of it, and swung his weight back and forth as hard as he could, he
might loosen it that way. So he ran up to the top limbs and caught hold
tight, and rocked this way and that with all his might, and pretty soon
he felt his bear-ladder begin to rock, too. Then he rocked a good deal
harder, and all of a sudden down it went and little Cousin Redfield Bear
flew over into a pile of stove-wood, and for ten minutes didn't know
whether he was killed or not, he felt so poorly. Then he crawled over to
a flat stone and sat down on it, and cried, and felt of himself to see
if he was injured anywhere; and he did not feel at all like bothering
with his bear-ladder any more, or eating molasses, either.

"But that was quite early in the day, and after Cousin Redfield had sat
there awhile he didn't feel so discouraged. His pains nearly all went
away, and he began to feel that if he had some molasses now it would
cure him. So then he got up and went over to look at the ladder, and
took hold of it, and found that it wasn't very heavy, as it was pine,
and very dead and dry. He could drag it to the cave easy enough, but
when he got it there he couldn't set it up straight. He was too short,
and not strong enough, either.

[Illustration: SAT DOWN ON THE STONE TO THINK AGAIN AND CRY SOME MORE]

"So little Cousin Redfield went back and sat down on his stone to think
again and cry some more, because he found several new hurting places
that were not quite cured yet. Then he noticed the clothes-line, and
thought he might do something with that. He could get that down easy
enough, for it was not very high. Cousin Redfield had often hung out
the clothes on it himself. So he untied the ends of the clothes-line and
tied one end of it to the top of his bear-ladder, but didn't know what
to do with the other end, until he happened to see the big hooks in the
top of the cave where his father hung meat when they had a good supply.

"So then Reddie made a bunch of the other end of the rope and threw it
at those hooks, and kept on throwing it until after a while it caught on
one of them, and enough of it hung down for him to get hold of. Cousin
Redfield, for a small bear, was really quite smart to think of all that.

"It wasn't easy, though, even now, to get the bear-ladder up straight.
Reddie pulled, and tugged, and propped his feet against the side of the
cave, and the table and benches, and got out of breath, and was panting
and hot and his sore place