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Sometimes as many as seven bears were exhibited at once, each confined by a long rope or chain, and baited with three or four large and courageous dogs, who rushed upon him with open jaws. The bears, ferocious and fretful with continued fighting, were of great strength, and not only defended themselves with their teeth, but hugged the dogs to death, or half suffocated them before their masters could release them. The bears generally bore the same names as their owners-"Hunx," "George Stone," "Old Harry of Tame," and "Great Ned," were well-known public characters, and Shakspeare alludes to one named Sackerson."

Sometimes the bear broke loose, to the terror of women and children. On one occasion a great blind bear broke his chain, and bit a piece out of a servingman's leg, who died of the wound in three days. On such emergencies a daring gallant would often run up and seize the furious beast, entangled as he was with dogs, and secure him by his chain. It was to an exploit of this kind that Master Slender referred when, boasting of his prowess to Mistress Anne Page, he said: "I have seen 'Sackerson' loose twenty times, and have taken him by the chain; but, I warrant you, the women have so cried and shrieked at it, that it passed: but women, indeed, cannot abide 'em; they are very ill-favoured rough things."-Merry Wives of Windsor, act i. sc. I.

Shakspeare has drawn not a few illustrations and metaphors from this rude sport. In another place he speaks of the bearward's bears frightening

the fell-lurking curs by the mere shaking of their chains, and describes a hot o'erweening cur running back and biting his owner, who withheld him, yet when suffered to get within reach of the bear's fell paw, clapped his tail between his legs and howled.Second Part of Henry VI. act v. sc. I.

The noise of the bear-gardens must have been well-nigh unendurable, what with the din of men eager to bet on their favourites, and the loud shouts of the respective partisans of dog and bear. At the present day the comparison of a noisy house to a "bear-garden" still perpetuates the national amusement of our forefathers.

Happily, such pastimes have long been obsolete, although the memory of these bygone days is still occasionally revived by an attempted exhibition of a tame performing bear.*

*Singularly enough while these pages were passing through the press the daily papers of August 11, 1880, furnished a report of a summons which had just been heard by the magistrate at Greenwich against two Frenchmen who had been brought before him "charged with exhibiting a bear in the streets, to the danger of the public." A constable stated that on the afternoon of the previous day he was on duty at Rushey Green, Lewisham, when a party of ladies drove up in a carriage and said that some men were performing with a strange animal at Catford Bridge, and that their horse would not pass it. He went to the bridge, where he saw the two Frenchmen with a bear, which was dancing, turning summersaults, and climbing a pole. He told them that such exhibitions were not allowed in the public streets, and on their continuing the performance he took them into custody. The magistrate told the men that if they would at once leave the country with the bear, he would let them go. They gave the desired promise, and were accordingly discharged.

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THERE is no reason to doubt that, within historic times, the Beaver was an inhabitant of Britain, although, like the Bear, the Wolf, and the Wild Boar, it has long been exterminated before the advance of civilization.

The earliest notice. we find of it is contained in the code of Welsh laws made by Howel Dha (A.D. 940), and which, unlike the ancient Saxon codes and the Irish Senchus Mor, contains many quaint

laws relating to hunting and fishing. It is there laid down that the king is to have the worth of Beavers, Martens, and Ermines, in whatsoever spot they shall be killed, because from them the borders of the king's garments are made.

The price of a Beaver's skin, termed "croen llostlydan," at that time was fixed at 120 pence, while the skin of a Marten was only 24 pence, and that of a Wolf, Fox, and Otter 8 pence. This shows that even at that period the Beaver was a rare animal in Wales.

The superior warmth and comfort which the Beaver's skin afforded, added to the reputation of the medicinal properties of the castor, must have operated as a very powerful incitement to hunt the Beaver in those early times. We must, therefore, refer the period of their abundance in this country to an age much earlier than that of Howel Dha, the period, perhaps, before the Britons were driven from the more southern parts of Britain into the wilds of Cambria by the Romans, Danes, and Saxons, and when the mountainous wilds of Wales were almost unreclaimed from a state of Nature by the hand of cultivation. At such a time, it is very likely, the Beavers were numerous in many of the mountain streams and pools, but after the defeat of Vortigern, who settled with a remnant of his scattered Britons among these mountains, it is easy to conceive the Beaver would be sought for by the hunters, perhaps for the sake of food, and certainly for its fur; so that after the lapse of some centuries which passed

before the time of Howel Dha, its numbers would be progressively diminished, and that very considerably. There still remained, however, extensive wastes in Howel's time, for it was among the laws of that prince that every man was entitled to so much land of that kind as he should bring into cultivation. We cannot imagine, therefore, that the Beaver was unable to find a secure retreat among the valleys of these barren mountains, the hills of Snowdon.*

Howel Dha died in the year 948; the travels of Giraldus de Barri-or, as he is generally styled, Giraldus Cambrensis-did not take place till about two hundred and fifty years afterwards; it cannot, therefore, excite surprise that the Beaver had then become scarce and local, since we have seen the value attached to its skin, and established by law between two and three centuries before that time.

In his quaint account of the journey he made through Wales in 1188, in company with Baldwin, Archbishop of Canterbury (who afterwards fell before Acre in the train of Richard Cœur de Lion), Giraldus tells us that the Beaver was found in the river Teivi in Cardiganshire, and gives a curious account of its habits, apparently derived in some part from his own observation.t

Harrison, in his description of England prefixed to Holinshed's "Chronicles," remarks: "For to saie * Donovan, "British Quadrupeds." "Itinerary," ed. Hoare, vol. ii. p. 49.

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