TAMIAS STKIATITS. 239 



confinement, and altogether too fond of biting hj s captor's finders 

 on insufficient provocation. It is proper to state, however, that 

 the very young have not, to my knowledge, been cagecl, and I in- 

 cline to the belief that they would well repay one for the care be- 

 stowed upon them. 



In the American Naturalist for March, 1870 ('p. 58), Mr. A. J. 

 Cook, of Lansing, Michigan, states that a Chipmunk was observed 

 "busily nibbling at a snake that had been recently killed. He 

 could hardly be driven away, and soon returned to his feast when 

 his tormentors had withdrawn a short distance." 



Thomas Pennant says of this species : " During the mayz harvest, 

 these squirrels are very busy in biting off the ears, and filling their 

 mouths so full with the corn that their cheeks are quite distended. 

 It is observable, that they give great preference to certain food ; 

 for if, after filling their mouths with rye, they happen to meet with 

 wheat, they fling away the first, that they may indulge in the 

 last." * 



John Josselyn, writing in 1675 of the animals of New England, 

 called the Chipmunk " mouse-squirril ", and said of it : " The 

 mouse-squirril is hardly so big as a Rat, streak'd on both sides 

 with black and red streaks, they are mischievous vermine destroying 

 abundance of Corn both in the field and in the house, where they 

 will enaw holes into Chests, and tear clothes both linnen and 



o 



wollen, and are notable nut-gathers in August ; when hasel and 

 filbert nuts are ripe you may see upon every Nut-tree as many 

 mouse-squirrils as leaves ; So that the nuts are gone in a trice, 

 which they convey to their Drays or Nests." f 



* Synopsis of (Quadrupeds. 1771, p. 289. 



| Two Voyages to New England. Boston reprint, p. 69. 



