66 The Poets Beasts. 



everything, it doats on honey. Dx) you remember the 

 shabby trick of Sir Reynard when he takes poor Bruin from 

 Malepardus to the carpenter's house on the pretence of 

 giving him honeycombs? The bear arrives at the castle 

 of the defaulting fox, and finds Reynard pretending to be 

 sick. He had eaten, he said, something that had disagreed 

 with him. "What was it?" asks the bear with a friendly 

 solicitude. 



" ' Uncle,' replied the other, ' what will it avail you to know? The 

 food was simple and mean ; we poor gentry are no lords, you know, 

 but are glad to eat from necessity what others taste for mere wanton- 

 ness. Yet not to delay you, that which I ate was honeycombs, large, 

 full, and very pleasant. But, impelled by hunger, I ate so very im- 

 moderately that I was afterwards infinitely distempered.' * Ay ! ' 

 quoth Bruin, 'honeycombs, do you say? Hold you them in such 

 slight respect, nephew? Why, sir, it is food for the greatest emperors 

 in the world : help me, fair nephew, to some of these honeycombs, and 

 command me while I live ; for only a small share I will be your servant 

 everlastingly,' 'You are jesting with me, surely, uncle,' replied the 

 fox. 'Jest with you !' cried Bruin, 'beshrevv my heart, then; for I 

 am in such serious good earnest, that for a single lick of the same you 

 shall count me among the most faithful of your kindred.' 'Nay, if 

 you be,' returned Reynard, ' I will bring you where ten of you would 

 not be able to eat the whole at a meal. This I do out of friendship, 

 for I wish to have yours in return, which above all things I desire.' 

 ' Not ten of us ! ' cried the bear, ' not ten of us ! it is impossible ; for 

 had I all the honey between Hybia and Portugal, I could eat the whole 

 of it very shortly myself.' " 



So Bruin goes, gets his head caught in a cleft log, and 

 is very nearly killed. 



Its life is particularly innocent, and its manners, as a rule, 

 are the reverse of ferocious. Having satisfied itself with 

 berries and buds, the bear returns to its cave, and there, put- 

 ting its paws into its mouth, lies humming to itself like some 

 great baby, sucking its thumbs and crooning. It takes few 

 precautions against surprise, will stay out eating wild straw- 

 berries or acorns till the sun is fairly up, and will then 

 go into a cleft in the rock or hollow tree, and murmur 



