a tree climber. The black bear "hugs" himself up a tree, and usually destroys his victim by compression. The grisly does not possess this power, so as to enable him to ascend a tree trunk; and for such a purpose his huge, dull claws are worse than useless.

His favorite haunts are the thickets of fruit-bearing shrubs, under the shade of which he makes his lair, and upon the berries of which he partly subsists. He lives much by the banks of streams, hunting among the willows, or wandering along the steep and rugged bluffs, where scrubby pine, and dwarf cedar, with its rooting branches, form an almost impenetrable underwood.

The grisly bear is omnivorous. Fish, flesh, and fowl are eaten by him apparently with equal relish. Like the black bear, he is fond of sweets; and various kinds of wild berries are eagerly devoured by him. He is too slow of foot to overtake either the buffalo, elk, or deer, though he sometimes comes upon these creatures unawares; and he will drag the largest buffalo to the earth, if he can only get his claws upon it. Not unfrequently he robs the panther of his repast, and will drive a whole pack of wolves from the carrion they have just succeeded in killing. Several attempts have been made to raise the young grislies, but they have all failed; the animals proving any thing but agreeable pets. As soon as grown to a considerable size, their natural ferocity displays itself, and their dangerous qualities usually lead to the necessity for their destruction.

Many years ago, two cubs of the grisly bear were kept for some time in Peale's Museum in Philadelphia. When first received, they were quite small, but speedily gave indications of that ferocity for which this species is so remarkable. As they increased in size, they became exceedingly dangerous, seizing and tearing to pieces every animal they could lay hold of, and expressing extreme eagerness to get at those accidentally brought within sight of their cage, by grasping the iron bars with their paws, and shaking them violently, to the great

terror of spectators, who felt insecure while witnessing such displays of their strength.

In one instance, an unfortunate monkey was walking over the top of their cage, when the end of the chain which hung from his waist dropped through within reach of the bears: they immediately seized it, dragged the screaming animal through the narrow aperture, tore him limb from limb, and devoured his mangled carcass almost instantaneously. At another time, a small monkey thrust his arm through an opening in the bear cage to reach after some object: one of them immediately seized him, and with a sudden jerk tore the whole arm and shoulder blade from the body, and devoured it before any body could interfere. They were still cubs, and very little more than half grown, when their ferocity became so alarming as to excite continual apprehension lest they should escape; and they were killed in order to prevent such an event.

The grisly bear is a dangerous assailant. White hunters unless when mounted and well armed, never attack him; and the Indians consider the killing a grisly bear a feat equal to the scalping a human foe. These never attempt to hunt him, unless when a large party is together; and the hunt is, among some tribes, preceded by a feast and a war dance. It is often the lot of the solitary trapper to meet with this four-footed enemy, and the encounter is rated as equal to that with two hostile Indians.

In the course of Lewis and Clarke's expedition to the Rocky Mountains, a grisly bear was seen lying in a piece of open ground, about three hundred paces from the Missouri River; and six men, all of whom were good hunters, went to attack him. Concealing themselves by a small eminence, they were able to approach within forty paces unperceived; four of the hunters now fired, and each lodged a ball in his body, two of which passed directly through his lungs. The bear sprang up and ran furiously, with open mouth, upon them; two of the hunters, who had reserved their fire, gave him two additional wounds, one of which, by breaking his shoulder blade, some

what retarded his motions. Before they could again load their guns, he came so close on them, that they were obliged to run towards the river; and before they had gained it, the bear had almost overtaken them.

Two men jumped into the canoe; the other four separated, and concealing themselves among the willows, fired as fast as they could load their pieces. Several times the bear was struck; but each shot seemed only to direct his fury towards the hunters. At last he pursued them so closely that they threw aside their guns and pouches, and jumped from a perpendicular bank, twenty feet high, into the river. The bear sprang after them, and was very near the hindmost man, when one of the hunters on the shore shot him through the head, and finally killed him. When they had dragged him on shore, they found that eight balls had passed through his body in different directions.

L. THE CHILD'S FUNERAL.

BRYANT.

Sorrento is a beautiful town, about twenty-five miles from Naples. Amalfi, a seart in the neighborhood, was a great naval and commercial power during the middle as. The tomb of Virgil is in the environs of Naples.]

FAIR is thy sight, Sorrento; green thy shore;
Black
crags behind thee pierce the clear blue skies;
The sea, whose borderers ruled the world of yore,
As clear, and bluer still, before thee lies.

Vesuvius smokes in sight, whose fount of fire,

Outgushing, drowned the cities on his steeps;
And murmuring Naples, spire o'ertopping spire,
Sits on the slope beyond where Virgil sleeps.

Here doth the earth, with flowers of every hue,
Heap her green breast when April suns are bright,

Flowers of the morning-red, or ocean-blue,
Or, like the mountain frost, of silvery white.

Currents of fragrance, from the orange tree

And sward of violets, breathing to and fro, Mingle, and wandering out upon the sea,

Refresh the idle boatsman where they blow.

Yet even here, as under harsher climes,

Tears for the loved and early lost are shed; That soft air saddens with the funeral chimes, Those shining flowers are gathered for the dead.

Here once a child, a smiling, playful one,

All the day long caressing and caressed, Died when its little tongue had just begun

To lisp the names of those it loved the best.

The father strove his struggling grief to quell,
The mother wept as mothers use to weep,
Two little sisters wearied them to tell

When their dear Carlo would awake from sleep.

Within an inner room his couch they spread,

His funeral couch; with mingled grief and love, They laid a crown of roses on his head,

And murmured, "Brighter is his crown above."

They scattered round him, on the snowy sheet,
Laburnum's strings of sunny-colored gems,
Sad hyacinths, and violets dim and sweet,

And orange blossoms on their dark-green stems.

And now the hour is come; the priest is there ;
Torches are lit, and bells are tolled; they go,
With solemn rites of blessing and of prayer,
To lay the little one in earth below.

The door is opened. Hark! that quick, glad cry!
Carlo has waked, has waked, and is at play;
The little sisters laugh and leap, and try
To climb the bed on which the infant lay.

And there he sits alive, and gayly shakes

In his full hands the blossoms red and white,
And smiles with winking eyes, like one who wakes
From long, deep slumbers at the morning light.

LL. THE BLUEBIRD.

ALEXANDER WILSON.

[Alexander Wilson was born in Paisley, Scotland, in 1766, came to this country in 1794, and died in 1813. His American Ornithology, from which the following extract is taken, is a work of great merit; distinguished alike for scientific accuracy and poetical feeling.]

THE pleasing manners and sociable disposition of this little bird entitle him to particular notice. As one of the first messengers of spring, bringing the charming tidings to our very doors, he bears his own recommendation always along with him, and meets with a hearty welcome from every body.

Though generally accounted a bird of passage, yet so early as the middle of February, if the weather be mild, he usually makes his appearance about his old haunts, the barn, orchard, and fence posts. Storms and deep snows sometimes succeeding, he disappears for a time, but about the middle of March is again seen, accompanied by his mate, visiting the box in the garden, or the hole in the old apple tree, the cradle of some generations of his ancestors.

The usual spring and summer song of the bluebird is a soft, agreeable, and oft-repeated warble, uttered with open, quivering wings, and is extremely pleasing. In his motions and general character he has great resemblance to the robin redbreast of Britain; and had he the brown olive of that bird,