had started in great haste
to get up to the spot, and give assistance. In running forward, he
scarce looked before him; and was dashing recklessly through among
trees, when his head came in contact with a large bees' nest, which was
suspended upon a vine that stretched across the path. The nest was
constructed out of agglutinated mud, and attached only slightly to the
vine; and Ossaroo, having become entangled in the latter, shook it so
violently that the nest fell down, broke into pieces, and set the whole
swarm of angry bees about his ears. It was just then that he had been
heard crying out, and that Karl and Caspar had run to his rescue; which
act both of them now said they very much regretted. They were hardly in
earnest, however; and Ossaroo, having procured an herb from the woods,
the sap of which soon alleviated the pain of the stings, in a short time
the tempers of all three were restored to their usual equanimity.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

THE AXIS AND PANTHER.

The maternal solicitude displayed by the bear in endeavouring to carry
her young out of danger, had quite won the admiration of the
plant-hunters; and now that the excitement of the conflict was over,
they experienced some pangs of regret at having killed the creature.
But the thing was done, and could not be helped. Besides, as Ossaroo
informed them, these bears are esteemed a great nuisance in the country.
Descending from their mountain retreats, or issuing out of the jungle
during the season of the crops, they commit very destructive
depredations upon the produce of the farmer, often entering his very
garden without fear, and in a single night laying waste the contents of
a whole enclosure. On hearing this, both Karl and Caspar were more
contented with what they had done. Perhaps, reflected they, had these
two cubs lived to grow up, they or their mother might have devastated
the paddy-field of some poor jemindar, or farmer, and he and his family
might have been put to great distress by it.

Whether or not their reasoning was correct, it satisfied the two boys,
and quieted their consciences about the killing of the bears. But as
they continued their journey, they still conversed of the curious
circumstance of the old one carrying off her cubs in the manner she was
doing. Karl had read of such a habit in animals--which is common to
many other sorts along with the bears--such as the great ant-eater of
South America, the opossum, and most kin