be lonelier than ever; for since I cannot find another one, how
could it?
Five Months Later
It is not a kangaroo. No, for it supports itself by holding to
her finger, and thus goes a few steps on its hind legs, and then
falls down. It is probably some kind of a bear; and yet it has
no tail–as yet–and no fur, except on its head. It still keeps
on growing–that is a curious circumstance, for bears get their
growth earlier than this. Bears are dangerous–since our
catastrophe–and I shall not be satisfied to have this one prowling
about the place much longer without a muzzle on. I have offered
to get her a kangaroo if she would let this one go, but it did no
good–she is determined to run us into all sorts of foolish risks,
I think. She was not like this before she lost her mind.
A Fortnight Later
I examined its mouth. There is no danger yet; it has only one
tooth. It has no tail yet. It makes more noise now than it ever
did before–and mainly at night. I have moved out. But I shall
go over, mornings, to breakfast, and to see if it has more teeth.
If it gets a mouthful of teeth, it will be time for it to go, tail
or no tail, for a bear does not need a tail in order to be
dangerous.
Four Months Later
I have been off hunting and fishing a month, up in the region that
she calls Buffalo; I don’t know why, unless it is because there
are not any buffaloes there. Meantime the bear has learned to
paddle around all by itself on its hind legs, and says “poppa”
and “momma.” It is certainly a new species. This resemblance to
words may be purely accidental, of course, and may have no purpose
or meaning; but even in that case it is still extraordinary, and
is a thing which no other bear can do. This imitation of speech,
taken together with general absence of fur and entire absence of
tail, sufficiently indicates that this is a new kind of bear. The
further study of it will be exceedingly interesting. Meantime I
will go off on a far expedition among the forests of the North and
make an exhaustive search. There must certainly be another one
somewhere, and this one will be less dangerous when it has company
of its own species. I will go straightway; but I will muzzle this
one first.
Three Months Later
It has been a weary, weary hunt, yet I have had no success. In
the mean time, without stirring from the home estate, she has
caught another one! I never saw such luck. I might have hunted
these woods a hundred years, I never should have run across that
thing.
Next Day
I have been comparing the new one with the old one, and it is
perfectly plain that they are the same breed. I was going to stuff
one of them for my collection, but she is prejudiced against it
for some reason or other; so I have relinquished the idea, though
I think it is a mistake. It would be an irreparable loss to science
if they should get away. The old one is tamer than it was, and
can laugh and talk like the parrot, having learned this, no doubt,
from being with the parrot so much, and having the imitative faculty
in a highly developed degree. I shall be astonished if it turns
out to be a new kind of parrot, and yet I ought not to be astonished,
for it has already been everything else it could think of, since
those first days when it was a fish. The new one is as ugly now
as the old one was at first; has the same sulphur-and-raw-meat
complexion and the same singular head without any fur on it. She
calls it Abel.
Ten Years Later
They are boys; we found it out long ago. It was their coming in
that small, immature shape that puzzled us; we were not used to it.
There are some girls now. Abel is a good boy, but if Cain had