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Entered according to Act of Congress, in J unc, 1869, by J. W. Burke & Cos., in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States for the So. District of Georgia.
VOL. 111.
SOMETHING ABOUT BEARS.
>®f f—
_Ap>|) EARS belong to the order of
carnivorous animals, which
includes all that feed mainly
on flesh. They are, however, less car
nivorous than the other families of that
order, as somb of them live almost en
tirely on vegetables, and only eat ani
mal food from necessity. Their claws
are not retractile—like those of the cat
and other carnivorous animals —and are
better suited for climbing and digging
than for tearing flesh, while their teeth
are adapted to a vegetable diet.
Bears inhabit both the temperate and
frigid zones, and, unlike other animals,
attain their greatest size in the extreme
north. The White, or Polar bear of the
Arctic regions, frequently weighs from
a thousand to fifteen hundred pounds.
It is snow white, and feeds altogether
upon flesh.
It was long doubtful whether any true
bears inhabit Africa, though a planti
grade animal resembling the bear was
reported to exist in the mountains of
Abyssinia. It is now ascertained that
the bear exists on the Atlas and Tetuan
mountains. It inhabited Syria, and
David slew one while attending the
flocks of his father, (1 Sam. xvii., 80.)
When the prophet Elisha was on his
way from Jericho to Bethel, some young
men mocked him as he passed, and God
sent two she bears out of the forest,
which tore forty-two of them. The she
bear is peculiarly ferocious when de
prived of her young, and “a bear rob
bed of her whelps” became a proverb,
for expressing ungovernable rage and
fury, (2 Sam. xvii., 8 ; Prov. xvii., 12 ;
llos. xiii., 8.) The bear is distinguish
ed for its voracity, and “a greedy bear”
is used as an emblem of a rapacious
ruler over the poor people, (Proverbs,
xxviii., 15.) The Medo-Persian em
pire is symbolized by the bear in Dan.,
vii., 5, and the great beast which wield
ed the power of the former empires had
the feet of a bear, (Rev. xxii., 2.)
The picture opposite represents a
Bear eating a goat.
MACON, GEORGIA, JULY 24, 1869.
Written for Burke’s Weekly,
SAL-O-QUAH;
OR,
Boy-Life Among the Indians.
BY REV. F. R. GOULDING,
Author of “ Young Marooners,” “ Mctrooner’s
Island,” etc.
CHAPTER XXII.
VIEW FROM CITRRAHEE —“ ERUPTION ’ J
UNPLEASANT COMPANIONS, ANI) WIIAT
WAS DONE WITH THEM —TUCCOA FALLS
—THE SHOWER BATH.
morning, an hour's ride
carried us from our encamp
ment by the spring to the foot
of Currahee mountain.
There, a roomy house, a story and a
half high, with a piazza in front, and
boasting, as few others in that region
could then boast, of being framed of
saum stuff, opened its inviting door for
the reception of travelers. As it had
been our humor, however, to carry with
us our own shelter and stores, we did
not patronize these worthy settlers of
wayside hospitality, farther than to ob
tain from them a drink of deliciously
cool water, and a few needful points of
instruction about our road.
The trail formerly used by the In
dians, and which alone was known to
our guides, had been blocked up by the
fences of these new settlers, who, in
place of it, had opened a carriage-way
as far up the mountain side as it was
convenient for wheels to ascend. The
destroyers of the Indian trail had had
the good taste, though, to conduct their
road around a magnificent white oak,
whose stately trunk and graceful pro
portions were of themselves worth go
ing out of one's way to see.
Halting our carriages and putting a
side-saddle on old Gray for my aunt, we
were not many minutes in gaining the
summit, which was a bare flat rock,
terminated on one side in a sheer preci
pice, and covered here and there with
thick beds of mountain moss, whose
grey filaments in a dry time crumble to
powder under under the foot, but with
the slightest moisture in the air furnish
delightful seats, soft as cushions of
velvet.
There was not one of the company, —
not excepting Quash, who had never
been upon a mountain top before, and
whose love of ease would have proved
paramount to his delight in beautiful
scenery, had we not almost compelled
him to come up with us, —there was
not one of us who did not acknowledge
that we were more than compensated
for our labor by the wide-spread land
scape, which was in many parts check
ered with farms that looked in the dis
tance no bigger than handkerchiefs, — in
others rumpled with sharp hills, —in
others gleaming with the flash of water,
—while far to the North and East the
Blue Ridge Mountains lifted themselves
above the horizon like a rough bank of
dense blue clouds, preparing to give us
a thunder-storm. We greatly enjoyed
ourselves for more than an hour, and
finally took our departure, not because
we were satiated, but driven away by
the increasing heat of the sun upon the
rocky and almost shadeless summit.
Five miles travel carried us to the
Tuccoa Falls, near which also we found
a house of public accommodation. Less
pretentious than the other, —for it was
built of logs, and planned upon the
usual frontier model of “two pens and
a passage,” though its wide passage had
been converted into a room, and sheds
had been built around, —it nevertheless
had a look of greater comfort, and bet
ter suited to the countr}'. Major Wal
ton, the owner and occupant, could
show so well-fed a person, and a family
of daughters, besides his wife, so well
fed too, as to require no advertisement
posted on a sign-board without,
“ Good cheer ; To be had here.”
It was Saturday, midday, when we ar
rived, and my aunt expressed the desire
to stop here and spend the Sabbath.
But there was a reason for this which,
if not more potent than a desire to sanc
tify the Sabbath, was more pressing.
For more than a day she had been con
scious of a very disagreeable eruption
No. 4.