devour it. It would take but a moment
or two, and the baby could come afterward.

The boy gave a frightened glance behind him as he jumped off the
platform and scrambled up the bank with the baby in his arms. He saw
that the bear had paused, and a gleam of hope came to him. He put the
baby down on its feet and started to run with it. But the baby was
heavy; its legs besides being, as already remarked, very fat, were very
short, and progress was not rapid. The bear, the boy knew, would not be
occupied with the luncheon long. He reached the windlass where the mule
had worked, and leaned pantingly against the post holding the cord by
pulling which the weight was released from the top of the timbers on the
barge. A wild idea of trying to climb the post with the baby came into
his head. He looked up and noticed the cord.

Like a flash came to the terrified boy a great thought. If he dared only
stop a moment! If he dared try to pull the cord as he had seen his
father do and release the trigger which sustained the great weight!
There was the bear right under it!

Even as this thought came to Johnny the bear looked up and growled.
Johnny grabbed at the baby and started to run again, but the baby
stumbled and rolled over into a little hollow with its fat legs sticking
upward. In desperation Johnny jumped back and caught at the cord. He
pulled with all his might, but the trigger at the top of the pile-driver
sustained a great burden and the thing required more than Johnny's
strength. "Come, baby, quick!" he cried. "Put your arm about me and lean
back!" The young gentleman addressed had regained his feet again and was
placid. He waddled up, put his arm about Johnny, and leaned back
sturdily. The bear looked up again and growled, this time more
earnestly. The luncheon was about finished. Johnny set his teeth and
pulled again. The baby added, say, thirty pounds to the pull. It was
just what was needed. There was a creak at the top of the pile-driver,
and then--

"W-h-i-r-r! T-h-u-d!"

Six hundred pounds of iron dropped from a height of twenty-five feet on
the small of the back of an elephant would finish him. It is more than
enough for a bear. Over the river and through the forest went out one
awful roar of brute agony, then all was still. A bear with its backbone
broken and crushed down into its stomach is just as dead as a chipmunk
would be under the same circumstances. For a moment the silence
prevailed, to be followed by