Part 10 (1/2)
There are yellow moca.s.sins, or Ladies'-slippers, the same that I told you of a little while ago; and white lilies, crane-bills, and these pretty lilac geraniums; here are scarlet-cups, and blue lupines, they are all in bloom now, and many others. If we were on the Rice Lake plains, my lady, we could gather all these and many, many more. In the months of June I and July those plains are like a garden, and their roses scent the air.”
”Nurse, I will ask my dear papa to take me to the Rice Lake plains,” said the little girl, as she gazed with delight on the lovely Canadian flowers.
CHAPTER IX.
NURSE TELLS LADY MARY ABOUT A LITTLE BOY WHO WAS EATEN BY A BEAR IN THE PROVINCE OP NEW BRUNSWICK--OF A BABY THAT WAS CARRIED AWAY, BUT TAKEN ALIVE--A WALK IN THE GARDEN--HUMMING-BIRDS--CANADIAN BALSAMS.
”Nurse,” said Lady Mary, ”did you ever hear of any one having been eaten by a wolf or bear?”
”I have heard of such things happening, my dear, in this country; but only in lonely, unsettled parts of the country, near swamps and deep woods.”
”Did you ever hear of any little boy or girl having been carried off by a wolf or bear?” asked the child.
”No, my lady, not in Canada, though similar accidents may have happened there; but when I was a young girl I heard of such tragedies at New Brunswick; one of the British provinces lying to the east of this, and a cold and rather barren country, but containing many minerals, such as coal, limestone, and marble, besides vast forests of pine, and small lakes and rivers. It resembles Lower Canada in many respects; but it is not so pleasant as the province of Upper Canada, neither is it so productive.
”Thirty years ago it was not so well cleared or cultivated as it is now, and the woods were full of wild beasts that dwelt among the swamps and wild rocky valleys. Bears, wolves, and catamounts abounded, with foxes of several kinds, and many of the fine furred and smaller species of animals, which were much sought for, on account of their skins. Well, my dear, near the little village where my aunt and uncle were, living, there were great tracts of unbroken swamps and forests, which of course sheltered many wild animals. A sad accident happened a few days before we arrived, which caused much sorrow, and no little fright, in the place.
”An old man went out into the woods one morning with his little grandson, to look for the oxen, which had strayed from the clearing. They had not gone many yards from the enclosure when they heard a crackling and rustling among the underwood and dry timbers that strewed the ground. The old man, thinking it was caused by the cattle they were looking for, bade the little boy go forward and drive them, on the track; but in a few minutes he heard a fearful cry from the child, and hurrying forward through the tangled brushwood, saw the poor little boy in the deadly grasp of a huge black bear, who was making off at a fast trot with his prey.
”The old man was unarmed, and too feeble to pursue the dreadful beast. He could only wring his hands and rend his grey hairs in grief and terror; but his lamentations would not restore the child to life. A band of hunters and lumberers, armed with rifles and knives, turned out to beat the woods, and were not long in tracking the savage animal to his retreat in a neighbouring cedar swamp. A few fragments of the child's dress were all that remained of him; but the villagers had the satisfaction of killing the great she-bear with her two half-grown cubs. The magistrates of the district gave them a large sum for shooting these creatures, and the skins were sold, and the money given to the parents of the little boy; but no money could console them for the loss of their beloved child.
”The flesh of the bear is eaten both by Indians and hunters; it is like coa.r.s.e beef. The hams are cured a led, the woods disappear. The axe and the fire destroy the haunts that sheltered these wild beasts, and they retreat further back, where the deer and other creatures on which they princ.i.p.ally feed abound.”
”Nurse, that was a very sad story about the poor little boy,” said Lady Mary.
”I also heard of a little child,” continued nurse, ”not more than two years old, who was with her mother in the harvest field; who had spread a shawl on the ground near a tall tree, and laid the child upon it to sleep or play, when a bear came out of the wood and carried her off, leaping the fence with her in its arms; but the mother ran screaming after the beast, and the reapers pursued so closely with their pitchforks and reaping-hooks, that Bruin, who was only a half-grown bear, being hard pressed, made for a tree; and as it was not easy to climb with a babe in his arms, he quietly laid the little one down at the foot of the tree, and soon was among the thick branches out of the reach of the enemy. I dare say baby must have wondered what rough nurse had taken her up; but she was unhurt, and is alive now.”
”I am so glad, nurse, the dear baby was not hugged to death by that horrid black bear; and I hope he was killed.”
”I dare say, my lady, he was shot by some of the men; for they seldom worked near the forest without having a gun with them, in case of seeing deer, or pigeons, or partridges.”
”I should not like to live in that country, Mrs. Frazer; for a bear, a wolf, or a catamount might eat me.”
”I never heard of a governor's daughter being eaten by a bear,” said Mrs.
Frazer, laughing, as she noticed the earnest expression on the face of her little charge. She then continued her account of the ursine family.
”The bear retires in cold weather, and sleeps till warmer seasons awaken him; he does not lay up any store of winter provisions, because he seldom rouses himself during the time of his long sleep, and in the spring he finds food, both vegetable and animal, for he can eat anything when hungry, like the hog. He often robs the wild bees of their honey, and his hide being so very thick, seems insensible to the stings of the angry bees. Bruin will sometimes find odd places for his winter bed, for a farmer, who was taking a stack of wheat into his barn to be threshed in the winter time, once found a large black bear comfortably asleep in the middle of the sheaves.”
”How could the bear have got into the stack of wheat, nurse?”
”The claws of this animal are so strong, and he makes so much use of his paws, which are almost like hands, that he must have pulled the sheaves out, and so made an entrance for himself. His skin and flesh amply repaid the farmer for any injury the grain had received. I remember seeing the bear brought home in triumph on the top of the load of wheat. Bears often do great mischief by eating the Indian corn when it is ripening; for besides what they devour, they spoil a vast deal by trampling the plants down with their clumsy feet. They will, when hard pressed by hunger, come close to the farmer's house and rob the pig-sty of its tenants. Many years ago, before the forest was cleared away in the neighbourhood of what is now a large town, but in those days consisted of only a few poor log-houses, a settler was much annoyed by the frequent visits of a bear to his hog-pen.
At last he resolved to get a neighbour who was a very expert hunter to come with his rifle and watch with him. The pen where the fatling hogs were was close to the log-house; it had a long low s.h.i.+ngled roof, and was carefully fastened up, so that no bear could find entrance. Well, the farmer's son and the hunter had watched for two nights, and no bear came; on the third they were both tired, and lay down to sleep upon the floor of the kitchen, when the farmer's son was awakened by a sound as of some one tearing and stripping the s.h.i.+ngles from the pen. He looked out; it was moonlight, and there he saw the dark shadow of some tall figure on the ground, and spied the great black bear standing on its hinder legs, and pulling the s.h.i.+ngles off as fast as it could lay its big black paws upon them. The hogs were in a great fright, screaming and grunting with terror. The young man stepped back into the house, roused up the hunter, who took aim from the doorway, and shot the bear dead. The head of the huge beast was nailed up as a trophy, and the meat was dried or salted for winter use, and great were the rejoicings of the settlers who had suffered so much from Bruin's thefts of corn and pork.”
”I am glad the hunter killed him, nurse, for he might have eaten up some of the little children, when they were playing about in the fields.”
”Sometimes,” continued Mrs. Frazer, ”the bears used to visit the sugar-bush, when the settlers were making maple sugar, and overturn the sap-troughs, and drink the sweet liquid. I dare say they would have been glad of a taste of the sugar too, if they could have got at it. The bear is not so often met with now as it used to be many years ago. The fur of the bear used to be worn as m.u.f.fs and tippets, but, is now little used for that purpose, being thought to be too coa.r.s.e and heavy, but it is still made into caps for soldiers, and worn as sleigh-robes.”