Page:Hugh Pendexter--Tiberius Smith.djvu/113

 way to capture the Kinack pennant and dub ourselves the champions of Alaska, but we had no radical hint of the glory, not even after we had berthed aboard the Liz.

"The captain of the sealer, we quickly discovered, was an old employé of the circus, and had often collected odd chunks of Arctic life for the big shows. We had been with him once on an Iceland trip. His quest now was a mighty one, being nothing less than a whole village of tame polar bears. Needless to say, he was playing second fiddle to my patron when it came to annexing such important brutes, and even I began to lose my melancholy frown when I appreciated the fat bonus awaiting a successful outcome of the venture. So gradually waxing almost human in my deportment to Tib, we sailed away from the realm of the open-work sock.

"You should know, sir, that there is no better card for a menagerie than the Ursus maritimus; and despite his natural ferocity and the fact that he is the greatest meat-eater among his furry fellows, the big beast can be tamed and is unusually acute of perception. All the up-to-date animal shows have polars that will do all sorts of tricks and never growl. But as it costs like sin to get them, and as it takes time to make out their naturalization papers, an opportunity to pilfer a whole bevy of the deep-coated entertainers is a