BEAR CATCHING A SEAL.
As we have said, the bear dives well, and is nearly as much at home in the water as upon the ice. If it catches sight of a seal upon a drifting floe, it will slide quietly into the sea, swim with only the tip of its nose above the water, and, diving under the floe, reach the very spot which the hapless seal has regarded as an oasis of safety. It is this stratagem of its enemy which has taught the seal to watch its hole so warily. Even on extensive ice-fields fast to the land, where the bear cannot conceal its approach by taking advantage of hummocks or other inequalities, the seal is not safe; for then Bruin drops down a hole, and swims along under the ice-crust until it reaches the one where the poor seal is all unwittingly enjoying its last rays of sunshine.
The bear’s season of plenty begins with the coming of the spring. In February and March the seal is giving birth to her young, who are born blind and helpless, and for ten days are unable to take to the water. The poor mothers use every effort to protect them, but, in spite of their affectionate exertions, a perfect massacre of the innocents takes place, in which, not improbably, the Arctic wolf is not less guilty than the Arctic bear.
Voracity, however, frequently proves its own Nemesis, and the bear, in its eager pursuit of prey, often involves itself in serious disaster. The seal instinctively breeds as close as possible to the open water. But the ice-floes, during the early equinoctial gales, will sometimes break up and drift away in the form of pack-ice; a matter of indifference, says Osborn, to the seal, but a question of life and death to the bear. Borne afar on their little islets of ice, rocked by tempestuous waters, buffeted by icy gales, numbers of these castaways are lost along the whole area of the Polar Sea. It is said that when the gales blow down from the north, bears are sometimes stranded in such numbers on the shores of Iceland as to endanger the safety of the flocks and herds of the Icelandic peasants; and they have been known to reach the coasts of Norway.
Bears drifting about at a considerable distance from the land are often enough seen by the whalers. They have been discovered fully sixty miles from shore, in Davis Strait, without any ice in sight, and utterly exhausted by long swimming. It is thus that Nature checks their too rapid increase; for beyond the possibility of the wolf hunting it in packs and destroying the cubs, there seems no other limitation of their numbers. The Eskimos are too few, and too badly provided with weapons, to slaughter them very extensively. Wherever seals abound, so do bears; in Barrow Strait and in the Queen’s Channel they have been seen in very numerous troops. The Danes assert that they are plentiful about the northern settlement of Upernavik in Greenland, for nine months in the year; and from the united testimony of the natives inhabiting the north-eastern portion of Baffin Bay, and that of Dr. Kane, who wintered in Smith Sound, it is evident that they are plentiful about the polynias, or open pools, formed there by the action of the tides.
In the summer months, when the bear is loaded with fat, it is easily hunted down, for then it can neither move swiftly nor run long; but in deep winter its voracity and its great strength render it a formidable enemy to uncivilized and unarmed man. Usually it avoids coming into contact with our British seamen, though instances are on record of fiercely contested engagements, in which Bruin has with difficulty been defeated.
It is folly, says Sherard Osborn, to talk of the Polar bear hibernating: whatever bears may do on the American continent, there is only one Arctic navigator who ever saw a bear’s nest! Bears were seen at all points visited by our sailors in the course of M’Clure’s expedition; at all times and in all temperatures; males or females, and sometimes females with their cubs. In mid-winter, as well as in midsummer, they evidently frequented spots where tides or currents occasioned either water to constantly exist, or only allowed such a thin coating of ice to form that the seal or walrus could easily break through.
That the Polar bear does not willingly attack man, except when hotly pursued or when suffering from extreme want, is asserted by several good authorities, and confirmed by an experience which Dr. Hayes relates. He was strolling one day along the shore, and observing with much interest the effect of the recent spring-tides upon the ice-foot, when, rounding a point of land, he suddenly found himself confronted in the full moonlight by an enormous bear. It had just sprung down from the land-ice, and met Dr. Hayes at full trot, so that they caught sight of each other, man and brute, at the same moment. Being without a rifle or other means of defence, Dr. Hayes suddenly wheeled towards his ship, with much the same reflections, probably, about discretion and valour as occurred to old Jack Falstaff when the Douglas set upon him; but discovering, after a few lengthy strides, that he was not “gobbled up,” he looked back over his shoulder, when, to his gratification as well as surprise, he saw the bear speeding towards the open water with a celerity which left no doubt as to the state of its mind. It would be difficult to determine which, on this occasion, was the more frightened, the bear or Dr. Hayes!
A curious illustration of the combined voracity and epicureanism of Bruin is recorded by Dr. Kane. A cache, or depôt of provisions, which had been constructed by one of his exploring parties with great care, and was intended to supply them with stores on their return journey, they found completely destroyed. It had been built, with every possible precaution, of rocks brought together by heavy labour, and adjusted in the most skilful manner. So far as the means of the builders permitted, the entire construction was most effective and resisting. Yet these “tigers of the ice” seemed to have scarcely encountered an obstacle. Not a morsel of pemmican (preserved meat) remained, except in the iron cases, which, being round, with conical ends, defied both claw and teeth. These they had rolled and pawed in every direction,—tossing them about like footballs, although upwards of eighty pounds in weight. An alcohol-case, strongly iron-bound, was dashed into small fragments; and a tin can of liquor twisted almost into a ball. The bears’ strong claws had perforated the metal, and torn it up as with a chisel.