at the four
squirming, helpless things in his hand the tears of repentance filled
his eyes. "We might as well kill them and end their misery. We can't
find another Squirrel's nest so late as this." But after a little
silence he added, "I know some one who will put them out of pain. She
may as well have them. She'd get them anyway, and that's the old gray
wild Cat. Let's put them in her nest when she's away."

This seemed a reasonable, simple and merciful way of getting rid of
the orphans. So the boys made for the "canon" part of the brook. At
one time of the afternoon the sun shone so as to show plainly all that
was in the hole. The boys went very quietly to Yan's lookout bank, and
seeing that only the Kittens were there, Yan crept across and dropped
the young Squirrels into the nest, then went back to his friends to
watch, like Miriam, the fate of the foundlings.

They had a full hour to wait for the old Cat, and as they were very
still all that time they were rewarded with a sight of many pretty
wild things.

A Humming-bird "boomed" into view and hung in a misty globe of wings
before one Jewel-flower after another.

"Say, Beaver, you said Humming-birds was something or other awful
beautiful," said Woodpecker, pointing to the dull grayish-green bird
before them.

"And I say so yet. Look at that," as, with a turn in the air, the
hanging Hummer changed its jet-black throat to flame and scarlet that
silenced the critic.

After the Humming-bird went away a Field-mouse was seen for a moment
dodging about in the grass, and shortly afterward a Shrew-mole, not so
big as the Mouse, was seen in hot pursuit on its trail.

Later a short-legged brown animal, as big as a Rabbit, came nosing up
the dry but shady bed of the brook, and as it went beneath them Yan
recognized by its little Beaver-like head and scaly oar-shaped tail
that it was a Muskrat, apparently seeking for water.

There was plenty in the swimming-pond yet, and the boys realized that
this had become a gathering place for those wild things that were
"drowned out by the drought," as Sam put it.

The Muskrat had not gone more than twenty minutes before another
deep-brown animal appeared. "Another Muskrat; must be a meeting,"
whispered the Woodpecker. But this one, coming close, proved a very
different creature. As long as a Cat, but lower, with broad, flat head
and white chin and throat, short legs, in shape a huge Weasel, there
was no mistaking it; this was