THE GUN AT HOME AND ABROAD 
both in Norway and Sweden of these animals living for years on an insect, 
vegetable and fruit diet amid sheep and horses and doing them no harm. 
Like other predatory animals, however, once a large and powerful bear 
has learned how to attack and kill horses and sheep he will repeat the ex- 
periment frequently unless shot. 
In the autumn the principal food of this animal is found in the berry 
patches. He is fond of juniper and rowan berries and will climb trees 
and break off the branches. Of low-growing berries he has an especial 
taste for cloudberry, raspberry, cranberry, crowberry and whortle- 
berry. 
The methods of hunting the brown bear in Europe are various. In Norway 
and Sweden the commonest is to range the woods in winter with several 
dogs and find the “ hie ” or winter retreat of the bear. The hunters run 
on “ ski,” and if the travelling is good the dogs soon run the quarry 
to bay, when it is easily killed with modern rifles. In former times, with 
indifferent rifles, this sport was dangerous, but it can hardly be said to 
be so now. Many bears are also killed by the young peasants, who find 
a fresh track in the snow in spring and run it till the bear is finally ex- 
hausted. A Grondalen boy of nineteen, named Elias Lilljefjeld, told me that 
in the spring of 1899 he found the track of a large bear in the valley and 
ran it, without a dog, for three days without halting before he killed it 
seventy miles distant. He slept in the woods and subsisted on two cakes of 
“ flatbrod.” 
When the bear first goes into winter quarters it does not sleep very 
soundly, and the hunter should be accompanied by a properly trained 
bear-dog, who, when held in harness, will lead the sportsman direct to 
the “ hie.” The greatest caution should be observed in approaching the 
den as the hearing and scenting powers of the bear are as acute as those 
of an elk. When moved a bear generally runs down wind and will do so in a 
provoking manner all day, so that a stern and often unsuccessful chase 
is the usual result. Bears have wonderful staying powers and can clamber 
and roll up and down hill faster than any dog. 
Bears feed in the autumn at dawn and sunset in the great patches of 
blueberries and most of those that have been killed by English sportsmen 
have been shot after being spied and stalked at such times. 
If there are fresh bear signs in a neighbourhood it is a good plan, even 
if the main pursuit is elk, to spend a few hours each evening in spying 
blueberry patches, for a bear does not readily leave any place where food 
358 
