Tracks in the snow led to a
large hole under the sill of the house where a part of the cellar wall
had caved in.
"But there's a bear or some other large animal down cellar," Addison
said. "You watch here at the window."
He got a brick and, pulling the old wardrobe aside, flung it down the
stairs and yelled. Instantly there was a clatter below, and out from the
hole under the sill bounded a big black animal, evidently a bear, and
loped away through the snow.
We could now pretty well account for the nocturnal uproar. Bears
hibernate in winter, but are often out until the first snows come. The
storm had probably surprised this one while he was still roaming about,
and he had hastily searched for a den.
The storm had abated, and we decided to start for Lovell at once. We
gave the sheep a foddering of hay and then got the flock outdoors. Old
Peg was very loath to leave the barn, and we had to drag her out by main
strength. Addison went ahead and tramped a path in the deep snow.
Finding that there was no help for it, Old Peg followed, and the flock
trailed after her in a woolly file several hundred feet long.
Flourishing my stick and shouting loudly, I urged on the rear of the
procession.
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