"Holloa!" he cried, abruptly modulating his voice into quite a different key, "who sits here, at this late hour, on Manitou hill, hiding himself from my moonshines?" And with these pleasant preliminaries to their better acquaintances, his bearship seated himself upon his stump of a tail, with his amiable muzzle directly confronting the boy, as though he were in for a good, long talk and meant to be at his ease while so engaged. He had the look of one who was conscious of being the possessor of immense wisdom, and was accustomed to seeing whatever he might choose to let drop from his sagacious jaw waited for, snatched at and borne away as precious bits to be treasured up for lifelong use. The moccasins daintily adjusted themselves beside the bear, the toe of the left foot resting on the ground, with the heel turned upward, as if the wearer were standing with his legs crossed, and with the left arm thrown carelessly over the bear's shoulders. The attitude was, doubtless, an easy and graceful one: too fine, indeed, to be all lost in the air. But it pleased Sprigg exceedingly just as it was. It made him feel that the bear could not be such a terrible fellow after all, if the moccasins could make themselves so completely at home in his presence. "Who, I say?" repeated the bear. "Who sits here at this late hour on Manitou hill, hiding himself from my moonshine? What's wrong about my moonshine?" But Sprigg said never a word, moved never a limb, winked never an eye. "I say, what's wrong about my moonshine? If you have a tongue, speak!" Poor Sprigg had a tongue, but it stuck fast to the roof of his mouth, and when he world have told the bear as much, it stuck still faster. "Speak, I tell you! None of your mums with me!" the bear's voice terribly gruff by this time. "If you don't----" "Sir!" gasped out Sprigg at last. "Sir!" mockingly echoed the bear. "Sir! and is 'Sir' all a boy has to say for himself, who dodged my moonshine? I knew that much before. Now, sir, to the purpose, and tell me something I don't know." "Yes, sir," which was as near to the purpose as anything the boy could think of just then. His grim questioner looked at him with so hard a countenance that it kept his scared wits from performing the very office demanded of them. "Now, there is some sense in that," remarked the bear, with a grim smile and with a nod of the head to the right, as if the comment was intended for his ear, who stood there; and Sprigg could see that the moccasins shook, as if the wearer were laughing heartily. "Having discovered that he has a tongue," continued the bear, "we will now take a fresh start and find out, if we can, what stuff the cub is made of. Now, sir, what's your name?" "Sprigg," replied the boy, glad to have an opportunity, at last, of saying something to the purpose. "Is that an English name, or Indian name?" inquired the bear. "It is my name, sir; and you can see that I am not an Indian, by my coonskin cap."