return to the red squirrel, because he returns to me
hourly. He is the most frisky, diverting, and altogether impish
of all our wild creatures. He is a veritable Puck. All the other
wild folk that cross my field of vision, or look in upon me here
in my fragrant hay-barn study, seem to have but one feeling about
me: "What is it? Is it dangerous? Has it any designs upon me?"
But my appearance seems to awaken other feelings in the red
squirrel. He pauses on the fence or on the rail before me, and
goes through a series of antics and poses and hilarious gestures,
giving out the while a stream of snickering, staccato sounds that
suggest unmistakably that I am a source of mirth and ridicule to
him. His gestures and attitudes are all those of mingled mirth,
curiosity, defiance, and contempt--seldom those of fear. He comes
spinning along on the stone wall in front of me, with those
abrupt, nervous pauses every few yards that characterize all his
movements. On seeing me he checks his speed, and with depressed
tail impels himself along, a few inches at a time, in a series of
spasmodic starts and sallies; the hind part of his body
flattened, and his legs spread, his head erect and alert, his
tail full of kinks and quirks. How that tail undulates! Now its
end curls, now it is flattened to the stone, now it springs
straight up as if part of a trap, hind feet the while keeping
time in a sort of nervous dance with the shrill, strident
cackling and snickering. The next moment he is sitting erect with
fore paws pressed against his white chest, his tail rippling out
behind him or up his back, and his shrill, nasal tones still
pouring out. He hops to the next stone, he assumes a new
position, his tail palpitates and jerks more lively than ever;
now he is on all fours, with curved back; now he sits up at an
angle, his tail all the time charged with mingled suspicion and
mirth. Then he springs to a rail that runs out at right angles
from the wall toward me, and with hectoring snickers and shrill
trebles, pointed straight at me, keeps up his performance. What
an actor he is! What a furry embodiment of quick, nervous energy
and impertinence! Surely he has a sense of something like humor;
surely he is teasing and mocking me and telling me, both by
gesture and by word of mouth, that I present a very ridiculous
appearance.

A chipmunk comes hurrying along with stuffed cheek-pouches,
traveling more on the side of the wall than on the top, stop