34 WILD BROTHER 
to buy him. I would n’t any more sell Bruno than 
I would sell my baby, and you must know that I 
would n’t sell my baby.” 
Just to try her, I took twenty-five dollars from 
my pocket and asked her to accept it, remarking 
that I had understood that it was for sale, and in 
fact I had been told before I left Boston that it had 
been sold. 
“No, sir, it is ot for sale,” she emphatically re- 
plied: “not for twenty times twenty-five dollars. 
You could n’t carry enough money in your pockets 
to buy this bear, Mr. Underwood.” 
This seemed quite final, but I inquired further 
about the letter that I had received telling me of 
the sale. And this is the story that I was told, first 
by Mrs. Weldon, and afterward by some of the men. 
The first time Gordon, the boss of the camp, 
went out to the settlement and told about the 
little bear, some commercial traveling men, hear- 
ing the story, offered to buy the cub. They thought 
that they might make some money by exhibiting 
a bear which had been brought up in such an un- 
usual way. To bind the bargain and make sure of 
their prize, they gave the boss a check. A few 
days later, Gordon went back into the woods to 
get the cub, but the woman refused to give it up. 
It was her bear, she had saved its life, and no one 
was going to take it from her. 
