neck to see if I were following. I went up some way 

 after it, but as it went on along the mountain more 

 quickly than I could follow it in the deep snow, under 

 which, moreover, there were crevices into which I kept 

 falling up to my waist, I preferred to clamber down on 

 to the fjord-ice again. In a little while the bear emerged 

 from beneath a perpendicular cliff with a precipitous 

 bit of talus beneath it. Here it began to crawl care- 

 fully along at the very top of the talus. I was now 

 afraid of its lying down in a place like this, where we 

 could not get at it, and even though the range was long 

 I felt I must fire and see if I could not make it fall over. 

 It did not look as if it had too firm a footing up there. 

 It was blowing like anything here under the cliff, and I 

 saw that the bear had to lie flat down and hold on with 



