[Illustration: THE TRAVELLERS AND THE BEAR.]
Two men being to travel through a forest together, mutually promised to
stand by each other in any danger they should meet upon the way. They
had not gone far before a Bear came rushing towards them out of a
thicket; upon which one, being a light nimble fellow, got up into a
tree; the other falling flat upon his face, and holding his breath, lay
still while the Bear came up and smelled at him; but that creature,
supposing him to be a dead carcass, went back again into the wood,
without doing him the least harm. When all was over, the Spark who had
climbed the tree came down to his companion, and, with a pleasant smile,
asked him what the Bear said to him--'For,' says he, 'I took notice that
he clapt his mouth very close to your ear.'----'Why,' replies the
other, 'he charged me to take care, for the future, not to put any
confidence in such cowardly rascals as you.'