Andy, "was not so
cross as the father, but she was very careless. She would sit upon her
fat haunches in the door of the burrow while the babies were nibbling
around outside, pretending to keep an eye on them. But half the time she
would be sound asleep, with her head dropped straight down on her
stomach, between her little black paws. One day, as she was dozing thus
comfortably, a marsh hawk came flapping low overhead, and pounced on one
of the youngsters before it had time to more than squeak. At the sound
of that despairing squeak, to be sure, she woke up and made a savage rush
at the enemy. But the wary bird was already in the air, with the prize
drooping from his talons. And the mother could do nothing but sit up and
chatter after him abusively as he sailed away to his nest.

"You see, the mother was brave enough, as I said before, but very
careless. She was different from the ordinary run of woodchucks, in that
she had only three feet. She had lost her left hind paw."

"Was that because she was so careless?" asked the Babe.

Uncle Andy looked at him suspiciously. Like so many other story-tellers,
he preferred to make all the jokes himself. He was suspicious of other
people's jokes. But the Babe's round, attentive eyes were as innocent as
the sky.

"No," said he gravely; "_that_ was something she could not help. It was
an accident. It has nothing to do with Young Grumpy, but since you've
asked me about it I had better tell you at once and save interruptions.

"You see it was this way. Before she came to live on the Anderson Farm
she used to have a burrow over on the other side of the Ridge, where the
people went in for a good deal of trapping and snaring. One day someone
set a steel trap just in front of her burrow. Of course she put her foot
into it at the first chance. It was terrible. You know the grip of
those steel jaws, for I've seen you trying to open them. She was game,
however--they're always game, these woodchucks. Instead of squealing and
hopping about and losing her wits and using up her strength, she just
popped back into her hole and dragged the trap in with her as far as it
would go. That was not very far, of course, because the man who set it
had chained it to a stump outside. But she thought it better, in such a
trouble, to be out of range of unsympathetic eyes. There in the hole she
tugged and wrenched at the cruel biting thing till even her obstinacy had
to acknowledge