THE BEAR MAKES A JOURNEY 55 
journey she got more exercise than I did. Oc- 
casionally we paused to rest the horses. All along 
the way we now began to see on the ground bits 
of charred and blackened leaves, which, on pre- 
vious days, had been carried on the dry air from the 
burning forest to the north of us. 
About one o’clock, while I was walking ahead, 
I came into a clearing where a log cabin stood. In 
the smoky atmosphere it did not look like Gordon’s 
camp. I rubbed my eyes and looked again. Yes, 
this was the place all right; we had approached it 
from a different direction, and there was Bruno 
climbing a tree near the cabin. The children, who 
were sitting in the doorway, sprang up and gave us 
a happy welcome. The family seemed not at all 
alarmed about the forest fires, though the smoke 
was now so thick that the tree-tops only a short 
distance away could hardly be seen through the 
murky air. 
In case the conflagration should sweep their way, 
the Weldons were prepared. A short distance be- 
hind the cabin, in the side of the bank, they had 
dug a pit ten feet deep and ten feet square. Over 
its top were sapling trees and spruce boughs, and 
over these dirt and sods. Into the brook, just 
below the spot where they had dug the under- 
ground room, they had thrown a quantity of earth, 
which had formed a dam and backed the water 
