“He likes buns especially,” said George, “and I have none for him in my bag. He ate the last one this noon, and since then we have not come to a bakery where I could buy more.”
“Likes buns, does he?” asked the farmer’s wife. “Well, I have some, but they have raisins in. Do you think Dido would not like them on that account?”
“Raisins in the buns!” cried George, making a low bow. “Why he will like them all the better on that account. The buns I give him only have little currants in. He will like raisins very much better indeed.”
And Dido did. He thought he had never tasted such good buns as those the farmer’s wife gave him. And Dido did all his tricks in the barn that night, safe and dry from the rain. The farmer and his wife, the hired man and some boys and girls, came from nearby houses to watch Dido do his tricks, and no one had to give a cent because the farmer had been kind to the men, and the farmer’s nice wife had been very good to Dido.
The next morning the sun shone, for the rain had stopped, and after Dido had taken a bath, in the big trough where the farm horses drank, he and his two masters started off down the country road again, having had a good breakfast.
The farmer’s wife gave George more raisin-buns to put in his bag for Dido, and the dancing bear was very glad when he saw them.
“I shall not be hungry to-day,” said Dido to himself.
That day they passed through two or three small towns, and Dido did his tricks several times, so that the hat of George had quite some money in it. And that night the men and their trained bear slept in the woods, with moss for a bed and the blankets they carried with them for covers. Dido’s fur was his blanket.
Dido awakened early the next morning, before either of the men. He looked at them sleeping near him, and then he rolled over on the bed of moss, stretched his strong legs, scratched with his claws on the soft ground and opened his mouth to stretch that in a big yawn.