“Well, Perker, you’re the pluckiest chap I ever met! You couldn’t have hired any man about here to undertake that job for ten dollars an hour!”
And he laughed again and fell to skinning the bear, chuckling. Then the boy wanted to know what he was going to do with the rope. This reminded Perker and he gave it to him. Never was a boy so thoroughly delighted. He had a lasso that had actually lassoed and held a wild bear, and a big one at that!
Perker found his idolized wheel in a sad state. Its rim was badly buckled, and half a dozen spokes were bent, but after some straightening and tightening, with Smith’s aid, except for a wet saddle, rapidly drying, the wheel was as good as ever.
Mr. Smith proposed to cure the skin and send it to Mr. Perker, taking his city address for that purpose. This pleased Perker immensely; and they parted with mutual satisfaction.
When Mr. Perker reached the city, he limped home, and Mrs. Effie, while she tended his hurts, remarked: “Theophilus, you’re too big a fool to be trusted to go alone into the woods! And the sooner you get rid of that fool of a dog the longer you’ll be likely to dodge the Foolkiller!”
Mr. Perker did not report this observation to the Club, but Mrs. Perker’s kitchen-girl reported it to Mrs. Littleweed’s cook, and a course of pumping, by the Club wits, extracted the other facts from Mr. Perker.
This is the reason the members, when Mr. Perker proudly exhibits the bear-skin, sometimes speak of “Mr. Perker’s bear,” and sometimes of “Mr. Bear’s Perker.”
FAST ICE-YACHTS.
HOW THEY ARE BUILT, RIGGED AND HANDLED.