296 The Squirrel as a Pet. [Sess. 
die. He must have the free run of the room at least, and 
when you have had him for some time you may allow him to 
accompany you out of doors. There is no fear of him running 
away from you; he regards you as his protector, and will 
always run to you for safety. When brought up with dogs or 
cats he lives in perfect harmony with them, and their play is 
often most amusing. My present squirrel allows the cats to 
pat or lick him with perfect unconcern. He knows that he 
will receive no injury from them. 
Squirrels are proverbially fond of play, and will nibble, 
worry, and kick at one’s hand like any frolicsome kitten. 
Hide-and-seek round a chair or round one’s back affords him 
a never-ending joy. Most human-like are the habits our 
present squirrel has of yawning and stretching his arms. 
When tired he cannot restrain his yawns, and invariably on 
awakening he yawns. Bread, biscuits, lettuce, fruit, cake, and 
of course nuts of all kinds, form his articles of diet; and I am 
sorry to say that he is not an abstainer, for he is inordinately 
fond of mild table or lager beer. 
I deny entirely that the squirrel destroys the eggs of wild 
birds. This is asserted by some writers as a fact. The squirrel 
is an absolute vegetarian, and never tastes animal food even in 
the shape of the contents of an egg. He isa much more strict 
disciplinarian than our human vegetarians who eke out their 
restricted dietary by the addition of milk and eggs. Mr 
Speedy cited the case of a squirrel being shot while sitting on 
a blackbird’s nest, and in whose stomach eggs with parts of the 
shell were found, and took this as a proof that the squirrel eats 
eggs. I fancy, even if he did eat egg, that one blackbird’s egg 
would prove an ample meal for a squirrel, and so I cannot 
think that the plural number was really meant here. I am 
inclined to think that the yellow matter which was present in 
this unfortunate squirrel’s stomach was not of eggy origin. 
The matter which they frequently vomit up is yellow in 
colour, and is due to the oily yellow matter in the nuts and 
kernels which they consume. Even in the remote chance 
that this squirrel did partake of an egg, an isolated case such 
as this would not prove that it was the custom of squirrels to 
eat eggs. A hungry animal may eat anything, as shipwrecked 
mariners have been known to eat their fellows or even shoe- 
