"Yes," answered the naturalist. "These are plantigrade; and for this reason they have been cla.s.sed along with the bears under the general name _ursidae_; but in father"s opinion, and mine too," added Alexis, with a slight sparkle of scientific conceit, "this cla.s.sification is altogether an erroneous one, and rests upon the very insignificant support of the plantigrade feet. In all other respects the different genera of small animals, that have thus been introduced into the family of the bears are, as unlike the latter almost bears as are to blue bottles."
"What animals have been included in this family _ursidae_?"
"The European glutton and American wolverine (_gulo_), the badgers of both continents, and of Asia (_meles_), the racc.o.o.n (_procyon_), the Cape ratel (_mellivora_), the panda (_ailurus_), the benturong (_ictides_), the coati (_nasua_), the paradoxure (_paradoxurus_), and even the curious little teledu of Java (_mydaus_). It was Linnaeus himself who first entered these animals under the heading of _bears_--at least, such of them as were known in his day; and the French anatomist, Cuvier, extended this incongruous list to the others. To distinguish them from the true bears, they divided the family into two branches--the _ursinae_, or bears properly so called, and the _subursinae_, or little bears. Now, in my opinion," continued Alexis, "there is not the slightest necessity for calling these numerous species of animals even "_little bears_." They are not bears in any sense of the word: having scarce any other resemblance to the n.o.ble Bruin than their plantigrade feet. All these animals--the Javanese teledu excepted--have long tails; some of them, in fact, being very long and very bushy--a characteristic altogether wanting to the bears, that can hardly be said to have tails at all. But there are other peculiarities that still more widely separate the bears from the so called "little bears;" and indeed so many essential points of difference, that the fact of their being cla.s.sed together might easily be shown to be little better than mere anatomical nonsense. It is an outrage upon common sense," continued Alexis, warming with his subject, "to regard a racc.o.o.n as a bear,--an animal that is ten times more like a fox, and certainly far nearer to the genus _canis_ than that of _ursus_. On the other hand, it is equally absurd to break up the true bears into different _genera_--as these same anatomists have done; for if there be a family in the world the individual members of which bear a close family likeness to one another, that is the family of Master Bruin. Indeed, so like are the different species, that other learned anatomists have gone to the opposite extreme of absurdity, and a.s.serted that they are all one and the same! However, we shall see as we become acquainted with the different members of this distinguished family, in what respects they differ from each other, and in what they are alike."
"I have heard," said Ivan, "that here, in Norway and Lapland, there are two distinct species of the brown bear, besides the black variety, which is so rare; and I have also heard say that the hunters sometimes capture a variety of a greyish colour, which they call the "silver bear." I think papa mentioned these facts."
"Just so," replied Alexis; "it has been the belief among Swedish naturalists that there are two species, or at least permanent varieties, of the brown bear in Northern Europe. They have even gone so far as to give them separate specific names. One is the _ursus arctos major_, while the other is _ursas arctos minor_. The former is the larger animal--more fierce in its nature, and more carnivorous in its food.
The other, or smaller kind, is of a gentler disposition--or at all events more timid--and instead of preying upon oxen and other domestic animals, confines itself to eating grubs, ants, roots, berries, and vegetable substances. In their colour there is no perceptible difference between the two supposed varieties--more than may be often found between two individuals notedly of the same kind; and it is only in size and habits that a distinction has been observed. The latest and most accurate writers upon this subject believe that the great and little brown bears are not even varieties; and that the distinctive characteristics are merely the effects of age, s.e.x, or other accidental circ.u.mstances. It is but natural to suppose that the younger bears would not be so carnivorous as those of greater age. It is well-known that preying upon other animals and feeding upon their flesh, is not a natural instinct of the brown bear; it is a habit that has its origin, first in the scarcity of other food, but which, once entered upon, soon develops itself into a strong propensity--almost equalling that of the _felidae_.
"As to the black bear being a distinct species, that is a question also much debated among both hunters and naturalists. The hunters say that the fur of the black European bear is never of that jetty blackness which characterises the real black bears of American and Asiatic countries, but only a very dark shade of brown; and they believe that it is nothing more than the brown fur itself, grown darker in old age.
Certainly they have reason for this belief: since it is a well-known fact that the brown bears do become darker as they grow older."
"Ha!" said Ivan, with a laugh, "that is just the reverse with us. Look at Pouchskin there! Your hair was once black, wasn"t it, old Pouchy?"
"Yes, Master Ivan, black as a crow"s feathers."
"And now you"re as grey as a badger. Some day, before long--before we get home again may be--your moustache, old fellow, will be as white as an ermine."
"Very like, master, very like--we"ll all be a bit older by that time."
"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed Ivan; "you"re right there, Pouchy; but go on, brother!" he added, turning to Alexis, "let us hear all about these Scandinavian bears. You have not spoken yet of the "silver" ones."
"No," said Alexis; "nor of another kind that is found in these countries, and that some naturalists have elevated into a different species--the "ringed bear.""
"You mean the bears with a white ring round their necks? Yes, I have heard of them too."
"Just so," rejoined Alexis.
"Well, brother, what do _you_ think? is it a distinct species, or a permanent variety?"
"Neither one nor the other. It is merely an accidental marking which some young individuals of the brown bear chance to have, and it scarcely ever remains beyond the age of _cubhood_. It is only very young bears that are met with of this colour; and the white ring disappears as they get older. It is true that hunters now and then meet with an odd ringed bear of tolerable size and age; but all agree that he is the brown bear, and not a distinct kind. The same remarks apply to the "silver" bear; and hunters say that in a litter of three cubs they have found all three colours--the common brown, the "ringed," and the "silver,"--while the old mother herself was a true _ursus arctos_."
"Well, since papa only binds us to the brown and black, it will be a nice thing if we could fall in with a skin of the ringed and silver varieties. It would please him all the better. I wonder now what sort is this fellow we are following? By the size of his tracks he must be a wopper!"
"No doubt an old male," rejoined Alexis; "but if I am not mistaken, we shall soon be able to determine that point. The _spar_ gets fresher and fresher. He must have pa.s.sed here but a very short while ago; and I should not wonder if we were to find him in this very ravine."
"See!" exclaimed Ivan, whose eyes had been lifted from the trail, and bent impatiently forward;--"see! by the great Peter! yonder"s a hole, under the root of that tree. Why might it not be his cave?"
"It looks like enough. Hush! let us keep to the trail, and go up to it with caution--not a word!"
All three, now scarce breathing--lest the sound should be heard--stole silently along the trail. The fresh-fallen snow, still soft as eider-down, enabled them to proceed without making the slightest noise; and without making any, they crept up, till within half-a-dozen paces of the tree.
Ivan"s conjecture was likely to prove correct. There was a line of tracks leading up the bank; and around the orifice of the cavity the snow was considerably trampled down--as if the bear had turned himself two or three times before entering. That he had entered, the hunters did not entertain a doubt: there were no return tracks visible in the snow--only the single line that led up to the mouth of the cave, and this seemed to prove conclusively that Bruin was "at home."
CHAPTER NINE.
HYBERNATION OF BEARS.
As already stated, it is the custom of the brown bear, as well as of several other species, to go to sleep for a period of several months every winter,--in other words, to _hybernate_. When about to take this long nap, the bear seeks for himself a cave or den, in which he makes his bed with such soft substances as may be most convenient--dry leaves, gra.s.s, moss, or rushes. He collects no great store of these however-- his thick matted fur serving him alike for bed and coverlet; and very often he makes no further ado about the matter than to creep into the hole he has chosen, lie down, snugly couch his head among the thickets of long hair that cover his hams, and thus go to sleep.
Some naturalists have a.s.serted that this sleep is a state of torpidity-- from which the animal is incapable of awaking himself or of being awakened, until the regular period of indulgence in it may have pa.s.sed.
This, however, is not the case; for bears are often surprised in their sleep, and when aroused by the hunters act just as is usual with them at other times.
It must be observed, however, that the retirement of the bear into winter quarters is not to be regarded as of the same nature as the hybernation of marmots, squirrels, and other species of rodent animals.
These creatures merely shut themselves up from the cold; and to meet the exigencies of their voluntary imprisonment, they have already collected in their cells a large store of their usual food. Bees and many other insects do precisely same thing. Not so with the bear. Whether it be that he is not gifted with an instinct of providence it is difficult to say; but certain it is, that he lays up no store for these long dark days, but goes to sleep without thought of the morrow.
How he is maintained for several months without eating is one of nature"s mysteries. Every one has heard the absurd theory: that he does so by "sucking his paws," and the ingenious Buffon has not only given credence to this story, but endeavours to support it, by stating that the paws when cut open yield a substance of a milky nature!
It is a curious fact that this story is to be found scattered all over the world--wherever bears hybernate. The people of Kamschatka have it; so also the Indians, and Esquimaux of the Hudson"s Bay territory, and the Norwegian and Lap hunters of Europe. Whence did these widely-distributed races of men derive this common idea of a habit which, if the story be a true one, must be common to bears of very different species?
This question can be answered. In northern Europe the idea first originated--among the hunters of Scandinavia. But the odd story once told was too good to be lost; and every traveller, since the first teller of it, has taken care to embellish his narrative about bears with this selfsame conceit; so that, like the tale of the Amazon women in South America, the natives have learnt it from the travellers, and not the travellers from the natives!
How absurd to suppose that a huge quadruped, whose daily food would be several pounds weight of animal or vegetable matter--a bear who can devour the carca.s.s of a calf at a single meal--could possibly subsist for two months on the _paw-milk_ which Monsieur Buffon has described!
How then can we account for his keeping alive? There need be no difficulty in doing so. It is quite possible that during this long sleep the digestive power or process is suspended, or only carried on at a rate infinitesimally small; that, moreover, life is sustained and the blood kept in action by means of the large amount of fat which the bear has collected previous to his _going to bed_. It is certain that, just at their annual _bed time_, bears are fatter than at any other season of the year. The ripening of the forest fruits, and the falling of various seeds of mast-worts, upon which, during the autumn, bears princ.i.p.ally subsist, then supply them with abundance, and nothing hinders them to get fat and go to sleep upon it. They would have no object in keeping awake: were they to do so, in those countries where they practise hybernation, they would certainly starve, for, the ground being then frozen hard, they could not dig for roots, and under the deep covering of snow they might search in vain for their masts and berries. As to foraging on birds or other quadrupeds, bears are not fitted for that.
They are not agile enough for such a purpose.
They will eat both when they can catch them; but they cannot always catch them; and if they had no other resource in the snowy season the bears would certainly starve. To provide them against this time of scarcity, nature has furnished them with the singular power of somnolence. Indeed, that this is the purpose is easily proved. It is proved by the simple fact that those bears belonging to warm lat.i.tudes, as the Bornean, Malayan, and even the black American of the Southern States, do not hybernate at all. There is no need for them to do so.
Their unfrozen forests furnish them with food all the year round; and all the year round are they seen roaming about in search of it. Even in the Arctic lands the polar bear keeps afoot all the year; his diet not being vegetable, and therefore not snowed up in winter. The female of this species hides herself away; but that is done for another purpose, and not merely to save herself from starvation.
That the stock of fat, which the bear lays in before going to sleep, has something to do with subsisting him, is very evident from the fact that it is all gone by the time he awakes. Then or shortly afterwards, master Bruin finds himself as thin as a rail; and were he to look in a gla.s.s just then, he would scarce recognise himself, so very different is his long emaciated carca.s.s from that huge plump round body, that two months before he could scarce squeeze through the entrance to his cave!
Another great change comes over him during his prolonged sleep. On going to bed, he is not only very fat, but also very lazy; so much so that the merest tyro of a hunter can then circ.u.mvent and slay him.
Naturally a well-disposed animal--we are speaking only of the brown bear (_ursus arctos_) though the remark will hold good of several other species--he is at this period more than usually civil and soft-tempered.
He has found a sufficiency of vegetable food which is more congenial to his taste than animal substances; and he will not molest living creature just then, if living creature will only let him alone. Aroused from his sleep, however, he shows a different disposition. He appears as if he had got up "wrong side foremost." His head aches, his belly hungers, and he is disposed to believe that some one has stolen upon him while asleep, and robbed him of his suet. Under this impression he issues from his dark chamber in very ill humour indeed. This disposition clings to him for a length of time; and if at this period, during his morning rambles, he should encounter any one who does not get speedily out of his way, the party thus meeting him will find him a very awkward customer. It is then that he makes havoc among the flocks and herds of the Scandinavian shepherd--for he actually does commit such ravages--and even the hunter who meets him at this season will do well to "ware bear."
And so does the hunter; and so did Alexis, and Ivan, and Pouchskin. All three of them were well enough acquainted with the habits of the bear-- their own Russian bear--to know that they should act with caution in approaching him.
And in this wise they acted; for instead of rushing up to the mouth of the hole, and making a great riot, they stole forward in perfect silence, each holding his gun c.o.c.ked, and ready to give Bruin a salute, the moment he should show his snout beyond the portals of his den.
Had they not tracked him to his cave, they would have acted quite differently. Had they found a bear"s den--within which they knew that the animal was indulging in his winter sleep--they would not have cared so much how they approached it. Then he would have required a good deal of stirring up to induce him to show himself, so that they could get a shot at him; but the track told them that this one had been up and abroad--perhaps for several days--and as the new snow, in all likelihood, had hindered him from picking up much to eat, he would be as "savage as a meat axe."
Expecting him to spring out almost on the instant, the three took stand at some distance from the mouth of the cave; and, with arms in readiness, awaited his coming forth.
CHAPTER TEN.
BRUIN AT HOME?
The entrance to the cave, if cave it was, was an aperture of no great dimensions--about large enough to admit the body of a full-grown bear, and no bigger. It appeared to be a hole or burrow, rather than a cave, and ran under a great pine-tree, among whose roots, no doubt, was the den of the bear. The tree itself grew up out of the sloping bank; and its great rhizomes stretched over a large s.p.a.ce, many of them appearing above the surface soil. In front of the aperture was a little ledge, where the snow was hacked by the bear"s paws, but below this ledge the bank trended steeply down--its slope terminating in the bed of deeper snow already described.
As stated, the three hunters had taken their stand, but not all together. Directly in front of the cave was Pouchskin, and below it, of course, on account of the sloping bank. He was some six paces from the aperture. On the right side Ivan had been placed, while Alexis had pa.s.sed on, and now stood upon the left. The three formed a sort of isosceles triangle, of which Pouchskin was the apex, and the line of the bank the base. A perpendicular dropped from the muzzle of Pouchskin"s gun would have entered the aperture of the cave. Of course Pouchskin"s was the post of danger; but that was to be expected.
They stood a good while in silence. No signs of Bruin--neither by sight nor hearing.