to go home and notify the Old Squire
and Addison, in order that they, too, might join the hunt, if disposed.

I set off at a run again; but by this time I had become not a little
leg-weary; night, too, was at hand. The boys were milking, and I met the
Old Squire coming toward the house with two brimming pailfuls. "Old
'Three-Legs' has just killed one of Murches' sheep and a lamb, too!" I
shouted.

"Is that so?" said the old gentleman, but the intelligence did not
excite him so much as I had expected it would. He looked at me and said,
"You look badly heated. You have run too hard."

"But that old bear's killed a sheep!" I exclaimed. "They are all going
after him. They sent me to get you and the boys."

By this time Addison and Halstead had risen off their milking stools to
hear the tidings, and exhibited signs of interest.

"Did you see the bear, my son?" the Old Squire asked.

"Yes, siree!" I exclaimed, and thereupon I poured forth all the
particulars. "They want all of us to load our guns and go with them," I
cried expectantly.

"Well," remarked the Old Squire, with what seemed to me a very provoking
lack of enthusiasm. "If they are all going, I guess they will not need
us. You had better go to the well and wash your face and head in some
cold water, then rest a while and have your supper; it has been a very
hot day."

"But old Three-Legs!" I exclaimed. "He may get away!"

"Yes, he may," said Gramp, laughing. "I should not wonder if he did.

"I will tell you something about bears, my son," he went on,
good-naturedly. "A bear is quite a knowing animal, and sometimes very
cunning. This one they call old 'Three-Legs' is remarkably so. I'm very
sure that, if we all went over there as quick as we could, and stayed
around all night, we shouldn't find him. That bear knew just as well as
you did that you had gone to get help and would be back with it; and I
shouldn't wonder if by this time he was three miles away--and still
going. What that bear did after you and Ned left was to listen awhile,
till he made sure you were gone, then stuff himself with as much more of
that mutton as he could hold, and leave the place as fast as he could
go. He's gone, you may depend upon it;--and he will not come near that
place again for a week or two probably. That is bear nature and bear
wit. They seem to know some things almost as well as men. They know when
they kill sheep that men will make a fuss about it. That bear was lying