Page 95 - Animals of the Sakhalin Region in myths and legends

Once the sea lion went to the seashore, and fell asleep. And the bear
walked along the edge of the sea in search of food thrown out by the sea.
The bear saw a huge sea lion, and roared at the top of the bear’s throat:

— Hey, who are you? Why are you lying across my path? Step aside,
I’ll get through!
The sea lion woke up and, yawning, and replied:
— I don’t want to move. Get around me.
— You are so big and fat, it takes a long time to bypass you! Get away!
— And you can jump over me. If you jump over, you will go further, and

if not, you will bypass me.
They argued for a long time, but no one wanted to give in. It came to a
fight. They fought for a long time, but no one yielded in strength.
There is nothing to do — after all, the bear is reluctant to bypass the
sea lion. The bear jumped, but could not jump, because he is so clumsy.
He remained on the back of the sea lion. To hold on to it, he grabbed the
neck with the claws of four paws. The sea lion got scared, roared, crawled
to the sea with a bear on its back. Only at the water’s edge did the bear

run away.
Since then, the sea lion, swimming along the seashore, always shouts
loudly, threatens the bear, calls him to fight. And the bear prefers to calmly
search for food by the river.

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