hazardous risk, because so many men are able to tell all about it.
Judging from reliable records of the ways and means of the grizzly
bear, I think we must award the second prize for courage to "Old
Ephraim." The list of his exploits in scaring pioneers, in
attacking hunters, in robbing camps, and finally in bear-
handling and almost killing two guides in the Yellowstone Park, is
long and thrilling. The record reaches back to the days of Lewis
and Clark, who related many wild adventures with bears. The
grizzlies of their day were very courageous, but even then they
were _not_ greatly given to attacking men quite unprovoked!
In those days of bow-and-arrow Indians, and of white men armed
only with ineffective muzzle-loading pea rifles, using only weak
black powder, the grizzlies had an even chance with their human
adversaries, and sometimes they took first money. In those days
the courage of the grizzly was at its highest peak; and it was
then conceded by all frontiersmen that the grizzly was thoroughly
courageous, and always ready to fight. In the light of subsequent
history, and in order to be just to the grizzly, we claim that his
fighting was _in self defense,_ for even in those days the
unwounded bear preferred to run rather than to fight
unnecessarily.
The rise of the high-power, long-range repeating rifle has made
the grizzly bear a different animal from what he was in the days
of Lewis and Clark. He has learned, _thoroughly,_ the supreme
deadliness of man's new weapons, and he knows that he is no longer
able to meet men on even terms. Consequently, he runs, he hides,
he avoids man, everywhere save in the Yellowstone Park, where he
has found out that firearms are prohibited. There he has broken
the truce so often that his offenses have had to be met with stern
disciplinary measures that have made for the safety of tourists
and guides.
Once I saw an amusing small incident. Be it known that when a new
black bear cub is introduced to a den of its peers, the newcomer
shrinks in fright, and cowers, and takes its place right humbly.
But species alter cases. Once when we received an eight-months-
old grizzly cub we turned it loose in a big den that contained
five black bear cubs a year older than itself. But did the grizzly
cub cower and shrink? By no manner of means. With head fully
erect, it marched calmly to the centre of the den, and with serene
confidence gave the other cubs the once-over with an air that
plainly said: "_I'm_ a grizzly! I'm here, and I've come to
stay. Do I hear any objections?"
Quite as if in answer to the challenge, an eighteen-months-old
black bear presently sidled up and made a trial blow at the
grizzly's head. Instantly the grizzly cub's right arm shot out a
well-delivered blow that sent the black one scurrying away in a
panic, and perceptibly cleared the atmosphere. That cub had
grizzly-bear _courage_ and _confidence;_ that was all.
There are a number of American sportsmen who esteem the Cape
buffalo as the most aggressive and dangerous wild animal in
eastern Africa. He is so courageous and so persistently bold that
he is much given to lying in wait for hunters and attacking with
real fury. The high grass of his swamps is very helpful to him as
a means of defense. In our National Collection of Heads and Horns
there is a huge buffalo head (for years the world's highest
record) that tells the story of a near tragedy. The brother of Mr.
F.H. Barber, of South Africa, fired at the animal, but failed to
stop it. His gun jammed, and the charging beast was almost in the
act of killing him when F.H. Barber fired without pausing to take
aim. His lucky bullet knocked a piece out of the buffalo's left
horn, dazed the animal for a moment, and afforded time for the
shot that killed the mighty bull.
The leopard is usually a vicious beast. When brought to bay it
fights with great fury and success. The black leopard is supremely
vicious and intractable. Nearly all leopards hate training, and I
have seen two or three leopard "acts" that were nerve-racking to
witness because of the clear determination of all the animals to
kill their trainer at the first opportunity.
The status of the big Alaskan brown bear has already been referred
to in terms that may stand as an estimate of its courage. Really,
it is now in the same mental state as the grizzly bears of the
days of Lewis and Clark, and the surplus must be shot to admonish
the survivors and protect the rights of man.
THE RAGE OF A WILD BULL ELK. One of the most remarkable
cases of rage, resentment and fighting courage in a newly
captured wild animal occurred near Buttonwillow, California, in
November 1904, and is very graphically described by Dr. C. Hart
Merriam in the _Scientific Monthly_ for November 1921. The
story concerns the leader of a band of the small California Valley
Elk (_Cervus nannodes_) which it was desired to transport to
Sequoia Park, for permanent preservation.
The bull refused to be driven to the corral for capture, so he was
roped, thrown, hog-tied and hauled six miles on a wagon. This
indignity greatly enraged the animal. At the corral he was
liberated for the purpose of driving him through a chute and into
a car.
From his capture and the jolting ride the bull was furious, and he
refused to be driven. His first act was to gore and mortally wound
a young elk that unfortunately found itself in the corral with
him. Then he was roped again and his horns were sawn off. At first
no horseman dared to ride into the corral to attempt to drive the
animal. Finally the leader of the cowboys, Bill Woodruff, mounted
on a wise and powerful horse who knew the game quite as well as
his rider, rode into the corral with the raging elk, and attempted
to drive it.
The story of the fight that followed, of raging elk vs. horse and
man, makes stories of Spanish bullfights seem tame and
commonplace, and the adventure of St. George and the dragon a dull
affair. With the stubs of his antlers the bull charged the horse
again and again, inflicting upon the splendid animal heart-rending
punishment. Finally, after a fearful conflict, the wise and brave
horse conquered, and the elk devil was forced into the car.
After a short railway journey the elk was forced into a crate,--
fighting at every step,--and hauled a two days' journey to the
Park. Reduced to kicking as its sole expression of resentment, the
animal kicked continuously for forty-eight hours, almost
demolishing the crate.
The final scene of this unparalleled drama of wild-animal rage is
thus described by Dr. Merriam: "Then the other gates were
raised, giving the bull an opportunity to step out. For the
first, time since his capture he did what was wanted; he
voluntarily crept to the rear of the wagon and hobbled out on the
ground. Looking around for an enemy to attack and not seeing any,
--some of the men having stationed themselves outside the park
fence, the others on top of the crate,--he set out for the river,
only a few rods away.
"His courage had not forsaken him, but his strength had. He was no
longer the proudly aggressive wild beast he had been. He had
reached his limit. The terrible ordeal he had been through; the
struggle incident to his capture; the rough, hot ride to the
corral, hog-tied, on the hard floor of the dead-ax wagon; the
outbursts of passion in the corral; the fighting and second roping
in connection with the sawing off of his horns; the battle with
the big horse; the ceaseless violence of his destructive
assaults, first in the car, then in the crate, continued for three
days and nights, had finally undermined even his iron frame; so
when at last he found himself free on the ground, he presented a
truly pitiful picture.
"With his head bent to one side and back curved, with one ear up
and the other down, and with a dejected, helpless expression on
his face, he hobbled wearily away, barely able to step without
falling. Slowly he made his way to the river, waded in, drank,
crossed to the far side, staggered laboriously up the low bank,
and lay down. The next day he was found in the same spot,--dead."
THE DEFENSE OF THE HOME AND FAMILY. Any man who is too
cowardly to fight for his home and country deserves to live and
die homeless and without a country.
With this subject of courage the parental and fraternal affections
of wild animals are inseparably linked. The defense of the home
and family unit is the foundation of all courage, and of all
fighting qualities in man or animals. The gospel of self-defense
is the first plank in the platform of the home defenders.
Obviously, the head of a family cannot permit himself to be
knocked out, because as the chief fighter in the Home Defense
League it is his bounden duty to preserve his strength and his
weapons, and remain fit.
In the days of the club, the stone axe and the flint arrow-head,
men were few and feeble, and the wild beasts had no cause to fear
extermination. Tooth, claw and horn were about as formidable as
the clumsy and inadequate weapons of man. The wild species went on
developing naturally, and some mighty hosts were the result.
But gunpowder changed all that. In the chase it gave weak men
their innings beside the strong. Man could kill at long range,
with little danger to himself, or even with none at all. And then
in the wild beast world the great final struggle for existence
began. Man's flippant phrase,--"the survival of the fittest,"--
became charged with sinister and deadly meaning.
But for Mother Love among wild creatures, species would not
multiply, and the earth soon would become depopulated. In the
entire Deer Family of the world, the annual shedding of all horns
is Nature's tribute to motherhood in the herd. A buck deer or a
bull moose is a domineering master--so long as his antlers remain
upon his head. But with the approach of fawn-bearing time in the
herd, down they go. I have seen a bull elk stand with humbly
lowered head, and gaze reproachfully upon his fallen antlers. The
dehorned buck not only no longer hectors and drives the females,
but in fear of hurting his tender new velvet stubs he keeps well
away from the front hoofs of the cows. The calves grow up quite
safe from molestation within the herd.
It may be set down as a basic truth that all vertebrate animals
are ready to defend their homes and their young against all
enemies that do not utterly outclass them in size and strength. Of
course we do not expect the pygmy to try conclusions with the
giant, but at the same time, wild creatures have their own queer
ways of defense and counter-attack, and of matching superior
cunning against superior force. But now, throughout the animal
world, the fear of man is paramount. Nearly all the wild ones have
learned it. It is only the enraged, the frightened or the cornered
bear, lion, tiger or elephant that charges the Man with a Gun, and
seeks to counter upon him with fang and claw before it drops. The
deadly supremacy of the repeating rifle that kills big game at
half a mile, and the pump shotgun that gets five geese out of a
flock, are well recognized by the terrorized big game and small
game that flies before the sweeping pestilence of machine guns and
automobiles.
THE FIGHTING CANADA GOOSE. In essaying to illustrate the
home defense spirit, my memory goes out to one truculent and
fearless Canada goose whose mate elected to nest in a horribly
exposed spot on the east bank of our Wild-Fowl Pond. The location
was an error in judgment. As soon as the nest was finished and the
eggs laid therein, the goose took her place upon the collection,
and the gander mounted guard.
There were so many hostiles on the warpath that he was kept on the
qui vive during all daylight hours. At a radius of about twenty
feet he drew an imaginary dead-line around the family nest, and no
bird, beast or man could pass that line without a fight. If any
other goose, or a swan or duck, attempted to pass, the guardian
gander would rush forward with blazing eyes, open beak, wings open
for action, and with distended neck hiss out his challenge. If
the intruder failed to register respect, and came on, the gander
would seize the offender with his beak, and furiously wing-beat
him into flight. That gander was afraid of nothing, and his
courage and readiness to fight all comers, all day long, caused
visitors to accord him full recognition as a belligerent power.
THE CASE OF THE LAUGHING GULL. About that same time, a pair
of laughing gulls had the temerity to build a nest on the ground
in the very storm centre of the great Flying Cage. Daily and
hourly they were surrounded by a truculent mob of pelicans,
herons, ibises, storks, egrets and ducks, the most of whom
delighted in wrecking households. The keepers sided with the
gulls by throwing around their nest a wire entanglement, with a
sally-port at one side for the use of the beleaguered pair.
The voice of an angry or frightened laughing gull is it [sic]
owner's chief defense. The female sat on her nest and shrieked out
her shrill and defiant war cry of "Kah! kah, kah, kah!" The male
took post just outside the sally-port, where he postured and
screamed and threatened until we wondered why he did not burst
with superheated emotion. I am sure that never before did two
small gulls ever raise so much racket in so short a time and their
cage-mates must have found it rather trying.
The gulls hatched their eggs, they reared their young
successfully, and at last peace was restored.
A Mother Antelope Fights Off an Eagle. Mr. Howard Eaton, of Wolf,
Wyoming, once saw a female prong-horned antelope put up a strong
and successful fight in defense of her newly-born fawn. A golden
eagle, whose spring specialty is for fawns, kids and lambs, was
seen to swoop swiftly down toward a solitary antelope that had
been noticed on a treeless range beside the Little Missouri. It
quickly became evident that the eagle was after an antelope fawn.
As the bird swooped down toward the mother, and endeavored to
seize her fawn in its talons, the doe rose high on her hind legs,
and with her forelegs flying like flails struck with her sharp-
pointed hoofs again and again. Her blows went home, and feathers
were seen to fly from the body of the marauder.
The doe made good her defense. The eagle was glad to escape, and
as quickly as possible pulled himself together and flew away.
The Defensive Circle of the Musk-Ox. Several arctic explorers have
described the wonderful living-ring defense, previously mentioned,
of musk-ox herds against wolves. Mr. Paul Rainey's moving pictures
have shown it to us in thrilling detail, with Eskimo dogs instead
of wolves. When a musk-ox herd is attacked by the big and deadly
arctic white wolves, the bulls and adult cows herd the calves and
young stock into a compact group, then take their places shoulder
to shoulder around them in a perfect circle, and with lowered
heads await the onset. The sharp down-and-up curved horn of the
musk-ox is a deadly weapon against all the dangerous animals of
the North, except man.
When a wolf approaches near and endeavors to make a breach in the
circle, the musk-ox nearest him tries to get him, and will even
rush out of the line for a short and brief pursuit. But the bull
does not pursue more than twenty yards or so, for fear of being
surrounded alone and cut off. At the end of his usually futile
run, back he goes and carefully backs into his place in the first
line of defense. A charging bull does not rush out far enough that
the wolves can cut him off and kill him. He is much too wise for
that.
Mr. Stefansson says that the impregnability of the musk-ox defense
is so well recognized by the wolves of the North that often a pack
will march past a herd in close proximity without offering to
attack it, and without even troubling the herd to form the hollow
circle.
A Savage Wild Boar. I once had a "fight" with a captive Japanese
wild boar, under conditions both absurd and tragic, and from it I
learned the courage and fury of such animals. The animal was
large, powerful, fearfully savage toward every living thing, and
insanely courageous. It was confined in a yard enclosed by a
strong wire fence, and while we were all very sure that the fence
would hold it, I became uneasy. In mid-afternoon I went alone to
the spot, passing hundreds of school children on the way, to study
the situation. When I reached the front of the corral and stood
still to look at the fence, the boar immediately rushed for me. He
came straight on, angry and terrible, and charged the wire like a
living battering-ram. He repeated these charges until I became
fearful of an outbreak, and decided to try to make him afraid to
repeat them. Procuring from the bear dens, a pike pole with a
stout spike in the end, I received the next charge with a return
thrust meant to puncture both the boar's hide and his
understanding. He backed off and charged more furiously than ever,
with white foam flying from his jaws.
He cared nothing for his punishment. He charged until his snout
bled freely, and the fence bulged at the strain.
Then I became regularly scared! I feared that the savage beast
would break through the fence in spite of its strength, and run
amuck among those helpless children. I "beat it" back to my
office, hurried back with one of my loaded rifles, and without
losing a second put a bullet through that raging brain and ended
that danger forever.
The Overrated Peccary. This reminds me that the collared peccary
has been credited with a degree of courage that has been much
exaggerated. While a hunted and cornered peccary will fight dogs
or men, and put up a savage and dangerous defense, men whom I
know in the peccary belt of Mexico have assured me that a drove of
peccaries will _not_ attack a hunter who has killed one of
their mates, nor keep him up a tree for hours while they swarm
underneath him waiting for his blood. I have been assured by
competent witnesses that in peccary hunting there is no danger
whatever of mass attack through a desire for revenge, and that
peccaries fired at will run like deer.
A Black Bear Killed a Man for Food. There is on record at least
one well-authenticated case of a black bear deliberately going out
of his way to cross a river, attack a man and kill him.
On May 17, 1907, at a lumber camp of the Red Deer Lumber Company,
thirty miles south of Etiomami on the Canadian Northern Railway,
Northwest Territory, a cook named T. Wilson was chased by a large
black bear, without provocation, struck once on the head, and
instantly killed. The bear then picked him up, carried him a short
distance, and proceeded to _eat_ him. Ten shots from a .32
calibre revolver had no effect. Later a rifle ball drove the bear
away, but only after it had eaten the left thigh and part of the
body. (Forest and Stream, Feb. 8, 1908.)
The Status of the Gray Wolf. In America wolves rarely succeed in
killing men, although they often follow men's trails in the hope
of spoil of some kind. But there are exceptions.
In 1912, around Lake Nipigon, Province of Ontario, Canada, there
existed a reign of terror from wolves. The first man killed was a
half-breed mail-carrier. Then, in December, another mail-carrier,
who was working the lumber camps north of Lake Nipigon, was killed
by wolves and completely devoured. The snow showed a terrible
struggle, in which four large wolves had been killed by the
carrier.
In Russia and in France in the days preceding the use of modern
breech-loading firearms, the gray wolves of Europe were very bold,
and a great many people were killed by them.
Killings by Wild Beasts in India. The killing by wild beasts of
unarmed and defenseless native men, women and children in India is
a very different matter from man-killing in resourceful and
dangerous North America. The annual slaughter by wild beasts in
Hindustan and British Burma is a fairly good index of the courage
and aggressiveness of the parties of the first part. In India
during the year 1878, in which we were specially interested, the
totals were as follows:
Persons killed by elephants, 33; tigers, 816; leopards, 300;
bears, 94; wolves, 845; hyenas, 33; snakes, 16,812.
Of course such slaughter as this by the ridiculous hyenas and the
absurd sloth bears of India is possible only in a country wherein
the swarming millions of people are universally defenseless, and
children are superabundant.
As a corollary to the above figures, a comparison of them with the
roster of wild animals killed and paid for is of some interest.
The dangerous beasts destroyed were as follows:
Elephants, 1; tigers, 1,493; leopards, 3,387; bears, 1,283;
wolves, 5,067; hyenas, 1,202; serpents, 117,782.
The Fighting Spirit in Baboons. In the first analysis, we find
that courage is an individual trait, and that so far as we know,
it never characterizes all the individuals of any one species. The
strongest and the best armed of men and beasts usually are
accounted the bravest ones of earth. The defenseless ones do well
to be timid, to avoid hostilities and to flee from conflict to
avoid being destroyed. It is just as much the duty of a
professional mother to flee and to hide, in order to save her own
life, as it is for "the old he-one" to threaten and to fight.
At the same time, there are many species which are concededly
courageous, as species. In making up this list I would place first
of all the baboons of eastern Africa, whom I regard collectively
as the most bold and reckless fighters per pound avoirdupois to be
found in the whole Order Primates. They have weapons, agility,
strength and cyclonic courage. On no other basis could they have
so long survived _on land_ in a country full of lions,
leopards, cheetahs, hyenas and wild dogs.
In order to appreciate the fighting spirit of a male baboon, the
observer need only come just once in actual touch with one. A
dozen times I have been seized by a powerful baboon hand shot out
with lightning quickness between or under his cage bars. The
combined strength and ferocity of the grab, and the grip on the
human hand or arm, is unbelievable until felt, and this with an
accompaniment of glaring eyes, snarling lips and nerve-ripping
voice is quite sufficient to intimidate any ordinary man.
But even in the courage and belligerency of baboons, there are
some marked differences between species. I rank them as follows:
The most fierce and dangerous species is the East African baboon.
The next for courage is the Rhodesian species.
The spectacular hamadryas baboon is a very good citizen. The
long-armed yellow species makes very little trouble, and
The small golden baboon is the best-behaved of them all.
Courage in the Great Apes. After forty years of ape study, with
many kinds of evidence, I am convinced that the courage and the
alleged ferocity of the gorilla has been much over-rated. I
believe this is due to the influence upon the human mind of the
great size and terrifying aspect of the animal.
Of all the men whom I have known or read, the late R. L. Garner
knew by far the most of gorilla habits and character by personal
observation in the gorilla jungles of equatorial Africa. And
never, in several years of intimate contact with Mr, Garner did he
so much as once put forth a statement or an estimate that seemed
to me exaggerated or overcolored.
In our many discussions of gorilla character Mr. Garner always
represented that animal as very shy, wary of observation by man,
profoundly cunning in raiding _in darkness_ the banana
plantations of man's villages, and most carefully avoiding
exposures by daylight. He described the gorilla as practically
never attacking men unless first attacked by them, and fleeing
unless forcibly brought to bay. He told me of are doubtable
African tribesman who once captured a baby gorilla on the ground
by suddenly attacking the mother with his club and beating her so
successfully that she fled from him and abandoned her young.
"But," said Mr. Garner, "there is only one tribe in Africa that
could turn out a man who would attempt a feat like that."
That the gorilla can and will fight furiously and effectively when
brought to bay is well known, and never denied.
Of the apes I have known in captivity, the chimpanzees are by far
the most aggressive, courageous and dangerous. A vigorous male
specimen over eight years of age is more dangerous than a lion,
or tiger, or grizzly bear, and _far more anxious_ to fight
something. I think that even if our Boma were muzzled, no five men
of my acquaintance could catch him and tie his hands and feet.
The orang-utan is only half the fighter that the chimpanzee is.
Even the adult males are not persistently aggressive, or inflamed
by savage desires to hurt somebody.