CHAPTER XI
A PLEASANT COMPANION
When Black Bruin awoke from his long sleep, stretched himself, andsallied forth into the open world, the first faint touch of red wasappearing upon the soft maples. Buds upon the other trees had notstarted and there were yet suggestions of the chill of meltingsnow-banks upon the air. The tones of the forest were still somber,light gray-green or ash color, suggesting the funeral pile of the lastyear.
If the sun shone brightly for an hour, there might come a dash of hailthe next and a chilling blast of wind that seemed to retard theoncoming spring for a whole month.
Life hung in the balance, the seasons coquetted, gray-haired old Wintertrifling and flirting with the warm, blushing, sweet-breathed Spring.
The awakening had not yet come. It might come the next week, or, ifthe spring was exceptionally late, it might not come until the nextmonth.
In accordance with his usual spring custom Black Bruin fasted forseveral days, eating only grasses, buds and roots. This satisfied himuntil the thick layers of fat, with which he had come forth from hiswinter sleep, disappeared and then he became ravenous, "as ravenous asa wolf," as the proverb says.
He hunted mice persistently, but mice seemed not to be as plentiful inthe wilderness as they were nearer civilization. Squirrels also werenot as numerous here as nearer the abode of man.
Most people, when they go to the great woods, expect to find themteeming with all kinds of life, and are much disappointed to find thatsong-birds and squirrels are decidedly more plentiful in their homevillage than in the wilderness. Many of the birds and smaller animalsare social little creatures and love to be near the abode of man, whileothers live upon the scatterings which agriculture deigns not to pickup.
One day Black Bruin was following along the banks of a good-sizedstream, looking for frogs, or anything, for that matter, which mightfit into a bear menu, when to his great astonishment he discoveredanother bear, not as large as himself, sitting upon a flat rock a fewfeet from the shore, watching the stream intently. Black Bruin hadnever seen any of his kind before and a feeling of curiosity andfriendly inquiry came over him. He did not go at once to make theacquaintance of the stranger, but kept very quiet and watched to seewhat she was doing.
HE DISCOVERED ANOTHER BEAR WATCHING THE STREAM]
He did not have long to wait, for a gust of wind soon dropped a bit ofbark upon the stream near the crouching bear. There was a spray ofwater, and a flash of the silver sides of the salmon as it darted tothe surface. Then the bear on the rock reached down with her paw and,with a lightning-like motion, batted the fish out of the water and wellup on the bank.
Black Bruin, during his year of wild life, had found several dead fish,which he had eaten with great relish. So, without waiting to considerthat the prize did not belong to him, he started out of the bushes forit.
But the real fisherman rushed at him with such ferocity that he quicklyretreated to cover and sat watching while she killed the fish.
When it had been dispatched, the lucky fisherman took it in her mouthand went away into the woods with the prize. Black Bruin followed at adistance, smelling of the bushes, where the fish brushed in passing,leaving a tantalizing scent.
Finally, the bear with the fish stopped under some spruces and beganeating it.
Soon two fuzzy shuffling little creatures joined her. What they wereor where they came from Black Bruin did not know. They seemed not tocare much for the fish which the old bear offered them, but preferredto romp and tumble about in the jolliest kind of frolic.
In the old days there had been a litter of puppies at the farmhouse.These queer little creatures were about the size of puppies, but BlackBruin did not think they were small dogs.
When the fish had been eaten, the three went away farther into thewoods, the two small creatures following in the footsteps of theirmother.
Then Black Bruin went up and smelled of their tracks and his good nosetold him that they were small bears.
After that Black Bruin saw the old bear and her two cubs often, but shewould not let him come near them, and did not evince much friendlinessfor him. But he had learned one valuable lesson and the following daywas upon the flat rock watching for fish.
He did not get one that day or the next, but he had patience, which allfishermen must have, and the third day got his fish.
It was much larger than the one he had seen the strange bear take andit made him a fine meal. After that he was a tireless fisherman.
One morning Black Bruin discovered a little dappled fawn following itsmother gleefully through the fragrant breeze-haunted forest, andremembering his calf-killing episode, just before the bear-hunt, heapproached cautiously. This was not a calf, for the habitation of manhad been left far behind. Calves he had made the acquaintance of whenhe was the farmhouse pet, in those far-off days. This was a wildernesscreature and it belonged to him if he could kill it, as did all thewild creatures that he could master.
This is the universal cry of the woods,--food, food, food; and it isthe cry of civilization as well. There is no dingle dell, where theharebell and the anemone grow, where the pine and the spruce standdarkling and sweet peace seems to fold her wings and sit brooding, butdanger is there. Danger that crawls and creeps and runs with greatbounds. Danger upon velvety paws, that fall on the mosses of theforest carpet as lightly as an autumn leaf; danger that slinks in grayprotectively colored forms which pass like shadows; danger upon wings,as sure and speedy as the hunter's arrow,--wings fringed with down,that their coming may be noiseless and fatal.
The tiny wood-mouse scampers gleefully in the dead leaves, but abovehim and about him are a dozen dangers. The nervous cottontail sitserect upon his haunches, his nose twitches and his large trumpet-likeears are turned this way and that to catch the slightest sound. Hiswhole attitude is one of intense watching and listening, and well hemay, for his enemies are legion and in every thicket, bush and tree-topa dark danger is lurking.
This is the war of the woods. The old, old story of carnage, life thattakes life that the breath of life may not go out of the nostrils.Cruel as fate is the law of the woods, but it is also the law of theshambles and carnivorous man.
Black Bruin was not as well versed in hunting as most of his wildkindred, so he did not take the precaution to get upon the windwardside of his game. The ever-watchful mother scented danger long beforehe got within striking distance. Her white flag went up and she ledher offspring at a breakneck pace from the place, but Black Bruin hadmarked them for his own and it was only a matter of patience.
For several days he watched their coming and going, until at last hediscovered where the mother left her offspring while she went to adistant lake to feed upon lily-pads.
The little dappled deer was hidden under a fallen tree-top and one day,while the doe was gone, he fell upon the helpless fawn, which,according to the unwritten law of the forest, was his legitimate meat.
With a swift sure rush and a savage snarl, he brought the little deerfrom hiding. There was a short, swift chase, an agonized bleat or two,and Black Bruin had a breakfast that well repaid him for all hiswatching and waiting.
The same afternoon he saw the mother, wild-eyed and bleating, racingwildly up and down the forest, asking, by terrified looks and actions,"Have you seen my little dappled fawn? He is gone and there is strongbear-scent about the tree-top where I hid him." For several days shehaunted the region and her anxiety and heedlessness of her own safetynearly caused her to fall a victim to the wary hunter, but she finallydisappeared altogether.
It was not until the full glory of mid-summer was over the land thatBlack Bruin met White Nose in a blueberry patch upon a barren hillside.At first she would have nothing to do with him, but he followed her sopersistently that she was at last obliged to take notice.
For a long time something in earth and air had been calling to BlackBruin,--something that he craved above all other things; but what itwas he never knew until he rubbed mu
zzles with White Nose and felt herwarm breath in his face. Then he knew that he had found what he wantedand that the old loneliness would not haunt him again.
But there was one thing about him that made his mate most suspiciousand it took much patient coaxing upon Black Bruin's part to overcomeher misgivings. This was the strong leather collar that the formerdancing-bear still wore about his neck.
It was the collar into which Pedro had fastened the chain during thelatter part of the bear's captivity. This White Nose could notunderstand. In all her experience she had never seen a bear wearingsuch a thing as this. The man-scent about it, too, made it still morealarming. But at last her prejudice was overcome, and the two came andwent together during the rest of the summer and the early autumn.
From her Black Bruin learned many of the secrets of the woods that hadhitherto been hidden from him. White Nose had been reared in the wild,so all her senses were keen and the woods and waters were herhunting-ground.
Together they caught salmon at a shallow point in the stream where allthey had to do was to sit upon a rock and knock them out on the bank asthey passed. Together, in the early autumn, they raided a beavercolony, breaking into the houses and killing several of the members.Black Bruin thought he had never tasted anything in his life quite sodelicious as beaver-meat.
White Nose also taught him how to lie in wait for the deer in a clumpof bushes by some pathway that they were in the habit of following, orby the lick, or perhaps by a spring where they often came to drink, andthen, before they suspected their presence, to make a sudden rush.
She showed him a hollow birch-stub, in which a family of raccoonsdwelt, and together they set to work to destroy the household of theirown smaller brother. They dug and tore at the base of the stub untilthey had undermined it, and then together pushed it over.
At first the raccoon family were much astonished and terrified at thecommotion outside their dwelling, and when finally the house came down,three sleek raccoons fled in as many directions. White Nose securedone and Black Bruin another, while the third escaped.
The last thing in the autumn, before they denned up, the two bears madea long journey of several days to the nearest settlement, where theykilled several sheep, and also carried off two small pigs. In thisstealing, Black Bruin took the lead, for he knew much better the waysof man, and the danger from his thunder and lightning than did hiscompanion.
Upon this good supply of mutton and pork they laid on the final layersof fat, and then returned to their wilderness and denned up for thewinter.