Then, instead of spreading their tablecloth on the green grass on the edge of the forest, the five big girls walked on and on until they reached a beautiful clearing where sunshine streamed in and drove the shadows back among the trees. The girls didn't know that the beautiful clearing was Little Bear's favorite playground. They didn't know that a vine-covered path led from the clearing straight to the home of the Three Bears.
Soon came all the Three Bears' wildwood friends
Quickly the big girls unpacked their picnic baskets. They spread a white tablecloth on the pine needles. One girl ran to the brook and filled a pail with clear, cold water. The others filled a wooden plate with sandwiches, and placed it on the table—ham sandwiches, jelly sandwiches, and peanut-butter sandwiches. On other wooden plates were cookies, doughnuts, chocolate cake, cream cake, and maple-sugar cake. One girl had brought a dish of honey, another a can of jelly, while the biggest girl untied a box of chocolates and put it on the table beside a saucer of fudge.
Then the girls gathered bunches of fringed gentians to decorate the white cloth. Birds were singing and butterflies were flitting about when the five big girls sat in a circle around their picnic dinner.
But before a girl had taken a bite of anything, somebody came to the picnic who hadn't been invited! That somebody was Little Bear. He walked across the clearing slowly and politely. Little Bear wasn't a bit afraid of five pretty girls sitting in a circle on his playground; he knew they wouldn't do him any harm!
But when the girls saw Little Bear they jumped up and ran away, screaming, "A bear! A bear! A bear!"
Little Bear was so surprised he stood still and watched the five girls until the last pink ribbon and blue ribbon had disappeared. Then he doubled up, and laughed, and laughed, until Father Bear and Mother Bear came. They laughed, too, when Baby Bear explained the fun.
"Did they think I would eat them up?" asked Little Bear, in a shrill voice; and then he laughed again!