d within a few feet of him; in fact,
just as they were about to spring on the bird, they caught sight of one
another, and each thought proper to slink back. After having retreated
a short distance, the man began to think it would be rather inglorious
to yield the prize without a struggle; and there being now more light,
he returned to the spot, when it appeared that the bear had also taken
the same resolution, and was actually advancing over the same open
space I have mentioned, growling, and tearing up the grass with her
feet. Though the man had only shot in his gun, he fired without
hesitation, and immediately took to his heels and fled, conceiving the
bear to be close in his rear, and returned not to pause till he gained
his own habitation. Having armed himself anew, and taken a companion
with him, he again repaired to the spot, where he found the bear lying
dead on the ground, some of the shots having entered her heart.

The American black bear lives a solitary life in forests and
uncultivated deserts, and subsists on fruits, and on the young shoots
and roots of vegetables. Of honey he is exceedingly fond, and, as he is
a most expert climber, he scales the loftiest trees in search of it.
Fish, too, he delights in, and is often found in quest of them, on the
borders of lakes and on the sea-shore. When these resources fail, he
will attack small quadrupeds, and even animals of some magnitude. As,
indeed, is usual in such cases, the love of flesh, in him, grows with
the use of it.

As the fur is of some value, the Indians are assiduous in the chase of
the creature which produces it. "About the end of December, from the
abundance of fruits they find in Louisiana and the neighboring
countries, the bears become so fat and lazy that they can scarcely run.
At this time they are hunted by the Indians. The nature of the chase is
generally this: the bear chiefly adopts, for his retreat, the hollow
trunk of an old cypress-tree, which he climbs, and then descends into
the cavity from above. The hunter, whose business it is to watch him
into this retreat, climbs a neighboring tree, and seats himself
opposite to the hole. In one hand he holds his gun, and in the other a
torch, which he darts into the cavity. Frantic with rage and terror,
the bear makes a spring from his station; but the hunter seizes the
instant of his appearance, and shoots him.

"The pursuit of the bear is a matter of the first importance to some of
the Indian