as he took in the scene of battle. He had longed for a fight but
what he saw now fairly paralyzed him. The two bears were at it,
roaring and tearing each other's hides and throwing up showers of
gravel and earth in their deadly clinch. In this first round
Noozak had the best of it. She had butted the wind out of Makoos
in her first dynamic assault, and now with her dulled and broken
teeth at his throat she was lashing him with her sharp hind claws
until the blood streamed from the old barbarian's sides and he
bellowed like a choking bull. Neewa knew that it was his pursuer
who was getting the worst of it, and with a squeaky cry for his
mother to lambast the very devil out of Makoos he ran back to the
edge of the arena, his nose crinkled and his teeth gleaming in a
ferocious snarl. He danced about excitedly a dozen feet from the
fighters, Soominitik's blood filling him with a yearning for the
fray and yet he was afraid.

Then something happened that suddenly and totally upset the
maddening joy of his mother's triumph. Makoos, being a he-bear,
was of necessity skilled in fighting, and all at once he freed
himself from Noozak's jaws, wallowed her under him, and in turn
began ripping the hide off old Noozak's carcass in such quantities
that she let out an agonized bawling that turned Neewa's little
heart into stone.

It is a matter of most exciting conjecture what a small boy will
do when he sees his father getting licked. If there is an axe
handy he is liable to use it. The most cataclysmic catastrophe
that cam come into his is to have a father whom some other boy's
father has given a walloping. Next to being President of the
United States the average small boy treasures the desire to