“I did that just to show you how I get out of a tree when I am really in a hurry,” explained Buster. “I don't climb trees much now unless it is for honey, but when I was a little fellow I used to love to climb trees.” Suddenly Buster sat up very straight and pointed his nose up in the wind. An anxious look crept into his face. He cocked his ears as if listening with all his might. That is just what he was doing. Presently he dropped down to all fours. “Excuse me,” said he, “I think I had better be going. Farmer Brown is coming down the Lone Little Path.” Buster turned and disappeared at a speed that was simply astonishing in such a clumsy-looking fellow. Old Mother Nature laughed. “Buster's eyes are not very good,” said she, “but there is nothing the matter with his nose or with his ears. If Buster says that Farmer Brown is coming down the Lone Little Path, there is no doubt that he is, although he may be some distance away yet. Buster has been smart enough to learn that he has every reason to fear man, and he promptly takes himself out of the way at the first hint that man is near. It is a funny thing, but most men are as afraid of Buster as Buster is of them, and they haven't the least need of being afraid at all. Where man is concerned there isn't one of you little people more timid than Buster Bear. The faintest smell of man will make him run. If he should be wounded or cornered, he would fight. Mrs. Bear would fight to protect her babies, but these are the only conditions under which a Black Bear will face a man. You think Buster is big, and he is, but Buster has relatives very much bigger than he. He has one beside whom he would look actually small. I'll tell you a little about these cousins of Buster.” CHAPTER XXXIII Buster Bear's Big Cousins Buster Bear had been right about the coming of Farmer Brown. It was only a few minutes after Buster's disappearance that Farmer Brown's footsteps were heard coming down the Lone Little Path, and of course that ended school for that morning. But the next morning all were on hand again at sun-up, for every one wanted to hear about Buster Bear's big cousins. “Way out in the mountains of the Far West, where Whistler the Marmot and Little Chief the Pika live, is a big cousin of Buster Bear,” began Old Mother Nature. “He is Silvertip the Grizzly Bear, and in the past no animal in all this great country was so feared by man, as he. But times have changed, and Silvertip has been so hunted with terrible guns that he has learned to fear man quite as much as Buster does.