A mother bear, with two cubs, came too near a whaler, and was shot. The cubs not trying to escape, were taken alive. The little creatures, though at first seeming quite unhappy, at length became in some measure reconciled to their fate, and being quite tame, were allowed sometimes to go at large about the deck.
While the ship was moored to a floe a few days after they were taken, one of them having a rope fastened round his neck, was thrown overboard. It at once swam to the ice, got upon it, and tried to escape. Finding itself, however, held by the rope, it tried to free itself in the following clever way.
Near the edge of the floe was a crack in the ice. It was of considerable length, but only eighteen inches or two feet wide, and three or four feet deep. To this spot the bear turned; and when, on crossing the chasm, the bight of the rope fell into it, he placed himself across the opening; then suspending himself by his hind feet, with a leg on each side, he dropped his head and most all of his body into the chasm; and with a foot applied to each side of the neck, tried for some minutes to push the rope over his head.
Finding that this scheme did not work, he moved to the main ice, and running with great force from the ship, gave a strong put on the rope; then going backward a few steps, he repeated the jerk. At length, after repeated attempts to make his escape in this way, every failure of which he announced with an angry growl, he gave himself up to his hard fate, and lay down on the ice in angry and sullen silence.
A young pointer, out with his master hunting, ran on a brood of very small partridges. The old bird cried, fluttered, and ran trembling along just before the dog's nose, till she had drawn him to a considerable distance; when she took wing and flew farther off, but not out of the field. At this the dog went back nearly to the place where the young ones lay concealed in the grass. The old bird no sooner saw this than she flew back again, settled first before the dog's nose, and a second time acted the same part, rolling and tumbling about till she drew off his attention from the brood, and thus succeeded in saving them.
A party of a ship's crew was sent ashore on a part of the coast of India, for the purpose of cutting wood for the ship. One of the men, having strayed from the rest, was greatly frightened by the appearance of a large lioness, who came toward him. But when she had come up to him, she lay down at his feet, and looked very earnestly, first at him, and then at a tree a short distance off. After doing this several times, she arose and started toward the tree, looking back at the man several times, as if trying to make him follow her. At length he went, and when he reached the tree, he saw a huge baboon with two young cubs in her arms. He supposed they must belong to the lioness, as she lay down like a cat, and seemed to be watching them very anxiously. The man being afraid to climb the tree, decided to cut it down, and having his axe with him, he at once set to work, the lioness, meantime, watching to see what he was doing. When the tree fell, she sprang upon the baboon, and after tearing her in pieces, she turned round and fawned round the man, rubbing her head against him in great fondness, and in token of her gratitude for the service he had done her. After this she took the cubs away, one at a time, and the man went back to the ship.