abbage were appearing, the heat generated
by their growth producing an open place in the snow about them. The
odour from which the name is derived was not at all offensive to the
bear who eagerly devoured many of the plants, varying the diet with
roots and small twigs swelling with sap.

In the damp hollows the coarse grass was turning green, and before long
the swamps were noisy with the shrill voice of the hylas, while the
streams once more teemed with fish.

As the season advanced Mokwa grew fat and contented, exerting himself
only enough to shuffle from one good feeding ground to another. He would
grunt complainingly at any extra exertion, as, for instance, that which
was required to reach the small wild sweet apples which he dearly loved,
and which were clustered thickly on their small trees at the edge of the
forest. At this season Mokwa's diet was almost strictly vegetarian and
the smaller creatures of the wilderness, upon which he sometimes preyed,
had little to fear from him.

The long summer days drifted by and autumn was not far away. Mokwa grew
restless; both his food and surroundings palled upon him. At length,
following a vague though persistent inner impulse, he turned his face
northward toward the hills which had been his birthplace and from which
he had been so strangely carried.

Long before daylight he had taken the trail and, in spite of the
protests of his overfed body, had pushed steadily on, pausing at the
edge of the tamarack swamp long enough to open with his sharp claws a
rotting log that lay in his path, a log which yielded him a meal of fat
grubs. Then he shambled on, drawn by some irresistible force. The mist
which hung like a white veil over the low ground bordering the swamp was
fast dissolving in curling wisps of vapor under the ardent rays of the
sun. The forest was alive with bird song; squirrels chattered to him
from the trees and the rattle of the kingfisher was in his ears, but
Mokwa held a steady course northward, his little eyes fixed on some
unseen goal.

About noon he came out upon the bank of the Little Vermilion, not far
from the place where he had so narrowly escaped death on the floating
ice. The roar of the falls came to him clearly on the still air and the
big bear shivered. If he remembered his wild ride, however, the memory
was quickly effaced by the discovery of a blueberry thicket, a luscious
storehouse that apparently had never been rifled. Mokwa feasted
greedily