e wrote a number of formal invitations. After
descanting, at some length, on the great expense and danger attending
his capture and training, I offered a programme of the performance, of
the "Infant Phenomenon of Sierran Solitudes," drawn up into the highest
professional profusion of alliteration and capital letters. A few
extracts will give the reader some idea of his educational progress:--

1. He will, rolled up in a Round Ball, roll down the Wood-Shed Rapidly,
illustrating His manner of Escaping from His Enemy in His Native Wilds.

2. He will Ascend the Well-Pole, and remove from the Very Top a Hat, and
as much of the Crown and Brim thereof, as May be Permitted.

3. He will perform in a pantomime, descriptive of the Conduct of the Big
Bear, The Middle-Sized Bear, and The Little Bear of the Popular Nursery
Legend.

4. He will shake his chain Rapidly, showing his Manner of striking
Dismay and Terror in the Breasts of Wanderers in Ursine Wildernesses.

The morning of the exhibition came; but an hour before the performance
the wretched Baby was missing. The Chinese cook could not indicate his
whereabouts. I searched the premises thoroughly; and then, in despair,
took my hat, and hurried out into the narrow lane that led toward the
open fields and the woods beyond. But I found no trace nor track of
Baby Sylvester. I returned, after an hour's fruitless search, to find
my guests already assembled on the rear veranda. I briefly recounted my
disappointment, my probable loss, and begged their assistance.

"Why," said a Spanish friend, who prided himself on his accurate
knowledge of English, to Barker, who seemed to be trying vainly to rise
from his reclining position on the veranda, "why do you not disengage
yourself from the veranda of our friend? And why, in the name of Heaven,
do you attach to yourself so much of this thing, and make to yourself
such unnecessary contortion? Ah," he continued, suddenly withdrawing one
of his own feet from the veranda with an evident effort, "I am myself
attached! Surely it is something here!"

It evidently was. My guests were all rising with difficulty. The floor
of the veranda was covered with some glutinous substance. It was--sirup!

I saw it all in a flash. I ran to the barn. The keg of "golden sirup,"
purchased only the day before, lay empty upon the floor. There were
sticky tracks all over the enclosure, but still no Baby.

"There's something moving the ground over there by