BEARS AND BEAR-HUNTING.

"NOTES of a Hunter," by Henry Clapp, call to mind some personal experience about bears and bear-hunting in Texas. I was much in the company of Mr. Benjamin Burke, a very observing, intelligent, and truthful man. He imparted to me many items of information respecting the habits of the bear. Some of these habits I had the opportunity of observing myself, and I have full confidence in the truth of his statements relative to the others.

I had read in my youth, in some great encyclopedia, that the bear goes to his winter's sleep very fat, and awakes from it in the spring very lean. I was surprised, then, to learn, that, so far as can be judged by appearances, he loses none of his fat during hibernation. Of course, in his wild state we cannot weigh him before going to sleep and after he wakes. The hunter says he goes to his winter-quarters "full fat," and comes out "full fat." I know that he is fat when he begins to travel in the spring; but he becomes lean rapidly, notwithstanding he may find plenty to eat. At this period he is destructive to hogs; indeed, all the summer, till the return of mast (acorns, grapes, and other autumn fruits) offers him better food. Mr. Burke had a very large gentle boar (he was raised as a pet) which was caught by a bear; but he broke away, and came to the house with a gaping wound just over the middle of his back. A gang of hogs will rally, in self-defence, against a wolf, a panther, or any other animal of America that I know of, except a bear. If you want to scatter a gang, throw among them a bit of fresh bear-skin. Apropos of this a story is told, for the truth of which I do not vouch, though I think it not improbable, that a man's hogs being in the habit of breaking into his neighbour's field, the latter caught one, sewed it up in the skin of a bear newly killed, and turned it loose among its fellows. These ran for dear life, and the bear-hog followed from social instinct till both fell, if not dead, at least quite exhausted.

I was not aware that a bear can climb a tree so small as that mentioned by Mr. Clapp. The hunter knows whether the animal is in the hollow of the tree above by the marks of the claws. In ascending he makes only the puncture of the claws. In descending, he leaves long scratches. They climb in order to “ 'lap," as the hunter says, described by Mr. Clapp as drawing in branches to get the fruit. I feel inclined to doubt whether they break off the

BEARS AND BEAR-HUNTING.

branches for the purpose of throwing them down, and then descending to eat the fruit. It looks too much like human reasoning. If the branch breaks, he may not be able to hold it; and when he goes down, he may eat the fruit. This would be all natural enough. In the South, acorns form the principal mast. They are fond of persimmons too, and grapes. When mast is not plentiful, they lap black-gum berries, and these impart to the flesh, not a bitter taste as would be supposed, but the peculiar savour of fish; so that, for a person of delicate taste, only severe hunger will force him to eat the meat of a bear that has lapped black-gum.

The female commonly climbs a tree to find a hollow for her winter-quarters, where she has her cubs. I was present at the taking of one from such a hollow. It was necessary to climb a neighbouring tree; then a piece of dry rotten wood set on fire, loosely attached to a pole, and thrust into her nest, soon forced her to turn out. Old, large bears do not like to climb, and generally hibernate in a thick bunch of cane or bushes, or among some fallen tree-tops, or in a hollow log, making a bed of leaves, grass, brush, or other stuff. During winter, if a warm day occurs, bears will sometimes go out and walk about, and perhaps drink; but they, probably, do not eat. One killed during the winter has nothing, or only a little mucus, in the stomach and intestines, and the plug in the vent, as mentioned by Mr. Clapp. This results, probably, from the hardening of the last fecal matter, mostly mucus, which comes from the intestines. But the idea that it is composed of gum-an idea that I never heard of in Texas-entertained by some, reminds me of another custom of bears, probably connected with animal heat. In some localities, particularly on a high bluff near a stream, a pine tree is occasionally seen, from which the bark, at a certain height, is plainly torn off by the teeth of some animal. It is said to be done by the bear in this manner: he rises on his hind feet with his back to the tree, and, turning his head to one side and to the other, rips off the bark with his tusks. The size of the animal is known, approximately, by the height of the marks he leaves. The same tree is visited year after year by bears of various sizes-none very small, however. I would say, trusting to memory, that the average_height may be about four feet. I have seen several such trees. I think Mr. Burke had never witnessed this performance, but received his information from Indians. I never saw any other than a pine thus marked.

BEARS AND BEAR-HUNTING.

Bears are fond of honey, and will rob bee-hives, if within reach. They also dig up "yellow-jackets," wasp's-nests, for the larvæ. The account of this is amusing. The animal digs rapidly, and when the insects sting him too fiercely, he quits for a moment, rolls over and over on the ground, snarling the while, and returns again to the attack, perhaps to go through the same movements several times before he bears off the prize.

It is exciting sport hunting bears with dogs. These come to be almost as fond of it as the hunter himself. Most of them, in the beginning, fear to attack, and some never get the better of the dread he inspires. A fierce one is apt to spring at the ear, to his sorrow. But the dog that has courage and prudence combined bites him behind, which he will by no manner of means tolerate, but will wheel to fight. I doubt if he ever properly strikes with his paws. He makes his own instinctive effort to seize the attacking party, and to put him in the place of the lowermost dog in the fight. Then he bites, and if he gets the dog by the back, and if this be a lean, thin dog, woe be to the dog. A fat one has a better chance. The bear cannot so well get his broader back into his mouth, and, the skin slipping, he generally escapes with only a flesh wound. Dogs, at first, often refuse bear-meat, but come to prefer it above all others, as does the hunter.

When hard pressed, the bear will back into a dense patch of cane, or into a bunch of bushes, and, standing erect on his hinder parts, make the best fight he is capable of. This is the time for the hunter, when his attention is absorbed by the dogs. Occasionally one is started, which runs steadily on, and escapes. Females and young commonly climb, or "tree" in hunters' dialect. Generally, they are then easily shot; but sometimes, on the hunter's approach, they will drop from the tree and run on again.

I once met a female and two cubs. I shot the mother fair in the breast, aiming at the white spot. The cubs "treed," and I killed them; I then went in search of the old one, fully expecting to find her, close by, dead. As she ran away she bled profusely, but the blood grew less, and finally stopped entirely, and I never found the bear. How she could go quite off with such a loss of blood was a mystery.

THE SADDUCEES.

THE SADDUCEES

WERE a sect among the Jews. It is said that the principles of the Sadducees were derived from Antigonus Sochæus, president of the Sanhedrin, 250 years before Christ, who, rejecting the traditionary doctrine of the scribes, taught that man ought to serve God out of pure love, and not from hope of reward, or fear of punishment; and that they derived their name from Sadoc, one of his followers, who, mistaking or perverting this doctrine, maintained that there was no future state of rewards and punishments. Whatever foundation there may be for this account of the origin of the sect, it is certain that in the time of our Saviour the Sadducees denied the resurrection of the dead, and the existence of angels and spirits, or souls of departed men; though, as Mr. Hume observes, it is not easy to comprehend how they could at the same time admit the authority of the law of Moses. They carried their ideas of human freedom so far as to assert that men were absolutely masters of their own actions, and at full liberty to do either good or evil; and though they believed that God created and preserved the world, they seem to have denied His particular providence. These tenets, which resemble the Epicurean philosophy, led, as might be expected, to great profligacy of life; and we find the licentious wickedness of the Sadducees frequently condemned in the New Testament; yet they professed themselves obliged to observe the Mosaic law because of the temporal rewards and punishments annexed to such observance; and hence they were always severe in their punishment of any crimes which tended to disturb the public tranquillity. The Sadducees rejected all tradition, and some authors have contended that they admitted only the books of Moses; but there seems no ground for that opinion, either in the Scriptures or in any ancient writer. Even Josephus, who was himself a Pharisee, and took every opportunity of reproaching the Sadducees, does not mention that they rejected any part of the Scriptures; he only says that "The Pharisees have delivered to the people many institutions as received from the fathers which are not written in the law of Moses. For this reason the Sadducees reject these things, asserting that those things are binding which are written, but that the things received by tradition from the fathers are not to be observed." Besides, it is generally believed that the Sadducees expected the Messiah with great impatience, which seems to imply

HOW TO BE SAVED.

their belief in the prophecies, though they misinterpreted their meaning. Confining all their hopes to this present world, enjoying its riches, and devoting themselves to its pleasures, they might well be particularly anxious that their lot of life should be cast in the splendid reign of this expected, temporal king, with the hope of sharing in His conquests and glory; but this expectation was so contrary to the lowly appearance of our Saviour, that they joined their inveterate enemies, the Pharisees, in persecuting Him and His religion. Josephus says, that the Sadducees were able to draw over to them the rich only, the people not following them; and he elsewhere mentions that this sect spread chiefly among the young. The Sadducees were far less numerous than the Pharisees, but they were in general persons of greater opulence and dignity. The council before whom our Saviour and St. Paul were carried consisted partly of Pharisees and partly of Sadducees.

IN a meeting in a town of Dorsetshire there were a good many people anxious about their souls. Several preachers had come there in succession, and their simple words about Jesus and His work had caused a great deal of trouble. Many who had before been merry and thoughtless now felt themselves to be lost sinners, and were listening eagerly, even in the passages and on the stairs, to the offer of salvation. But the people often get so far as these had got, and remain there a long time. They see plainly enough one-half of the truth-that God is a holy Judge; that "He will by no means clear the guilty;" that "the soul that sinneth, it shall die;" but they do not get hold of the other half of the truth, which tells how God can be just, and yet justify the ungodly.

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I knew that there were many in this state of mind in the meeting I have referred to, and I spoke to them in this way: Why do you not take God at His word? When you are alone in your own room, and the door shut, could you not think, 'God is in the room with me, and I can speak to Him, and He will hear me?' and could you not open your Bibles at that place where Jesus says, 'Him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out,' and, putting your finger on the words, claim the fulfilment of His promise? I feel as if I should, if anxious about my soul, find just what I wanted in that passage; that I could plead with God thus: