The night was black when he awoke, but Bears are not afraid of the
dark--they rather fear the day--and he swung along, led, as before, by
the impulse to get up above the danger; and thus at last he reached
the highest range, the region of his native Tallac.
He had but little of the usual training of a young Bear, but he had a
few instincts, his birthright, that stood him well in all the main
issues, and his nose was an excellent guide. Thus he managed to live,
and wild-life experiences coming fast gave his mind the chance to
grow.
Jack's memory for faces and facts was not at all good, but his memory
for smells was imperishable. He had forgotten Bonamy's cur, but the
smell of Bonamy's cur would instantly have thrilled him with the old
feelings. He had forgotten the cross ram, but the smell of "Old Woolly
Whiskers" would have inspired him at once with anger and hate; and one
evening when the wind came richly laden with ram smell it was like a
bygone life returned. He had been living on roots and berries for
weeks and now began to experience that hankering for flesh that comes
on every candid vegetarian with dangerous force from time to time. The
ram smell seemed an answer to it. So down he went by night (no
sensible Bear travels by day), and the smell brought him from the
pines on the hillside to an open rocky dale.
Long before he got there a curious light shone up.
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