Bear. According to an old idea, the bear brings forth unformed lumps of animated flesh, and then licks them into shape—a vulgar error, referred to in “3 Henry VI.” (iii. 2), where Gloster, bemoaning his deformity, says of his mother:
“She did corrupt frail nature with some bribe,
*****
To disproportion me in every part,
Like to a chaos, or an unlick’d bear-whelp,
That carries no impression like the dam.”
This erroneous notion, however, was long ago confuted by Sir Thomas Browne.[352] Alexander Ross, in his “Arcana Microcosmi,” nevertheless affirms that bears bring forth their young deformed and misshapen, by reason of the thick membrane in which they are wrapped, that is covered over with a mucous matter. This, he says, the dam contracts in the winter-time, by lying in hollow caves without motion, so that to the eye the cub appears like an unformed lump. The above mucilage is afterwards licked away by the dam, and the membrane broken, whereby that which before seemed to be unformed appears now in its right shape. This, he contends, is all that the ancients meant.[353] Ovid (Metamorphoses, bk. xv. l. 379) thus describes this once popular fancy:
“Nec catulus, partu quem reddidit ursa recenti,
Sed male viva caro est: lambendo mater in artus
Fingit, et in formam, quantam capit ipsa, reducit.”
Bears, in days gone by, are reported to have been surprised by means of a mirror, which they would gaze on, affording their pursuers an opportunity of taking the surer aim. In “Julius Cæsar” (ii. I), this practice is mentioned by Decius:
“unicorns may be betray’d with trees,
And bears with glasses.”[354]
Batman, “On Bartholomæus” (1582), speaking of the bear, says, “And when he is taken he is made blinde with a bright basin, and bound with chaynes, and compelled to playe.” This, however, says Mr. Aldis Wright,[355] probably refers to the actual blinding of the bear.
A favorite amusement with our ancestors was bear-baiting. As early as the reign of Henry II. the baiting of bears by dogs was a popular game in London,[356] while at a later period “a royal bear-ward” was an officer regularly attached to the royal household. In “2 Henry VI.” (v. 1), this personage is alluded to by Clifford, who says:
“Are these thy bears? We’ll bait thy bears to death,
And manacle the bear-ward in their chains,
If thou dar’st bring them to the baiting place.”
And again, in “Much Ado About Nothing” (ii. 1), Beatrice says, “I will even take sixpence in earnest of the bear-ward, and lead his apes into hell.” The synonymous term, “bear-herd,” occurs in “Taming of the Shrew” (Ind. scene 2), where Sly speaks of himself as “by transmutation a bear-herd;” and in “2 Henry IV.” (i. 2), Sir John Falstaff remarks how “true valor is turned bear-herd.” Among the Harleian MSS.[357] is preserved the original warrant of Richard III. appointing John Brown to this office, and which recites “the diligent service he had done the king” as the ground for granting him the privilege of wandering about the country with his bears and apes, and receiving the “loving benevolence and favors of the people.”[358] In the time of Queen Elizabeth bear-baiting was still a favorite pastime, being considered a fashionable entertainment for ladies of the highest rank.[359] James I. encouraged this sport. Nichols[360] informs us that on one occasion the king, accompanied by his court, took the queen, the Princess Elizabeth, and the two young princes to the Tower to witness a fight between a lion and a bear, and by the king’s command the bear (which had killed a child that had been negligently left in the bear-house) was afterwards “baited to death upon a stage in the presence of many spectators.” Popular, says Mr. Kelly, as bear-baiting was in the metropolis and at court, it was equally so among all classes of the people.[361] It is on record that at Congleton, in Cheshire, “the town-bear having died, the corporation in 1601 gave orders to sell their Bible, in order to purchase another, which was done, and the town no longer without a bear.” This event is kept up in a popular rhyme: