THE GRIZZLY AND BLACK BEAR 
only a few mining and fur trappers’ camps as yet marked the northward 
progress of civilized man. 
A friend who took up land on the Upper Skeena in 1 906 , before the Northern 
Railway was begun, tells me he has seen as many as twelve in a day, but 
here, as elsewhere, man will soon invade their territory and they will be 
shot or driven away. All about the confluents of the great Yukon River, 
and from here west to the coast, the grizzly is still very abundant, since, 
from Northern British Columbia northward, the coast and interior 
Indians seldom kill them. Firstly, because they are difficult to kill and 
become dangerous if wounded, and secondly, because their skins are of 
little value and not worth the great labour that is involved in properly 
curing them. A Liard River Indian told me he had seen thousands of 
grizzlies in his life and had only killed one, and that in self-defence. This 
bear, a fine one of 7 feet, he had taken to Telegraph Creek, and had received 
eight dollars for his trouble. He vowed he would never skin another. 
From the general point of view we must regard all these coast and island 
bears of Alaska as merely local forms of the grizzly. Most of the island 
forms are comparatively scarce, but on the peninsula the immense bears 
found there are still fairly numerous in spite of the numbers of shooters, 
both red and white, which attack them in May when they emerge from their 
winter sleep. The numbers that may be killed are now restricted, so that 
it is likely that, like the giant moose, they will survive for many years to 
come without appreciable diminution. There are a few, but very large, 
grizzlies in Central British Columbia, and I have seen some splendid 
specimens from Chilcotin, Kootenay and Northern Lillooet. Two of these, 
seen in a fur store in Vancouver, were 9 feet in length and identical in 
colour with the Wyoming “silvertip.” 
The grizzly bear is a great rough brute and in moments of ease heavy 
and lumbering, but in times of excitement very quick and powerful. 
Those who only know “ Old Ephraim ” in a cage could hardly guess 
how sharp he can be in his movements when he is either angry or frightened. 
There is little doubt that for some distance he can stride and run as fast 
as a horse. His strength is very great. Nothing lives in the west but the 
cougar that he cannot kill and carry away, and his power of moving 
immense logs that have been placed to hide a “ cache ” of meat or pro- 
visions is amazing. In the old days hunters constantly spoke of his courage 
and ferocity, and there is little doubt that the man who was only armed 
with a muzzle loader of little power had a stout heart when he dared to 
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