I HAVE since received a drawing of a White Bear[AC], from Mr. Collinson, and if that be perfect, the land and sea-bears are certainly distinct species, the difference in the length of their heads being sufficient to constitute them such. By this drawing it also appears that the feet of the sea-bear are formed like those of dogs, and other carnivorous animals, whereas those of the land-bear are shaped like the human hand. From the assertion of several travellers we also understand, that the former of these bears are much larger than the latter; Gerard de Veira says, that the skin of one which he killed measured twenty-three feet in length, which is three times the length of a common bear. In the collection of Voyages to the North it is stated that these bears are larger and more ferocious than those of our parts; but in the same work it is said, that although they are of a different shape, their heads and necks being much longer, and their bodies more slender, yet they are nearly of the same size with the others.
[AC] For which see vol. vi. page 270, of this Edition.
It is generally admitted by travellers that the heads of these sea-bears are so hard that a blow which would fell an ox does not stun them, and that their voice is more like the barking of a dog than that of a common bear. Robert Lade says, that he killed two sea-bears near the river Rupper of a prodigious size, which were so ferocious that they attacked the hunters, wounded two Englishmen, and killed several savages. It is mentioned in the third Dutch Voyage to the North, that a sea-bear was killed by the sailors on the coast of Nova Zembla, whose skin was thirteen feet long. From all which I am inclined to believe that this animal, which has been so frequently distinguished for its ferocity, is a much larger species than the common bear.
M. GMELIN, in the New Memoirs of the Academy at Petersburg, has given a description of this animal, which seems, at first sight, to be quite different from all those which we have spoken of under the article buffalo. “This cow (says he) which I saw alive, and of which I had a drawing made in Siberia, came from Calmuck. It was about the length of two Russian ells and a half; by this standard we may judge of its other dimensions, the proportion of which the designer has well executed. The body resembles that of a common cow: the horns bent inward; the hair on the body and head is black, except on the forehead and spine of the back, where it is white. The neck is covered with a mane, and the rest of the body with very long hair, which descends to the knees, so that the legs appear very short; the back is raised in the form of a hunch; the tail resembles that of a horse, is white, and very bushy; the fore legs are black, the hind ones white, and resemble those of the ox; there are two tufts of long hair upon the hind feet, one before and the other behind, but on the fore-feet there is but one, which is placed on the hind part. The excrements are more solid than those of the common cow; and in discharging its water the animal bends its body backward. It does not low like an ox, but grunts like a hog. It is wild, and even ferocious, for, excepting the man who gives it food, it strikes with its head all those that come near it. It dislikes the company of domestic cows, and when it sees one of them it grunts, which it seldom does on any other occasion." To this description M. Gmelin adds, “that it is the same animal spoken of by Rubruquis in his Travels into Tartary: that there are two species of these animals in that country; the first called sarluk, which is the same as he describes; the second chainuk, which differs from the other in the largeness of the head and horns, and also by the tail, which resembles that of the horse towards its insertion, and terminates like that of a cow: but that they both have the same dispositions.”
There is but a single character in all this description which indicates that the Calmuck Cows are of a particular species, which is their grunting instead of lowing, for as to all the rest, they so strongly resemble the bisons, that I do not doubt they are of the same species, or rather the same race. Besides, though the author says that these cows do not low but grunt, yet he acknowledges they do that only very seldom; and this was, perhaps, a particular affection of the individual he saw, for Rubruquis, and others whom he quotes, do not speak of this grunting; perhaps the bisons, when they are irritated, have also an angry grunt; even our bulls, especially in the rutting season, have a hollow interrupted voice, which much more resembles grunting than lowing. I am, therefore, persuaded that this grunting cow (vacca grunnicus) of M. Gmelin is no other than a bison, and does not constitute a particular species.