This puzzled Bobby. "Honey growing, how do you mean?"

"Wait," said Father Bear, "you'll see."

"Oh, my, father," called out Bobby. "Look at all the flies! I can count fifty hundred. Look, there's another. And here come some more.

Where are they all going?"

His father had been standing watching with a smile upon his face.

"You had better give up counting. There are far too many for me to try to count. No little Bobby Bear could possibly do it. Now, my boy, if you will look up in that tree you will see a great hole. Do you see it?"

"Where?" asked Bobby, bending his neck, so that he was looking at the very tip-top of the tree, where the branches seemed to hit the clouds.

Father Bear smiled as he called out: "No, no, not there. You're looking away too high. See, much lower," and he pointed to the place where the hole was.

"Oh, now I see it. I didn't look there. I thought you meant way up high," said Bobby Bear. "What makes the hole so black, father? And look, it's moving. Why, it's all flies."

"Now, my boy, I'll tell you all about the honey. Those little black things up there, of which there are so many, are not flies. They are bees. There are thousands of those bees swarming in and around that hole."

"Why, where do they all come from?" asked the little bear, "and what are they doing up there? And where's the honey? I don't see any honey."

"Wait a moment and I'll tell you," answered Father Bear. "That hole is the bees' home, just as the big cave is our house. And every night the bees come to the hole to sleep. But they have been at home many times in the day also.

"Haven't you ever seen the bees flying around the flowers? Perhaps you thought they were flies. Do you know what they were doing? They were getting honey from the flowers."

Bobby Bear was puzzled. "Honey from the flowers?" he repeated. "If the flowers have honey, why do we have to come all this way to get the honey? Why can't we go to the flowers the way the bee does and get all the honey we want?"

"If we did that, my boy," his father answered, "it would take us many years to fill even a small cup with honey. No, there are thousands and thousands of bees that come and go all day long and as they do nothing else, very soon they have a lot of honey all in one place. That is what we have come for today."

Leaving that great tree, they went and looked at many others. Some of the trees had big holes where bees buzzed around; most of them had no bees at all.

Bobby was getting impatient. "Why don't we get the honey, father?

Why do we walk around all day?"

Father Bear replied: "All in good time, my boy. First of all, we must find where the honey is, then we can come back and get it.

Besides the reason I have been going from tree to tree is because I wish to find which one has most honey. You know I will have to climb the tree and dig all the honey out, so I want to get as much honey as I can at one time."

"Look, father," cried Bobby Bear. "See all those bees over there. It seems to me there are more at that tree than at any tree we have seen yet."

"I guess you are right," Father Bear replied. "We'll go a little closer and see."

Sure enough, when they got beneath the tree which Bobby had pointed out, there were the bees swarming in hundreds. The buzzing noise they made would have given the bears a headache, only bears don't get such things.

Father Bear certainly was pleased. "Why, my boy, from that tree alone, if I am any judge, we can get enough honey to last us for months. In fact, you can have bread and honey for breakfast every morning, if you wish."

Bobby replied: "I can't exactly remember what the honey was like that Uncle Grumpy brought, for it is so long ago. But I don't think I would like to have bread and honey every morning. Some mornings I would like preserves, or eggs, or fish."

His father laughed. "Well, you won't have to eat honey every morning unless you wish. I only meant that there would be lots of it. Now let us get started."

Father Bear now looked carefully at all his claws to see that they were quite sharp. In order to climb the tree he would have to dig his claws deeply into the bark.

Bobby Bear, noticing this, said: "Why do you look to see if your claws are sharp, father? You filed them this morning before we came away."

"I know I did," his father answered, "and I am not worrying about the claws on my hands. However, we have done such a lot of walking, I thought perhaps the claws on my feet might have worn some on the rough ground."

Bobby looked up at the tree where all the bees were flying around and around, keeping up a most noisy buzzing. Then he thought of his father going all alone up the tree to take the honey from all those bees, which surely would not want to part with it.

Father Bear did not seem to be afraid. He had already dug his claws into the thick bark at the foot of the tree and was about to climb.

"Now, my boy," he said to Bobby, "when I get a little way up the tree, you hand me the big brown jar. I can easily climb the rest of the way with one hand, because the claws in my feet are very big and strong."

Bobby picked the jar up. My, but it was heavy. It was just about as much as he could do to lift it. However, he managed to get it well above his head and walked toward the tree.

He was so anxious to reach his father, that he did not look where he was going and his foot caught in a root, and down went Bobby, jar, and all.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HIS FOOT CAUGHT IN A ROOT]

The terrible crash made Father Bear turn around and when he saw what had happened he grew quite angry.

"Dear me, what a careless boy you are. That was the biggest jar your mother had. Now, not only shall we have to give up getting the honey today, but when we come tomorrow we will have to bring two small jars. This will mean you will have to carry one of the jars, as a punishment."

Bobby felt tears coming to his eyes, but being a brave little bear, he struggled against crying. "I am very sorry, father, and I will be more careful next time."

"Being sorry won't bring the jar back," but you could see from his face, he was not as angry as he had been at first when the jar smashed.

All the way home, Bobby was very quiet. Every once in a while his father would look at him and think that Bobby was still worrying about the broken jar. This was not a fact, however, for something had happened which Bobby felt he could not tell his father.

It had taken place while the two bears were walking from tree to tree looking for the one that had the most honey. A small tree with very bright green leaves had bent over and touched Bobby on the shoulder and had whispered in his ear: "What about Jane Bird? Don't forget, you must see her and must not give up until you find her."

Perhaps this, as well as the root of the big tree had been one of the causes of Bobby's stumbling when he went to give his father the big brown jar.

When Father Bear and Bobby Bear reached their cave, Mother Bear was standing waiting for them. The first thing she said was: "Where's the honey? Didn't you bring any?"

Bobby said nothing. He was too ashamed of his carelessness. By this time, Father Bear's anger had all gone and he felt sorry for Bobby.

So he said to Mother Bear:

"The jar fell to the ground and broke. We're going again tomorrow.

It doesn't matter, we can take two small jars."

This did not satisfy Mother Bear, however. "What am I going to do for a big jar?" she asked. "I've had that one so long I can never get along without it."

"Don't worry, mother," Father Bear answered. "The next time I go to the store, I'll get you one twice as big as the one that broke, if you wish."

After dinner, Bobby came timidly to his mother and asked: "Can I help you wash the dishes?"

"Oh, my, what's the matter with the boy? Did you hear that?" she asked Father Bear.

"Oh, that's nothing, mother. Aren't you always glad to have Bobby help you?" Father Bear was having his after dinner smoke and never liked to be bothered when he was enjoying himself that way. Besides he felt he had scolded Bobby Bear enough and he didn't want Mother Bear to know how the jar had really been broken.