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IX]
A JESTER AND A BEAR.
117
"No, I ca'n't let you out again!" he said, before the children could speak. "The Vice-Warden gave it me, he did, for letting you out last time! So be off with you!" And, turning away from them, he began digging frantically in the middle of a gravel-walk, singing, over and over again,
"'Poor thing,' he said, 'poor silly thing!
It’s waiting to be fed!’"
but in a more musical tone than the shrill screech in which he had begun.