Vainka broke through the wall of our _berloga_ and deliberately stepped out. The man with the pole quickly got out of the way, while the other raised his gun. For an instant I was in dread lest he should not recognise my dear brother in time, and was on the point of rushing forth to strike him dead before he should have slaughtered poor confiding Vainka, when, luckily for us all (for I should not have been in time), he dropped his arm, raised his hand to shade his eyes, stared, and broke into a roar of laughter: "Why!" he cried, "strike me blind if it isn't dear old Mishka himself!" (The humans, for reasons best known to themselves, call us all "Mishka.") With these words, he rushed up to Vainka, caught hold of the chain (the wrench to V.'s nose must have been exceedingly painful!) put both arms round my brother's neck, and commenced to kiss and to hug him in the most comical manner. He really appeared to be quite fond of Vainka, and Vainka himself seemed almost as glad to greet _him_. Then the peasant took some lumps of the cooked rye, which my brother says is so delicious (and which, I may mention, I believe in my heart to be one of the chief causes of Vainka's marvellous attachment to the debased life he leads!), and fed his new-found and long-lost friend. Vainka dropped a large piece of it on the ground, and I imagine the good fellow meant it for me; but the frugal peasant picked it up and pocketed it, so that I was not able to taste the vaunted stuff--bah! I'm sure it isn't up to July oats or honey, or even baby--which is delicious when one happens to be of a carnivorous turn of mind, as one is sometimes. Then they all went away and left me, never dreaming--as Vainka rightly anticipated--that another bear lay concealed within the _berloga_, and that Master Mishka, as they called him, was but my guest. Ha! ha! I should have liked to have dashed out and smashed them both--the men, I mean, when their backs were turned! I burned to do it--but discretion gained the day: there was that accursed fire-stick to be reckoned with: I have been told that guns can be made to spit their fire in an instant even when a man has been knocked down and is lying upon the ground. So I refrained and stayed where I was, and in a while fell asleep once more, sleeping safely and comfortably until April, when I left the den and went out once again upon my travels. I had one other visit from Vainka, a few months later. I had been hunting near his village, when of a sudden I became aware of Master V. approaching me through a thin birch spinney which lay between me and the fields around the hamlet. He looked very dejected--not at all as one would expect a bear to look who had just regained his liberty! He brightened up a little when he saw me. "Is anything the matter, brother?" I inquired, as I went to meet him. "Nothing whatever," he said, "excepting that, curiously enough, I do not feel inclined to escape, and yet here I am, in the act of escaping!"