OUT ALL ALONE
So the little Cub Bear started out for the very first time in his life all alone, and he did enjoy everything so much. He finally found a patch of berries, and there he ate all he wanted, and then he went over behind a log and lay down and went to sleep. When he awoke, it was nearly dark, and he knew that he must hurry home. He started, but had gone only a few steps when a little animal scampered across the path and ran up a tree.
The Cub Bear thought he would like to see this animal, and so he climbed up the tree after it, and there he found a strange looking animal. It had a tail something like a rat, but it was a great deal bigger than a rat, and bigger than a cat. It had long soft fur; but as soon as the little Cub Bear touched it, it rolled itself into a ball, and fell to the ground. Cub Bear clambered down the tree as fast as he could, and there at the foot of the tree he found this strange animal all rolled up like a ball. The Cub Bear smelt of it, and rolled it over very carefully, and looked it all over, but it seemed to be dead, and he felt so sorry to think that this little animal was dead.
And when he went home, the first thing he told his papa was, "Papa Bear, I saw the strangest little animal to-day, and I am very sorry that I killed it."
"I saw the strangest little animal to-day."
Then he told the Papa Bear how the little animal scampered up the tree, and how it rolled up into a furry ball, and how it dropped from the tree and seemed to be dead. The Papa Bear said:
"My dear little Cub Bear, the animal was not dead at all. That was just his way of fooling you, and making you think that he was dead, so that you would not bother him any more. The animal was an opossum. That is the way they always do when they are frightened, or when they think some one is going to take them and hurt them."
Then the little Cub Bear told his papa what a fine time he had had, and how he had found the berries and had eaten all he could, and that he was nearly ready to go to sleep.
Next morning, bright and early, the Papa Bear called the little Cub Bear again, for he wanted to teach him that he must work for himself, and find his own living, and he said:
"Little Cub Bear, do you want to go again into the woods to-day, and see if you can find some more berries?"
And the little Cub Bear said, "Yes, papa, I want to go, because I want to learn to work for myself, and take care of myself."
So the Papa Bear again told him to be very careful, and if he saw any men or any large animals, he was to come home as quickly as possible. The little Cub Bear said that he would do this, and then he started out joyously in the early morning light, while dew was on the ground, to see if he could not find another berry patch. And sure enough, before he had gone very far, he found a patch full of beautiful blackberries. He ate all he could of these, but he got scratched many times on his nose and on his paws. It did not hurt him any on his paws, because they were thick, but on the end of his nose, where the skin was very thin, sometimes the little Cub Bear was so badly scratched that he felt like crying. But he was a brave little fellow, and did not cry, and thought that as soon as he had enough to eat, he would go back and tell the Papa and Mamma Bear where they could find all they wanted to eat.
Pretty soon he left the berry patch, thinking he would go home a new way, and so he started, and very soon came to a beautiful lake, larger than the lake that the beaver had made near the den where they used to live. It was so wide at some places that he could hardly see across the lake. It was one of the most beautiful lakes in the world, and the most beautiful lake that this little Cub Bear had ever seen. The little Cub Bear sat down near a log to look at this lake, for it made him very happy and contented to see such a beautiful sight.
While he was waiting, he saw in the air a very large bird, larger than a hawk and larger than an eagle. This bird seemed to be flying about over the water, and around, and around; and the little Cub Bear wondered what this bird was trying to do. The most peculiar thing he noticed about the bird was that he had such a long bill. The bill was over a foot long, much larger than the bill of the ostrich, and larger than the bill of a goose, or any bird that the little Cub Bear had ever seen.
All of a sudden, this peculiar bird turned a sort of somersault and fell head downward into the water. While falling, the bird's wings were outstretched, and when it struck the water, there was a great splash and the bird disappeared, but soon reappeared floating on the surface, and shaking his head in a most peculiar way. The little Cub Bear wondered and wondered what the bird was doing. He waited until this strange bird began flying again, and then he noticed that there were a number of other birds which looked just like this one, and that they were flying about, and every once in a while one of these birds would turn a sort of a somersault and fall with outstretched wings into the water with a great splash, and then come up, and always bob his head in just that peculiar way, as though he were nodding at some one.
The little Cub Bear thought that when he got home he would tell the Papa Bear about it, and try to find out what kind of a bird it was. So he hurried and got home just as the sun set.
And when his papa asked him how he got along that day, he told him about the blackberry patch, and said that he hoped they would all go the next day and get something to eat, for there were plenty of berries for all the bears, and for any of the other animals who wanted to eat the berries.
The lion and the tiger both said that they did not care for berries, and the hippopotamus, too, said that he did not want any berries; the rhinoceros did not care for berries, but all the birds and the monkey thought it would be fine to go and get some of the berries the next day.
Then the little Cub Bear said:
"Oh, papa, I almost forgot. I want to tell you about the strange bird that I saw to-day, at a big lake in the mountains; it was bigger than a hawk, or an eagle. The bird had a long bill, and circled around, and around, and then turned a somersault, and fell with outstretched wings ker-splash into the water; and then the bird came up and shook his head as though he were nodding to a friend."
The Papa Bear said, "Why, I know what that was; that was a pelican, and if you had been nearer to him, you would have seen a strange bag under his bill."
The little Cub Bear said, "Well, what was he nodding his head about when he came up out of the water?"
And the Papa Bear said, "You see, the pelican dived into the water to get a fish, which he saw when he was flying about above the water, and he dove down into the water so straight, that he caught the little fish in his bill; and put it in the pouch under the bill, before the little fish could get away. And then when he came to the surface, he was nodding his head, so he could throw his bill up into the air, and try to get the fish down his throat."
Then the Papa Bear said that one time he saw a pelican swallow the head of a fish that he had found on the beach at the seashore, and this head was larger than two baseballs, and when the pelican got the head half way down his throat, it stuck there, and the poor pelican was in great distress, for he could not get the fish's head up or down. The Papa Bear said he did not know what happened to the pelican, for at that time two men came up, and the Papa Bear had to leave as fast as he could; but he thought perhaps these men might have helped the pelican to get the fish's head in his throat either up or down.
The little Cub Bear said, "I think it was very foolish of the pelican to try to swallow something so big without knowing whether he could get it down or not."
The Papa Bear said, "You see, we never can tell what we can do, until we try, and that is a good way to learn, if we are careful enough about our trying."
Again, the next morning, the Papa Bear called the little Cub Bear very early, and told him that he would like to have him go out again that day, and that if he would be very careful he could go farther than he had ever gone before.
So this time the little Cub Bear went a long, long way, and came to a place he had never been before, either with his papa or without him, and there was a great oak tree, and he saw high up in this tree little squirrels running about on the limbs of the trees, with their bushy tails over their backs. And the little Cub Bear, after he had found something to eat, came back and watched the squirrels, and he saw that they were gathering nuts and carrying them in their little paws into holes in the top of the tree. He noticed, too, that sometimes these little squirrels would sit on the end of the limb, just as the 'coon did, and take in their little forepaws a nut and bite through the shell of the nut very quickly, and get out the meat and eat it. He thought this was very, very nice, but he wondered why they did not eat all the nuts, and why they took some of them in the hole of the tree.
So that night, when he returned home, he talked to his papa about the little squirrels he had seen that day, with their beautiful bushy tails curling up over their backs, and their bright little eyes, and their sharp little teeth and soft fur; then he said:
"Papa, why do the little squirrels take some of the nuts into the hole in the tree?"
Papa Bear told him that it was because they were saving the nuts for the winter, when the snow was on the ground and there were no nuts to be had, and that the little squirrels spent all the winter time inside the tree, where it was warm and cozy; and that whenever they were hungry, they had this store of nuts to eat, and that the little squirrels seemed to know whether it was going to be a long, hard winter, or whether the winter was going to be mild, and that they knew just how many nuts to put away for the winter, whether it was short or long.
When it was night time, the little Cub Bear cuddled up in a ball and said:
"Papa, I want you to tell me a story before I go to sleep, about the inside of a nice warm tree, where the squirrels live."
And so the Papa Bear told this story: