Miss Grizzly was usually fed just outside the cook-house door. She preferred to eat in seclusion. But when especially hungry she came boldly into the dining-room while the men were eating. Walking round the table, she accepted whatever was offered her--and every one offered her something.
She was fond of the teamster who arrived twice a week with supplies and usually followed him homeward, running along behind the wagon. Now and then she preferred to ride close to him with her nose on his shoulder, sitting on her haunches like a big dog. Usually she went only two or three miles and then returned promptly home, but occasionally she lingered. One day, during her third summer at the mill, she followed the teamster as usual but did not return until in the night. After this she made an occasional excursion into the woods alone, sometimes being gone a day or two. One day, after an unusually long absence, she came back accompanied by another young grizzly.
Tracks in the dust showed that the stranger had hesitated to approach the mill. Within two or three hundred yards of it he had reared up, alert, as though he had scented or heard something alarming. Here and there in the road Miss Grizzly had evidently turned back to reassure him. Both finally came within a short distance of the mill, when at the appearance of one of the men the strange bear turned and fled.
The first winter Miss Grizzly did not offer to hibernate. She was fed regularly, and the men never thought of encouraging her to den up. But the second winter she slept three months. About the first of December she dug a den back into the side of the big sawdust pile and crawled in. Two or three times during the winter the men wakened her, and she came to the mouth of the den and then returned to sleep. Once she came out for a few hours, but, though tempted, refused to eat. Ordinarily Miss Grizzly slept outside the sawmill, against one end of the building; but sometimes she spent the night beneath the edge of the slab-pile.
The third autumn at the mill Miss Grizzly made numerous excursions into the woods alone, and one day she went off on one from which she did not return.
James Capen Adams, known as "Grizzly Adams," the celebrated hunter and trapper of wild American animals, was easily foremost for what he accomplished in showing the real character of the grizzly bear. His biography, "The Adventures of James Capen Adams," tells of his intelligent, sympathetic, and successful methods in handling grizzly bears, whether they were young or old. He made loyal companions of grizzlies and trained them so that they served him capably in a number of capacities. In the handling of these animals Adams studied their character. He was uniformly sympathetic, kind, calm, and firm. He endeavored to accomplish any desired end through gentleness and by appeal to the animal's interest and loyalty. Force and torture, which so often are the chief equipment of animal-trainers, had no place in his methods.