BLACK AMERICAN BEAR. 59 



to smoke, and seldom fail to make a speech in excul- 

 pation of the act of violence they have committed in 

 slaying it. Similar superstitions are prevalent among 

 the Laplanders and other northern nations. Pennant* 

 assures us, that the bear is the great master of the 

 Kamtskatkans in medicine, surgery, and the polite arts ; 

 these people observe the herbs he has recourse to when 

 ill or wounded, and acknowledge him as their dancing 

 master, mimicking his attitudes and graces with great 

 aptness. Bear dances, as Dr. Richardson observes, in 

 which the gestures of the animals are copied, are also 

 common with the North American Indians. Bear 

 hunts are attended with certain curious ceremonies, for 

 which we must refer the reader to Northern Zoology, 

 vol. i. p. 18. The women of some of the tribes will 

 not touch a bear's skin, or even step over it, so that one 

 spread at the door of a tent is an effectual bar against 

 female intruders ; and even the men of some of the 

 tribes will refuse to eat the flesh. 



During winter this species invariably hybernates, and 

 about 1000 skins are annually procured by the Hudson's 

 Bay company from black bears destroyed in their 

 winter retreats. It generally selects a spot for its den 

 under a fallen tree, and having scratched away a portion 

 of the soil, retires to it at the commencement of a snow- 

 storm, when the snow soon furnishes it with a close, 

 w^arm covering. Its breath makes a small opening in the 

 den, and the quantity of hoar frost which occasionally 

 gathers round the aperture serves to betray its retreat to 

 the hunter : in more southern districts they often shelter 

 themselves in hollow trees. The Indians remark that a 

 bear never retires to its den until it has acquired a thick 

 coat of fat ; and it is remarkable, that w-hen it comes 

 abroad in the spring it is equally fat, though in a few 

 days after it becomes very lean. The females retire at 

 once to their dens, and conceal themselves so carefully, 

 that even an Indian hunter can rarely detect them : but 

 the males, exhausted by the pursuit of the other sex, 



* Arctic Zool. i. 65. 



