The Polar bear is a big fellow, with long white hair, and he lives on seals and fish, and almost anything he can pick up. Sometimes he takes a fancy to have a man or two for his supper, as the following story will prove.
A ship, returning from Nova Zembla, anchored near an island in the Arctic Ocean, and two of the sailors went on land. They were standing on the shore, talking to each other, when one of them cried out, "Stop squeezing me!"
The other one looked around, and there was a white bear, very large but very lean and scraggy, which had sneaked up behind the sailors, and now had clutched one of them, whom he very speedily killed and commenced to eat, while the other sailor ran away.
The whole crew of the ship now landed, and came after the bear, endeavoring to drive him away from the body of their comrade; but as they approached him, he quietly looked at them for a minute, and then jumped right into the middle of the crowd, seized another man, and killed him. Upon this, the crew ran away as fast as they could, and scuttling into their boats, rowed away to the ship.
There were three of these sailors, however, who were too brave to stay there and see a bear devouring the bodies of their friends, and they returned to the island.
The bear did not move as they approached him, and they fired on him, without seeming to injure him in the least. At length one of them stepped up quite close to him, and put a ball into his head just above his eye.
But even this did not kill him, although it is probable that it lessened his vigor, for he soon began to stagger, and the sailors, falling upon him with their swords, were able to put him to death, and to rescue the remains of their comrades.
After these stories, I think that we will all agree that when we meet a procession of bears, be they black, white, or grizzly, we will be very wise to give them the right of way, and to endeavor to drive from our minds, as far as possible, such ideas of the animals as we may have derived from those individuals which we have seen in rural menageries, nimbly climbing poles, or sedately drinking soda-water.