Followers of the Trail

by Zoe Meyer

Thus he drifted for miles, while the banks seemed to glide swiftly to the rear and the stream grew gradually wider. At length a faint roar, growing louder every moment, caused Mokwa to stir uneasily as he peered ahead across the seething mass of black water and tumbling ice cakes. Suddenly his body stiffened and his eyes took on new hope. His cake had entered a side current which carried him near shore. Closer and closer drifted the great cakes all about him until at length, with a hoarse grinding, they met, piling one upon the other, but making a solid bridge from shore to shore. The jam lasted but a moment, but in that moment the bear leaped, as if on steel springs, and as the ice again drifted apart and swept on to the falls not far below, he scrambled ashore, panting but safe. Here, with tongue hanging out, he stood a moment watching the heaving waters which seemed maddened at the loss of their prey. Then he turned and vanished into the forest.

Mokwa now found himself in unknown territory, but, as he managed to find food to supply his needs, he accepted the situation philosophically and was far from being unhappy.

One day his wanderings brought him to the edge of the wilderness where, inclosed by a zigzag fence of rails, he caught his first glimpse of human habitation. Concealed in a clump of young poplars, he gazed curiously at the Hermit who was chopping wood at the rear of his cabin, and at Pal who ran about, sniffing eagerly here and there, but never far from his adored master.

At length one of his excursions into the border of the forest brought to Pal's keen nostrils the scent of the bear. Pal hated bears. The hair stiffened along his back while a growl grew in his throat, rumbled threateningly and broke forth into a volley of shrill barks.

"Bear! Bear! Bear!" he called in plain dog language; but the ears of the Hermit seemed to be strangely dull and, thinking that the dog had taken up the trail of a rabbit or at the most that of a fox, he whistled Pal back to the clearing. Pal obeyed reluctantly, stopping every few steps to look back and voice his opinion of the intruder; but, by the time he had joined his master, the bear had slipped into the forest.

Late that same afternoon, as Mokwa stood at the top of a small hill, a bright glitter from a grove of straight, smooth trees below, caught his eye. The glitter was alluring and, with no thought save to gratify his curiosity, the bear shambled quickly down the slope and brought up before a tree on the trunk of which hung a small, shining bucket. The sunlight reflected from the tin dazzled his little eyes, while to his ears came a curious, musical "plop, plop."

Without even taking the precaution to glance around him, Mokwa reared upon his haunches and examined the pail into which a clear fluid splashed, drop by drop, from a little trough inserted in the tree. A faint but delectable odour drifted to the sniffing black nose of the bear. It was Mokwa's first experience with maple sap and he proceeded to make the most of it.

Though unable to reach the liquid, owing to the smallness of the pail, he could easily lick the spile which conveyed the sap from the tree, and this Mokwa did with evident relish. His tongue sought out every crevice and even greedily lapped the tree about the gash; then, growing impatient at the slowness with which the wonderful fluid appeared, he turned his attention to the pail. Mokwa wished, no doubt, that several inches might have been added to the length of his tongue, but, though that useful member failed him, necessity found a way. He soon discovered that it was possible to dip in one paw from which the sweetness could easily be licked. However, the pressure of his other paw upon the rim of the pail caused it to tip, and sliding from the spile, it rolled upon the ground.

The accident did not dismay the bear. On the contrary it filled him with joy, for it served to bring the contents of the pail within reach, and he lapped up every drop before it could soak into the earth. The pail, too, was cleansed of sap as far as the eager tongue could reach, though, during the process, it rolled about in a way which sorely tried the bear's patience. At length it came to rest against the trunk of a tree, with which solid backing Mokwa was enabled to thrust in his muzzle far enough to lap up the last sweet drops.

But alas! when he attempted to withdraw his head, Mokwa found himself a prisoner. With the pressure against the tree the sap-bucket had become wedged so tightly upon his head that it refused to come off. Though the bear twisted and turned, banging the tin upon the ground and against trunks of trees, the endeavor to rid himself of this uncomfortable and unwelcome headdress was in vain. Mokwa grew more and more frantic and the din was so terrific that a horrified cottontail, with eyes bulging until they seemed in danger of rolling down his nose, sat frozen in his tracks at the edge of a spruce thicket. The Hermit, on his way to inspect his sap-buckets, broke into a run.