“Jimmy, there ain’t anything on earth that’s got more colours than a bear!  I’ve seen black bears as white as snow, an’ I’ve seen grizzlies almost as black as a black bear.  I’ve seen cinnamon black bears an’ I’ve seen cinnamon grizzlies, an’ I’ve seen browns an’ golds an’ almost-yellows of both kinds.  They’re as different in colour as they are in their natchurs an’ way of eatin’.

“I figger most natcherlists go out an’ get acquainted with one grizzly, an’ then they write up all grizzlies accordin’ to that one.  That ain’t fair to the grizzlies, darned if it is!  There wasn’t one of them books that didn’t say the grizzly wasn’t the fiercest, man-eatingest cuss alive.  He ain’t—­unless you corner ‘im.  He’s as cur’ous as a kid, an’ he’s good-natured if you don’t bother ’im.  Most of ’em are vegetarians, but some of ’em ain’t.  I’ve seen grizzlies pull down goat an’ sheep an’ caribou, an’ I’ve seen other grizzlies feed on the same slides with them animals an’ never make a move toward them.  They’re cur’ous, Jimmy.  There’s lots you can say about ’em without makin’ a fool o’ yourself!”

Bruce beat the ash out of his pipe as an emphasis to his final remark.  As he reloaded with fresh tobacco, Langdon said: 

“You can make up your mind this big fellow we are after is a game-killer, Bruce.”

“You can’t tell,” replied Bruce.  “Size don’t always tell.  I knew a grizzly once that wasn’t much bigger’n a dog, an’ he was a game-killer.  Hundreds of animals are winter-killed in these mount’ins every year, an’ when spring comes the bears eat the carcasses; but old flesh don’t make game-killers.  Sometimes it’s born in a grizzly to be a killer, an’ sometimes he becomes a killer by chance.  If he kills once, he’ll kill again.

“Once I was on the side of a mount’in an’ saw a goat walk straight into the face of a grizzly.  The bear wasn’t going to make a move, but the goat was so scared it ran plump into the old fellow, and he killed it.  He acted mighty surprised for ten minutes afterward, an’ he sniffed an’ nosed around the warm carcass for half an hour before he tore it open.  That was his first taste of what you might call live game.  I didn’t kill him, an’ I’m sure from that day on he was a big-game hunter.”

“I should think size would have something to do with it,” argued Langdon.  “It seems to me that a bear which eats flesh would be bigger and stronger than if he was a vegetarian.”

“That’s one o’ the cur’ous things you want to write about,” replied Bruce, with one of his odd chuckles.  “Why is it a bear gets so fat he can hardly walk along in September when he don’t feed on much else but berries an’ ants an’ grubs?  Would you get fat on wild currants?

“An’ why does he grow so fast during the four or five months he’s denned up an’ dead to the world without a mouthful to eat or drink?

“Why is it that for a month, an’ sometimes two months, the mother gives her cubs milk while she’s still what you might call asleep?  Her nap ain’t much more’n two-thirds over when the cubs are born.