habitual querulous whining which told me he had found his mother and had
resumed his customary appeal to her sympathy.

[Illustration]




V.


It is quite a common thing for Bears to spank their cubs when they need
it, and if Grumpy had disciplined Johnny this way, it would have saved
them both a deal of worry. Perhaps not a day passed, that summer,
without Grumpy getting into trouble on Johnny's account. But of all
these numerous occasions the most ignominious was shortly after the
affair with the Grizzly.

I first heard the story from three bronzed mountaineers. As they were
very sensitive about having their word doubted, and very good shots
with the revolver, I believed every word they told me, especially when
afterward fully endorsed by the Park authorities.

It seemed that of all the tinned goods on the pile the nearest to
Johnny's taste were marked with a large purple plum. This conclusion he
had arrived at only after most exhaustive study. The very odour of those
plums in Johnny's nostrils was the equivalent of ecstasy. So when it
came about one day that the cook of the Hotel baked a huge batch of
plum-tarts, the tell-tale wind took the story afar into the woods, where
it was wafted by way of Johnny's nostrils to his very soul.