Now, as they drew near the camp, they heard a strange commotion in its neighborhood; a medley of smothered angry growls, impatient whines, unwieldy floundering, and a dull thud and clank of iron, the excited squalling of a party of jays, and the chattering jeers of a red squirrel. Running forward in cautious haste, they presently discovered the cause of this odd confusion of noises to be a large black bear. His head was concealed in the pot-bellied syrup kettle, held fast in that position by the bail, that, in his eagerness to lick out the last drop of stolen sweet, had slipped behind his ears. His frantic efforts to get rid of his self-imposed muzzle were so funny that, after their first moment of bewilderment, the two spectators could but shout with laughter. Now upreared, the blindfolded bear would strike wildly at the kettle with his forepaws; then, falling on his back, claw it furiously with his hinder ones; then, regaining his feet, rush headlong till brought to a sudden stand by an unseen tree trunk. Recovering from the shock, he would remain motionless for a moment, as if devising some new means of relief, but would presently resume the same round of unavailing devices, with the constant accompaniment of smothered expressions of rage and terror. But there was little time for laughter when a precious kettle and a fat bear might at any moment be lost by the fracture of one and the escape of the other. Seth had no weapon but his axe, but with this he essayed prompt attack, the happy opportunity for which was at once offered. In one of his blind, unguided rushes, the bear charged directly toward the camp, till his iron-clad head struck with a resounding clang against the great boiling kettle. As he reeled backward from the shock, half stunned by it, and bewildered by the unaccustomed sound that still rang in his ears, Seth was beside him with axe uplifted. Only an instant he deliberated where and how to strike; at the skull he dared not with the axe-head, for fear of breaking the kettle, and he disliked to strike with the blade further back for fear of disfiguring the skin. But this was the preferable stroke, and in the next instant the axe-blade fell with a downright blow, so strong and well aimed that it severed the spinal column just forward of the shoulders. The great brute went down, paralyzed beyond all motion, to fall in a helpless heap and yield up his life with a few feeble gasps. “Oh, father,” cried Nathan, the first to break the sudden silence, with a voice tremulous in exultation, “to think we’ve got a bear. Won’t mother and Marthy be proud? and won’t Job think we’re real hunters?” Waiting but a moment to stroke the glossy fur and lift a huge inert paw, but such a little while ago so terrible, he sped home to bring his mother and sister to see the unexpected prize, while the jays renewed their querulous outcry, and the squirrel vociferously scoffed the fallen despoiler of his stolen nuts.