AN ICY HIGHWAY. 191 



mountains. They show how landslides are 

 started. The bed of clay debris on the ice of 

 this small stream is talus. How short a dis- 

 tance must one needs travel to see excellent ex- 

 amples of the working of some great natural 

 force, or to have a practical definition of some 

 geological term. 



On a number of logs crossing the stream the 

 fox squirrel has traveled, the tracks made by 

 short jumps, averaging about fourteen inches 

 apart. The front tracks are broader, and side 

 by side, as are also the hind ones, the latter 

 being but one or two inches back of those in 

 front. These squirrels evidently make most of 

 their daily visits before nine o'clock in the fore- 

 noon, and their tracks in the snow show that 

 they travel far and wide through the woods. 



In numerous places the tracks of crows are 

 seen along the open water, up one side of the 

 fringing ice and down the other. In several 

 places the misplaced snow shows where one had 

 slipped and probably fallen on the smooth ice, 

 and I can almost hear the involuntary crow 

 a damn" which must have followed such a mis- 



