8 



RECREATION. 



WAITING FOR IT TO COOL. 



this would keep him quiet until morn- 

 ing. Not a bit of it. He would get 

 hungry all the same and dig out of 

 his swaddling cloth. He would come 

 whining and crying around in the 

 tent, and there was no rest for any of 

 us until he had had a lunch. The boys 

 gave vent to a great deal of profan- 

 ity about these frequent interruptions 

 of their slumbers, but they were so 

 fond of little Ben that none of us 

 would for a moment entertain a 

 proposition either to kill him or to 

 leave him in the woods ; so we kept 

 our nursery running day and night, 

 even if we had to work overtime. 



While Ben was in his infancy, and 

 was being fed on spoon victuals, we 

 would sometimes make a gravy of 

 milk and flour, and add perhaps a 

 little bacon grease, or something else 

 we thought he might like, and with- 

 in 3 days after we commenced to pre- 

 pare such food, he learned to recog- 

 nize the frying pan when he saw it 

 taken out. When one of us would 

 pick it up and start for the fire, he 



would squall and follow us. He would 

 scramble over us, stand up on his 

 hind feet and watch the proceedings 

 as impatiently as a child would watch 

 the preparation of its breakfast. When 

 the mess was cooked he was at first 

 eager to jump into it, but he soon 

 learned it must first cool before he 

 could eat it. Then he would sit by 

 the frying pan and lick his chops, 

 whine, and dig up the ground around 

 it in impatience. Occasionally he 

 would feel of it with his paw to see 

 if the mess was cool enough to eat. As 

 soon as it reached a temperature that 

 was safe for him, he would put his feet 

 on the edge of the frying pan, chuck 

 his nose in, drink and lap as long as 

 he could hold his breath. Then he 

 would stop, and after a moment of 

 breathing, would sail in again. 



As soon as Ben was old enough 

 so we thought his stomach would 

 stand it, we gave him pieces of fresh 

 meat and bacon. At first we cooked 

 it for him, then we gave him a taste 

 of it in the raw state. He seemed to 



