Where Town and Country Meet 



Here I soon found traces of some inhab 

 itants with whom I am tolerably well ac 

 quainted, and who never seem surprised to 

 meet me at any season of the year. The red 

 squirrel had been chopping up pine-cones 

 at his front door, and had left the chips lying 

 about, for all the world like a woodcutter's 

 litter. I saw several places where he had 

 tried to scratch or gnaw through the thick 

 crust, but it had proved too much of a task 

 for him, and he had climbed a tree to see 

 if he could find another lodged pine-cone. 

 At length I heard him barking vigorously, 

 and soon saw the flirt of his tail in a hem 

 lock-tree across the hollow. He scolded me 

 till I was out of sight; for I presume he 

 held me in some way to blame for the fact 

 that nature had temporarily locked up his 

 provision cellar and carried off the key. 



As I walked dryshod up the bed of a 

 buried brook, my old friend, the ruffed 

 grouse (the farmer boy's "pa'tridge") 

 sprang up on thundering wings from a 

 clump of sumachs. I turned aside to in 

 vestigate, and found that the poor bird had 

 been driven by hunger to make a meal off 

 the astringent sumach berries, their purple 

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