untry to show off his tricks and make thereby a little money.

The children were somewhat afraid at first, but soon felt quite safe
when they saw he was firmly secured by a rope. Old bruin's keeper first
gave him a drink of water, then poured a pailful over him, which he
seemed to enjoy very much, as the day was a warm one. One of the men
said something in Swiss, at which the bear gave a roar-like grunt and
commenced to dance. Around and around the great lumbering fellow went on
his two hind legs, holding his fore paws in the air. It was not what one
would call a very "airy waltz," however. Again the keeper spoke, and
immediately bruin threw himself upon the ground and turned somersaults,
making us all laugh heartily. He then told him to shake hands (but all
in Swiss), and it was too funny to see the great awkward animal waddle
up on his hind legs and extend first one paw and then the other. But
what interested us all most, both big and little, was to hear the man
say, "Kisse me," and then to watch the bear throw out his long tongue
and lick his keeper's face.

We then gave the bear some milk to drink, when suddenly he gave a bound
forward toward the baby. But he was securely tied, as we well knew. The
milk roused all the beast's savage instincts, one of the men said.

But what will interest you most of all will be the fact that on the farm
(which consisted of five hundred acres, nearly all woodland) there were
seen almost every morning the footprints of a real savage bear. The
sheep were fast disappearing, and the farmers about were not a little
worried. One day I went for a walk into these same woods, and such
woods! you Western boys and girls could not possibly imagine them--the
old moss-covered logs, and immense trees cut down years ago and left to
lie there until all overgrown with mosses and lichens. I never before
experienced such a feeling of solitude as in that walk of over a mile in
length through those deep dark woods, where sometimes we had literally
to cut our way through with our little hatchets (we always carried them
with us when in the forest).

As I sauntered on, those lines of Longfellow's in Evangeline, came
unconsciously to my mind, so exactly did they describe the place:

This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks,
Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight,
Stand like Druids of old, with voices sad and prophetic.
Stand like harpe