18 OUR NATIONAL PAEKS. 



some place from which they can not get away. Then only are they 

 dangerous, and then they are dangerous indeed. 



The grizzly bear, by the way, is one of the shyest of wild animals, 

 and may be seen only with difficulty. It lives principally on roots, 

 berries, nuts, and honey — when honey may be had. It can not climb 

 trees like the brown bears. Its little ones are born in caves where 

 bears hibernate through the winters and are little larger than squirrels 

 when they first come into the world. 



The brown, cinnamon, and black bears, which, by the way, are the 

 same species only differently colored — the blondes and brunettes, so 

 to speak, of the same bear family — are quite different. They are 

 playful, comparatively fearless, sometimes even friendly. They are 

 greedy fellows, and steal camp supplies whenever they can. The 

 large meat wagons which carry supplies to the distant hotels and 

 camps over night are equipped with iron covers, because the bears 

 used to rip off the wooden tops during the resting times and run off 

 with sides of beef and mutton. One night several \ears ago teamsters 

 drove three bears from the top of a single one of these big wagons. 



This wild animal paradise contains thirty thousand elk, several 

 thousand moose, innumerable deer, many antelope, and a large and 

 increasing herd of wild bison. 



It is an excellent bird preserve also; more than 150 species live 

 natural, undisturbed lives. Eagles abound among the crags. Wild 

 geese and ducks are found in profusion. Many thousands of large 

 white pelicans add to the picturesqueness of Yellowstone Lake. 



The Yellowstone also contains a petrified forest of prehistoric trees 

 which is unexcelled in America. 



DISCOVERY OF THE YELLOWSTONE 



The first recorded visit to the Yellowstone was made by John 

 Colter in 1810. He was a trapper and adventurer who took refuge 

 there from hostile Indians. His story of its wonders was discredited. 



The next recorded visit was by a trapper named Joseph Meek in 

 1829, who described it as " a country smoking with vapor from boiling 

 springs and burning with gases issuing from small craters." From 

 some of these craters, he said, "issued blue flame and molten brim- 

 stone," which, of course, was not true, though doubtless Meek fully 

 believed it to be the truth. 



Between 1830 and 1840, Warren Angus Ferris, a clerk in the 

 American Fur Co., wrote the first description of the Firehole Geyser 

 Basin, but it was not until 1852 that the geyser district was actually 

 defined, and the geysers precisely located. This was done by Father 

 De Smet, the famous Jesuit missionary. 



It remained for a Government expedition, sent out in 1859 under 

 command of Capt. W. F. Keynolds, to first really explore and chart 



