o say anything, which he had not. However, the
polite beast respected her scruples; so the only way in which he could
testify his gratitude was by remaining to dinner. They had the
housedog for dinner that day, though, from some false notion of
hospitable etiquette, the woman and children did not take any.

On the next day, punctually at the same hour, the bear came again with
another thorn, and stayed to dinner as before. It was not much of a
dinner this time--only the cat, and a roll of stair-carpet, with one
or two pieces of sheet music; but true gratitude does not despise even
the humblest means of expression. The succeeding day he came as
before; but after being relieved of his torment, he found nothing
prepared for him. But when he took to thoughtfully licking one of the
little girl's hands, "that answered not with a caress," the mother
thought better of it, and drove in a small heifer.

He now came every day; he was so old a friend that the formality of
extracting the thorn was no longer observed; it would have contributed
nothing to the good understanding that existed between him and the
widow. He thought that three or four instances of Good Samaritanism
afforded ample matter for perpetual gratitude. His constant visits
were bad for the live stock of the farm; for some kind of beast had to
be in readiness each day to furnish forth the usual feast, and this
prevented multiplication. Most of the textile fabrics, too, had
disappeared; for the appetite of this animal was at the same time
cosmopolitan and exacting: it would accept almost anything in the way
of _entremets_, but something it would have. A hearthrug, a hall-mat,
a cushion, mattress, blanket, shawl, or other article of wearing
apparel--anything, in short, that was easy of ingestion was graciously
approved. The widow tried him once with a box of coals as dessert to
some barn-yard fowls; but this he seemed to regard as a doubtful
comestible, seductive to the palate, but obstinate in the stomach. A
look at one of the children always brought him something else, no
matter what he was then engaged on.

It was suggested to Mrs. Pinworthy that she should poison the bear;
but, after trying about a hundredweight of strychnia, arsenic, and
Prussic acid, without any effect other than what might be expected
from mild tonics, she thought it would not be right to go into
toxicology. So the poor Widow Pinworthy went on, patiently enduring
the consumption of her cattl