The larger bear-skin gave me the impression that the original owner must have been the size of a heifer twelve or fifteen months old. This was the ordinary brown bear of Europe, which still exists in Transylvania, Hungary, Italy, and especially in Turkey. The same bear inhabits Asia Minor, and both these varieties hybernate at the commencement of winter. In the extensive forests and mountains about Sabanja, beyond the Gulf of Ismid, I have seen the wild fruit trees severely injured by the brown bears, which ascend in search of cherries, plums, apples, walnuts, and sweet chestnuts. The heavy animal knows full well that the extremity of the boughs will not support its weight, it therefore stands erect upon a strong limb and tears down the smaller fruit-laden branches within its reach. Although bears are numerous throughout the forests, there is only one season when they can be successfully hunted; this is in late autumn, when the fruits are closing their maturity, and the apples and nuts are falling to the ground. The bears then descend from the mountain heights, and may be found late in the evening or before sunrise in the neighbourhood of such food. Asia Minor and Syria possess two distinct varieties of bears, although the countries are closely connected, and these animals are not inhabitants of the same district. The Syrian bear is smaller than the ordinary brown bear, and would hardly exceed 300 lbs. in weight. The fur is a mixed and disagreeable colour, a dusky gray of somewhat rusty appearance, but blanched in portions as though by age. This species is to be found at the present day upon Mount Horeb, and the natives assured me that, when the grapes are ripe, it is necessary to protect them by watchers armed with guns, to scare the bears during night. Wild animals which hybernate have a peculiar instinct for selecting hiding-places, which can seldom be discovered; in these they lie, free from all intrusion. The fruits of late autumn fatten the bear to a maximum condition, and when the harvest is over, and the ground is covered with a dense sheet of snow, it retires to some well-known cave, high among the mountains, in such undisturbed seclusion that it is seldom visited by the foot of man. Within a cave, nestled in ferns or withered leaves and grass, the fatted bruin curls itself to sleep throughout the winter months, and the warmth necessary to its existence is supplied by its own fat, which, being rich in carbon, supports vitality at the expense of exhaustion of supply.