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POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
The point, however, still unsettled is, whether or not this 
“barren-ground bear” is identical with the brown bear of 
Europe, and whether or not, in conjunction with the grizzly- 
bear, the two represent the same species which were spread 
over Europe in prehistoric times. Referring to species which 
have ceased to exist ; although much remains to be done, a great 
deal of valuable information has been gained in relation to the 
natural history of extinct bears from a study of the characters 
and habits of the living. Thus, among the most puzzling 
features in connection with the remains of extinct fossil bears, 
met with in caverns, are discrepancies in size between the teeth 
and bones of adult individuals. So marked is this that palae- 
ontologists cannot believe that they represent large and small 
varieties of one species ; considering, however, the advantages 
enjoyed by the progenitors of the present tribe of the members 
and the contracted range and food of the latter, there seems 
good reason to suppose as regards dimensions that the bears, 
like deer and several other animals, have absolutely degene- 
rated, and are decreasing in size. Indeed, everyone who 
has examined the remains of the associated quadrupeds found 
along with the exuvise of fossil bears, lions, and so forth, must 
believe that all fed sumptuously in those days, and also attained 
to the maximum dimensions of their species. 
I found- that the Himalayan brown bear was subject to much 
diversity in dimensions, so much so that certain old males pre- 
sented remarkable contrasts to smaller-sized adult individuals 
of both sexes, as much, in fact, in the bony skeleton and outline 
of the cranial ridges as in coloration ; moreover, so marked 
are these discrepancies, that supposing their skeletons had been 
found in a fossil state, the comparative anatomist could scarcely 
be blamed who pronounced them to belong to different species. 
Again, I found that the largest or patriarch bears are more 
addicted to passing their latter days in caverns than are the 
younger and more active. This was demonstrated by the 
appearances of their retreats, which are met with in secluded 
mountain forests, where the den is situated either under a 
shelving precipice or in the rock, from whence the owner 
descends daily to the sward below, where, after browsing until 
mid-day, it is a habit of the individual to repair to the neigh- 
bouring spring, usually shaded by trees, and wallow in the muddy 
water. In consequence the sides of these pools are beaten and 
plastered like a beaver-dam, whilst from the margin leading 
towards the den are deep impressions in the turf, caused by the 
animal constantly treading in the same footprints.* Thus 
it pursues the even tenor of its ways, hybernating in the den 
* Author, u Wanderings of a Naturalist in India,” p. 241. 
