Page:The Zoologist, 3rd series, vol 2 (1878).djvu/271

Rh northern provincial name of "brock," and theh only as an epithet. In the amusing play Twelfth Night (Act ii., Scene 5), Malvolio, reading a letter purposely dropped for his perusal, puts on airs, and places such a construction on the contents of the letter as to annoy Sir Toby Belch, who exclaims, but not loud enough for Malvolio to hear him, " Marry, hang thee, brock!"

Either this species or U. isabellinus would probably be the bear with which Shakspeare would be most familiar. Bear-baiting seems to have been a very popular amusement about that period and for many years subsequently. If I remember rightly, there was a "bear garden" situated somewhere on the south side of the Thames, not far from the south end of one of the bridges — Southwark, I think. I have seen it marked in old maps of London. Some account of " bear gardens" may be found in Strutt's ' Sports and Pastimes."

In the Merry Wives of Windsor (Act i., Scene 1), Slender asks of Anne Page —

Again, in Twelfth Night (Act i., Scene 3), Sir Andrew Ague- cheek, in lamenting his lack of education, exclaims —

Shakspeare mentions bears upwards of fifty times. The fol- lowing spirited description may probably be intended for "a find" with a Syrian bear, Ursus isabellinus:—

" I was with Hercules and Cadmus once, When in a wood of Crete they bay'd the bear With hounds of Sparta : never did I hear

The name of a celebrated fighting bear.