about to leave us, and it was towed or rather led away. The following
day I saw its skin stretched on the shrouds of the vessel, to whose
captain it had been presented. The other bear chace was after a
monstrous male, who resolutely faced us, and would have boarded our boat
had it not shot past him. He was flanked by the ship, which had run down
upon him as he lay exactly in her course, and by the boat, which had got
between him and the ice, and seeing no other resource, he turned upon
the boat. When discovered, he was so near the floe that, wishing to
intercept him, we leaped into the boat, and lowered away without waiting
for a gun; we were, therefore, obliged to meet him at close quarters.
But while we stood prepared, Shipley with a lance, and myself with the
boat's hatchet, to receive his onset, the skiff was allowed to keep on
her headway, and we passed beyond our foe, who took advantage of the
error, and dashed forward to the ice, which he gained just as our boat
in pursuit of him ran her nose up against the floe, and almost tripped
his heels.

It was said by the harpooner, who first caught sight of this bear, that
he was floating on his back in the water; and Greenlanders maintain, how
truly or wrongly I know not, that bears sometimes throw themselves into
this position to avoid being seen. Another reason for this attitude they
affirm to be, a power possessed by bears of flinging themselves suddenly
forward, by a violent jerk, whilst extended on their backs, so as to
bring themselves at once into a boat; but this is a feat of which I do
not believe them capable. Whilst speaking of bears, I may mention here,
that the mate of the Dundee nearly lost his life this summer, from the
fury of a she brownie, who attacked him on the ice. After killing her
cub, he had fired at her, and struck her on the jaw, which remained
gasping, as if dislocated, and believing her _hors de combat_, he
got upon the floe, to take possession of her slain offspring. The she