An Agreeable Disappointment.
"Sing a song of moccasins,
Pockets full of rye.
Four and twenty black bears.
Sniff! I smell a lie!"
So said the bear, in a nursery, sing-song tone of voice; then fetching a
quick sniff at the air, began peering about him--first this way, then
that way, then another way--every way, indeed, but straight at Sprigg.
"First behead the headsman,
Then we'll fry the friar;
Next we'll hang the hangman.
Snuff! I smell a liar!"
Again said the bear, still jingling out his words, and still stiffly
sniffing the air. He now looked down at the earth, then up at the moon,
then straight at Sprigg.
"Holloa!" he cried, abruptly modulating his voice into quite a different
key, "who sits here, at this late hour, on Manitou hill, hiding himself
from my moonshines?" And with these pleasant preliminaries to their
better acquaintances, his bearship seated himself upon his stump of a
tail, with his amiable muzzle directly confronting the boy, as though
he were in for a good, long talk and meant to be at his ease while so
engaged. He had the look of one who was conscious of being the possessor
of immense wisdom, and was accustomed to seeing whatever he might choose
to let drop from his sagacious jaw waited for, snatched at and borne
away as precious bits to be treasured up for lifelong use.
The moccasins daintily adjusted themselves beside the bear, the toe of
the left foot resting on the ground, with the heel turned upward, as if
the wearer were standing with his legs crossed, and with the left arm
thrown carelessly over the bear's shoulders. The attitude was,
doubtless, an easy and graceful one: too fine, indeed, to be all lost in
the air. But it pleased Sprigg exceedingly just as it was. It made him
feel that the bear could not be such a terrible fellow after all, if the
moccasins could make themselves so completely at home in his presence.
"Who, I say?" repeated the bear. "Who sits here at this late hour on
Manitou hill, hiding himself from my moonshine? What's wrong about my
moonshine?"
But Sprigg said never a word, moved never a limb, winked never an eye.
"I say, what's wrong about my moonshine? If you have a tongue, speak!"
Poor Sprigg had a tongue, but it stuck fast to the roof of his mouth,
and when he world have told the bear as much, it stuck still faster.
"Speak, I tell you! None of your mums with me!" the bear's voice
terribly gruff by this time. "If you don't----"
"Sir!" gasped out Sprigg at last.
"Sir!" mockingly echoed the bear. "Sir! and is 'Sir' all a boy has to
say for himself, who dodged my moonshine? I knew that much before. Now,
sir, to the purpose, and tell me something I don't know."
"Yes, sir," which was as near to the purpose as anything the boy could
think of just then. His grim questioner looked at him with so hard a
countenance that it kept his scared wits from performing the very office
demanded of them.
"Now, there is some sense in that," remarked the bear, with a grim smile
and with a nod of the head to the right, as if the comment was intended
for his ear, who stood there; and Sprigg could see that the moccasins
shook, as if the wearer were laughing heartily.
"Having discovered that he has a tongue," continued the bear, "we will
now take a fresh start and find out, if we can, what stuff the cub is
made of. Now, sir, what's your name?"
"Sprigg," replied the boy, glad to have an opportunity, at last, of
saying something to the purpose.
"Is that an English name, or Indian name?" inquired the bear.
"It is my name, sir; and you can see that I am not an Indian, by my
coonskin cap."
"Bless a body!" exclaimed the bear, "but that was well turned. Now,
sir, as you are getting a little glib, will you go still further and
tell us how old you are?"
"Twelve years old, sir, next June-day come a year," replied the boy, in
the peculiar sing-song way in which old-fashioned children were wont to
answer the question.
"Why, that's to-day, you young gump!" cried the bear, "and your answer
still leaves me in the fog as to your age--whether it's eleven or
twelve.'
"I was eleven years old the last time, and I was to be twelve years old
the next time, whenever that might be."
"Better and better," quoth the bear, with an approving nod, "and now I
shouldn't be surprised if he were prepared to tell us whose son he is.
Can you tell us that?"
"Oh, yes, sir, very easily!"
"Then why don't you, and prove it?"
"My pap's name is Jervis Whitney, and my mam's name is Elster Whitney;"
and the poor little runaway choked as he pronounced the dear names.
Whereupon, as if musing on what he had just heard, the bear made that
peculiar sound, which, uttered through the nose, with the lips closed,
amounts to a doubtful, undecided yes: "Oo-hooh"--then a pause--"he says
his pap's name is Jervis Whitney."
"Yes, sir, and my grandpap's name is Jervis Whitney, too," added
Sprigg, thinking that the fuller he gave his pedigree, the more
satisfactory might prove his information, "and I have an uncle who goes
by the name of Benjamin Whitney, who was shot through the knees at the
battle of Brandywine, so that he now goes about on wooden legs."
"And the better husband for his pegs, too, I warrant you," quoth the
bear, "for he will stick by his wife so long as she will stick to him."
"Yes, sir, and I have another uncle, who goes by the name of----"
"Ooh-hooh," said the bear, relapsing into his musing mood, "he has
another uncle. But, Jervis Whitney--now, where did I ever hear that
name? It sounds as familiar to my ear as the hum of a bee.
Ooh-hooh--Jervis Whitney. Yes, yes! Now I have it! I know the man; know
him like a book! It's the white hunter, whom Will-o'-the-Wisp and I fell
in with one moonshiny night last week; and a very pleasant sort of a
fellow we found him, too. Yes, and I gave him a pair of red moccasins
for his little son. Yes, and he told me his son's name was Sprigg. All
as clear as moonshine now. Sprigg!"
"Sir!" The urchin would have said "what" to pap and mam.
"A particular friend of yours sent you a pair of red moccasins one night
last week--did your father deliver them to you?"
"Yes, sir."
"Have you worn them yet?"
"Yes, sir."
"Have you worn them to-day?" To which, after a pause, Sprigg owned that
he had.
"Did you have them on when you left home?"
"Well, no, sir; not exactly."
"But I want it exactly--yes or no."
"Well, I was barefooted when I left the house, and wasn't barefooted
when I left the spring."
"What particular place did you have in your mind, as your journey's end,
when you set out from home?"
"Grandpap's house, sir."
"And did you ask permission of your father or mother, sir?"
"Yes, sir."
"And did you obtain their permission?" The bear's eyes, by this time, as
sharp as gimblets; as piercing as sprig-awls. Sprigg made a long pause
before answering this question; and when, at last, he did do so, he
pulled out the words, as a dentist pulls out teeth--with a twist and a
wince--"No, sir, I didn't."
"Did any one see you as you were taking your departure?"
"Yes, sir; mam saw me as I was climbing the fence."
"And what did your mam say to you, as you were climbing the fence?"
"She asked me where I was going with the big cedar bucket."
"And what did you tell her? Now, have a care, Sprigg! Be certain you
come square up!" and the bear raised his right fore-foot paw with a
warning gesture, awful to see, at the same time showing a double row of
teeth, which gleamed like crooked little dirks in the moonshine.
"Oh! Please, sir, don't look at me so with your teeth! I don't like to
see you look that way!" and our hero mashed up his face for a cry.
"Oh, you don't like my looks, hey! Hold your brine! You don't like my
looks! Aye, and bad boys never do! Never did! So, when bad boys find
fault with my looks, I just say: 'If you don't like 'em, you can lump
'em.' That's what I say. 'It's your own fault, if my looks don't please
your fancy.' I say that, too. 'You see right, and I'll look right,'
that's something more I say. Now, sir, out with it--straight as an
arrow, plump as a bullet--what did you tell your mother, as you were
climbing the fence?" And the bear again raised his right fore paw, and
showed the double row of crooked little dirks.
"Oh! if you please, sir, don't look that way," said our hero, still with
his face mashed up for a cry. "Please don't look at me so with your
long, sharp teeth! It scares me all but into fits! My name's Sprigg!"
"And who said it wasn't?" growled the bear; and then in a mocking tone
added: "Oh, he is trying to dodge me, is he? His name's Sprigg, is it?
With this for a fresh start, we'll pass on again to his age, and from
that to his pedigree; when he will tell us how his Brandywine uncle took
to preaching, because of his wooden legs. Speaking of preachers, up
comes his catechism, which, when well said, good little boys get the pat
on the head and go out to play. Thus, he was going to lead us by the
nose from point to point, till the point in point was clean lost sight
of. No, no, my sly cub; you don't bamboozle an old bear so easily as all
that. Then out with it at once, and mind how you blink it again! What
did you tell your mother?"
Sprigg would have blinked it still, but when he had looked this way and
that way at the bear, and down at the moccasins and up at the man in the
moon, he saw that to dodge the question longer were but to hide his
head, so to speak, under a fence rail, like a goose, or a pig, and fool
himself into thinking he was safe. So, with a great gulp, to keep his
heart down, which would come heaving up to his throat, he at last cried
out:
"Oh, I told her a lie! I told her a lie!" and bursting into tears, he
hid his face in his coonskin cap for shame.
The bear paused for a moment; then, in a voice quite soft and gentle for
him, said:
"But you mourn in your heart for having done this thing?"
"Yes, indeed; that I do!" and the little prodigal shook from top to toe
with the violence of his sobs.
"And for why?" asked the bear, in the same gentle way, only more so,
almost fatherly.
"Because," sobbed the boy, "had I not done so, I should not be here now,
in this dark and lonesome place, with nobody for company, nobody to give
me my supper, nobody to put me to bed, nobody to--to--"
"And nobody to sing you to sleep with a hymn, hey!" put in the bear with
a mocking grin, his fatherly manner gone In a twinkling. "No, no, my
laddie! You are showing me the matter wrong side out, giving it to me
wrong end foremost. You must mourn in your heart for the little lie you
have told, before you put up such a pitiful mouth for the ills you have
thereby brought upon yourself. Viewed in the right light, these ills are
precisely what you deserve; precisely what you need for your own good.
But come, quiet down and cheer up, and take a fresh start; go on and
make a clean breast of it by telling us the whole story. You climbed the
fence----"
Thus put to it, Sprigg fell to and told the whole thing, from beginning
to end--all just as it had happened. Indeed, he made so clean a breast
of it as to confess that he had cursed the moccasins on flinging them
away in his pet of wrath. When he had ended, greatly surprised was that
little sinner to find how much better he felt that, for once in his
life, he had told the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. The grim
confessor had kept his eyes the while fixed full and hard on those of
the young delinquent, without saying a word. Now he turned his head to
the right, with a look as were he inquiring of him who stood in the
moccasins if what they had heard were true. This look must have been
answered by an affirmative nod from the head in the air, which Sprigg
could not see; for, with a soft "Ooh-hooh," long drawn out, the bear
bent his eyes to the ground, as if he must needs meditate awhile on what
he had heard before he could fairly make up his mind what to say or do
next. Thus he remained for some moments, absorbed in thought; then,
looking up at Sprigg, he gravely shook his head--took several little
spells of shaking it before breaking the awful silence.
"It's a bad case, Sprigg; a mighty bad case, indeed. But before we
proceed any further, you may as well tell me how you like the looks of
the bull and the cat and the wolf--as well as do you mine?"
"Oh, no, indeed, sir! Not half so well!" And Sprigg was perfectly
sincere in the compliment. The bear improved the looks so complimented
by a beaming smile of gratified vanity; and the boy could perceive that
the moccasins were again agitated, as if the imp, or elf, or whatever it
was that stood in them, were laughing in his sleeves.
"It is true, Sprigg," resumed the bear, with a look of bland
self-satisfaction, "quite true that I have a rough coat and a rough
voice, and, it may be, a rough way with me sometimes, but they who know
me best can and do testify that my heart is in the right place, for all
that; and that it is a truer and kinder heart than many a one that beats
under wool, or fur, or even buckskin. But I am deviating and bearing
rather too near upon the unpardonable. A person may sooner hope to find
forgiveness for speaking ill of his neighbor than well of himself. Vice
versa, he who speaks to his own discredit, as you, Sprigg, have just
been doing, gains more credit thereby than were he to speak in the
highest praise of another. And why? Because those who listen to such a
person are sure to begin thinking of their own merits, while he is
confessing his demerits; and to think of them is to discover how immense
they are. This is a fact, for which we need not go one step out of our
way to find an example. We have it right here. The bad account you have
given of yourself had set me to thinking the better of myself. Your
confession of fault, putting me in a good humor with myself, puts me
also in a good humor with you. My merits, then, and your demerits are on
the best of terms. In short, Sprigg, to sum it all up in a nutshell, I
am not only one of the best fellows in the world, but one of the best
friends you ever had, or ever shall have; which assurance, though you
may doubt it now, I will prove to your entire satisfaction, even while
yet the month of June is young and rosy."
"Sprigg!" The boy said, "Sir," and the bear went on: "You have been a
bad boy to-day; indeed, you have been a bad boy all the days of your
life. You have never yet seen that day, Sprigg--neither winter nor
summer--when, eating a Christmas pie, you could put in your thumb and
pull out a plum and say: 'What a good boy am I!' Yet, to be just, you
are a boy of excellent parts in many ways, which encourages us to hope
that we may yet be able to bring out the good that is in you, and, at
the same time, bring out the evil; at any rate, crumple it up where it
is, which amounts to the same. How this desirable end is to be attained
is not yet quite clear to my own mind. So you will have to go home with
us to-night, where you shall make the acquaintance of our cubs, who will
gladly share their bed with you. And pleasant bed-fellows shall you find
them, too--so soft and warm! So affectionate, too! Only you mustn't let
them hug you too hard. Meanwhile, I shall consider your case, which,
being a peculiar one, I shall lay before my wife, that I may have the
benefit of her good advice. This she will gladly give, believe me; for
there is nothing in the world that pleases a wife more than for her
husband to beg the benefit of her good advice. Though I fear it is the
misfortune with some husbands--I won't say how many--to have wives so
overstocked with the treasure in question that they can not wait to be
called on, but must give it gratis, whether anybody wants it or not.
Like giving a man a bottle of bear's grease for his hair, when his scalp
is already sufficiently oily by nature; or by giving a boy a bearskin
cap, when he has already a coonskin one of his own, which answers every
purpose, especially if the tail is left on. These are the wives who save
their husbands' grindstones from being eaten by the cows, and thereby
keep their scissors sharp, to say nothing of their tongues."