I12 THE BEARS 
Tue INDIAN SLOTH-BEAR. 
Few people would believe that this awkward and ugly beast is so formidable as it is. It is 
the commonest Indian species, seldom eats flesh, prefers sucking up the contents of a white ants’ 
nest to any other meal, and is not very large; from 200 lbs. to 300 lbs. is the weight of a male. 
But the skull and jaws are very strong, and the claws long and curved. As they are used almost 
like a pickaxe when the bear wishes to dig in the hardest soil, their effect upon the human body 
can be imagined. 
Sir Samuel Baker says that there are more accidents to natives of India and Ceylon from 
this species than from any other animal. 
Mr. Watts Jones writes an interesting account of his sensations while being bitten by one 
7 E a WAS os 
A BROWN BEAR IN SEARCH OF INSECTS 
The photograph shows a bear feeding on insects, possibly large ants, which he licks up from the ground, after scratching them out with his claws 
Photo by C. Reid} 
of these bears: “I was following up a bear which I had wounded, and rashly went to the mouth 
of a cave to which it had got. It charged. I shot, but failed to stop it. I do not know exactly 
what happened next, neither does my hunter who was with me ; but I believe, from the marks 
in the snow, that in his rush the bear knocked me over backwards—in fact, knocked me three or 
four feet away. When next I remembered anything, the bear’s weight was on me, and he was bi- 
ting my leg. He bit two or three times. I felt the flesh crush, but I felt no pain at all. It was 
rather like having a tooth out with gas. I felt no particular terror, though I thought the bear 
had got me; but in a hazy sort of way I wondered when he would kill me, and thought what a 
fool I was to get killed by a stupid beast like a bear. The shikari then very pluckily came up 
and fired a shot into the bear, and he left me. I felt the weight lift off me, and got up. I did 
not think I was much hurt. . . . The main wound was a flap of flesh torn out of the inside of 
my left thigh and left hanging. It was fairly deep, and I could see all the muscles working under- 
neath when I lifted it up to clean the wound.” This anecdote was sent to Mr. J. Crowther Hirst 
