HAPTER XI

A PLEASANT COMPANION

When Black Bruin awoke from his long sleep, stretched himself, and
sallied forth into the open world, the first faint touch of red was
appearing upon the soft maples. Buds upon the other trees had not
started and there were yet suggestions of the chill of melting
snow-banks upon the air. The tones of the forest were still somber,
light gray-green or ash color, suggesting the funeral pile of the last
year.

If the sun shone brightly for an hour, there might come a dash of hail
the next and a chilling blast of wind that seemed to retard the
oncoming spring for a whole month.

Life hung in the balance, the seasons coquetted, gray-haired old Winter
trifling and flirting with the warm, blushing, sweet-breathed Spring.

The awakening had not yet come. It might come the next week, or, if
the spring was exceptionally late, it might not come until the next
month.

In accordance with his usual spring custom Black Bruin fasted for
several days, eating only grasses, buds and roots. This satisfied him
until the thick layers of fat, with which he had come forth from his
winter sleep, disappeared and then he became ravenous, "as ravenous as
a wolf," as the proverb says.

He hunted mice persistently, but mice seemed not to be as plentiful in
the wilderness as they were nearer civilization. Squirrels also were
not as numerous here as nearer the abode of man.

Most people, when they go to the great woods, expect to find them
teeming with all kinds of life, and are much disappointed to find that
song-birds and squirrels are decidedly more plentiful in their home
village than in the wilderness. Many of the birds and smaller animals
are social little creatures and love to be near the abode of man, while
others live upon the scatterings which agriculture deigns not to pick
up.

One day Black Bruin was following along the banks of a good-sized
stream, looking for frogs, or anything, for that matter, which might
fit into a bear menu, when to his great astonishment he discovered
another bear, not as large as himself, sitting upon a flat rock a few
feet from the shore, watching the stream intently. Black Bruin had
never seen any of his kind before and a feeling of curiosity and
friendly inquiry came over him. He did not go at once to make the
acquaintance of the stranger, but kept very quiet and watched to see
what she was doing.

[Illustration: HE DISCOVERED ANOTHER BEAR WATCHING THE STREAM