104 SQUIRRELS AND OTHER FUR-BEARERS 



If the porcupine were as vulnerable to its enemies 

 as, say, the woodchuck, it would probably soon 

 come to be as alert and swift of foot as that 

 marmot. 



For an hour or more, that afternoon on the 

 mountain top, my attention was attracted by a 

 peculiar continuous sound that seemed to come 

 from far away to the east. I queried with my- 

 self, *' Is it the sound of some workman in a 

 distant valley hidden by the mountains, or is its 

 source nearer by me on the mountain side ? " 

 I could not determine. It was not a hammering 

 or a grating or the filing of a saw, though it 

 suggested such sounds. It had a vague, distant, 

 ventriloquial character. In the solitude of the 

 mountain top there was something welcome and 

 pleasing in it. Finally I set out to try to solve 

 the mystery. I had not gone fifty yards from 

 camp when I knew I was near the source of the 

 sound. Presently I saw a porcupine on a log, and 

 as I approached the sound ceased, and the animal 

 moved away. A curious kind of chant he made, 

 or note of wonder and surprise at my presence 

 on the mountain, — or was he calling together 

 the clan for a midnight raid upon my camp ? 



I made my bed that night of ferns and bal- 

 sam boughs under an overhanging rock, where 

 the storm that swept across the mountain just 



