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he cubs watched him in wonder. Fearing that Mother Bruin might at any moment appear and misunderstand the situation, the Hermit was about to call the dog and return to the house, leaving the bears in possession of the tree. Before he could pucker his lips for a whistle, however, the situation was taken from his hands. One of the cubs, upon shifting his position, loosened a small apple which fell directly into the upturned face of the dog. With a yelp of pain and astonishment Pal scuttled for the cabin, his tail between his legs and his interest in bear cubs suddenly evaporating. The Hermit looked up in mock reproach at the cub. "Aren't you ashamed to treat my dog that way after I fed you sugar and gave you my lunch?" he asked. "And now I suppose I shall have to give you more sugar to get you to come down. I don't care to have Mother Bruin with her three hundred odd pounds roosting in my apple tree." He went to the house, returning with a number of lumps of sugar and several apples. The cubs at once scrambled from the tree, keeping their eyes greedily upon the good things with which they allowed themselves to be tolled some distance into the woods. There the Hermit left them to feast while he made good time back to the cabin and his chastened dog. In their wanderings one day in late summer the cubs, now so fat and well fed that their gait was a mere waddle, came upon a great patch of blueberries. Here was a treat indeed. They rose upon their hind legs and greedily stripped the branches until their faces were so stained with juice that Mother Bruin would scarcely have recognized them. Now it happened that they had found the same blueberry patch on the bank of the Little Vermilion that Mokwa, the big bear, had discovered after his strange ride the year before. And as so often happens, history repeated itself. The cubs wandered to the edge of the river, and seeing a log with one end resting on the bank and the other in the water, the more venturesome of the twins crouched upon it with his face close to the water to look for fish. His weight at the end caused the log to tip. Into the river he went, heels over head, while the log slipped loose from its moorings. At that point the water was not deep and the bear soon regained his feet but, as he scrambled back upon the log, it drifted farther out. The next moment it was caught by the current and carried swiftly along, the little bear crouching upon it in a frightened
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