He had no
other reason for going. The grizzly was the hero of western
tribes of Indians from Alaska on down into the Sierra Madre.
Among western white men who met him, occasionally in death,
the grizzly inspired a mighty saga, the cantos of which lie
dispersed in homely chronicles and unrecorded memories as well
as in certain vivid narratives by Ernest Thompson Seton,
Hittell's John Capen Adams, John G. Neihardt, and others.
For all that, neither the black bear nor the grizzly has been
amply conceived of as an American character. The conception
must include a vast amount of folklore. In a chapter on "Bars
and Bar Hunters" in _On the Open Range_ and in "Juan Oso" and
"Under the Sign of Ursa Major," chapters of _Tongues of the
Monte_, I have indicated the nature of this dispersed epic in
folk tales.
In many of the books listed under "Nature; Wild Life;
Naturalists" and "Mountain Men" the bear "walks like a man."
ALTER, J. CECIL. _James Bridger_, Salt Lake City, 1922
reprinted by Long's College Book Co., Columbus, Ohio. Contains
several versions of the famous Hugh Glass bear story.
HITTELL, THEODORE H.
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