BLACK BRUIN'S FIRST ACQUAINTANCE WITH A PANTHER

BLACK BRUIN

The Biography of a Bear

By

Clarence Hawkes

Author of
Shaggycoat, The Biography of a Beaver
The Trail to the Woods
Tenants of the Trees
The Little Foresters
etc.

Illustrated by
Charles Copeland

Philadelphia
George W. Jacobs & Co.
Publishers

Copyright, 1908, by
GEORGE W. JACOBS AND COMPANY

All rights reserved
Printed in U. S. A.

Dedicated to
My illustrator and friend

MR. CHARLES COPELAND

whose clever brush has caught so
perfectly each whim of nature in
field and forest, and called from
hiding the furtive furred and
feathered folk, who come and go
like shadows in the ancient woods.

THE GREAT BEAR OF THE MOUNTAINS

He had stolen the belt of Wampum
From the neck of Mishe-mokwa,
From the Great Bear of the mountains,
From the terror of the nations,
As he lay asleep and cumbrous,
On the summit of the mountains,
Like a rock with mosses on it,
Spotted brown and gray with mosses.
—LONGFELLOW.

CONTENTS

ILLUSTRATIONS

Black Bruin's first acquaintance with a panther . . . Frontispiece

The bear hurried in hot pursuit

Black Bruin dealt the porcupine a crushing blow

Growler sprang at Black Bruin's throat

He discovered another bear, watching the stream

URSUS, THE DROLL

INTRODUCTORY

With the possible exception of the deer family, the bear is the most widely disseminated big game, known to hunters.

He makes his home within the Arctic Circle, often living upon the great ice-floe, or dwells within a tropical jungle, and both climates are agreeable to him, while longitudinally he has girdled the world.

Of course bruin varies much, according to the climate in which he lives, and the conditions of his life, but all the way from the poles to the tropics he retains certain characteristics that always proclaim him a bear.

He is a plantigrade, walking like a man upon the soles of his feet. There is more truth than poetry in Kipling's poem, "The Man Who Walks Like a Bear," for some men do walk like a bear.

Bruin's