After descanting, at some length, on the great expense and danger attending his capture and training, I offered a programme of the performance, of the "Infant Phenomenon of Sierran Solitudes," drawn up into the highest professional profusion of alliteration and capital letters.A few extracts will give the reader some idea of his educational progress:--1.He will, rolled up in a Round Ball, roll down the Wood-Shed Rapidly, illustrating His manner of Escaping from His Enemy in His Native Wilds.
2.He will Ascend the Well-Pole, and remove from the Very Top a Hat, and as much of the Crown and Brim thereof, as May be Permitted.
3.He will perform in a pantomime, descriptive of the Conduct of the Big Bear, The Middle-Sized Bear, and The Little Bear of the Popular Nursery Legend.
4.He will shake his chain Rapidly, showing his Manner of striking Dismay and Terror in the Breasts of Wanderers in Ursine Wildernesses.
The morning of the exhibition came; but an hour before the performance the wretched Baby was missing.The Chinese cook could not indicate his whereabouts.I searched the premises thoroughly;and then, in despair, took my hat, and hurried out into the narrow lane that led toward the open fields and the woods beyond.But Ifound no trace nor track of Baby Sylvester.I returned, after an hour's fruitless search, to find my guests already assembled on the rear veranda.I briefly recounted my disappointment, my probable loss, and begged their assistance.
"Why," said a Spanish friend, who prided himself on his accurate knowledge of English, to Barker, who seemed to be trying vainly to rise from his reclining position on the veranda, "why do you not disengage yourself from the veranda of our friend? And why, in the name of Heaven, do you attach to yourself so much of this thing, and make to yourself such unnecessary contortion? Ah," he continued, suddenly withdrawing one of his own feet from the veranda with an evident effort, "I am myself attached! Surely it is something here!"It evidently was.My guests were all rising with difficulty.The floor of the veranda was covered with some glutinous substance.It was--sirup!
I saw it all in a flash.I ran to the barn.The keg of "golden sirup," purchased only the day before, lay empty upon the floor.
There were sticky tracks all over the enclosure, but still no Baby.
"There's something moving the ground over there by that pile of dirt," said Barker.
He was right.The earth was shaking in one corner of the enclosure like an earthquake.I approached cautiously.I saw, what I had not before noticed, that the ground was thrown up; and there, in the middle of an immense grave-like cavity, crouched Baby Sylvester, still digging, and slowly but surely sinking from sight in a mass of dust and clay.
What were his intentions? Whether he was stung by remorse, and wished to hide himself from my reproachful eyes, or whether he was simply trying to dry his sirup-besmeared coat, I never shall know;for that day, alas! was his last with me.
He was pumped upon for two hours, at the end of which time he still yielded a thin treacle.He was then taken, and carefully inwrapped in blankets, and locked up in the store-room.The next morning he was gone! The lower portion of the window sash and pane were gone too.His successful experiments on the fragile texture of glass at the confectioner's, on the first day of his entrance to civilization, had not been lost upon him.His first essay at combining cause and effect ended in his escape.
Where he went, where he hid, who captured him, if he did not succeed in reaching the foothills beyond Oakland, even the offer of a large reward, backed by the efforts of an intelligent police, could not discover.I never saw him again from that day until--Did I see him? I was in a horse-car on Sixth Avenue, a few days ago, when the horses suddenly became unmanageable, and left the track for the sidewalk, amid the oaths and execrations of the driver.Immediately in front of the car a crowd had gathered around two performing bears and a showman.One of the animals, thin, emaciated, and the mere wreck of his native strength, attracted my attention.I endeavored to attract his.He turned a pair of bleared, sightless eyes in my direction; but there was no sign of recognition.I leaned from the car-window, and called softly, "Baby!" But he did not heed.I closed the window.The car was just moving on, when he suddenly turned, and, either by accident or design, thrust a callous paw through the glass.
"It's worth a dollar and half to put in a new pane," said the conductor, "if folks will play with bears!"
