176 NEIGHBOURS UNKNOWN 



the prudence of anything that called itself a 

 squirrel. Near the great trunk of the blasted 

 tree he found another giant, half-fallen, its 

 top still upheld by the embrace of its stout- 

 armed neighbours. The long gradual incline 

 he rightly judged to be a favourite pathway 

 of the flying squirrels as they raced up- 

 wards from their excursions to the forest- 

 floor. So, upon the slope of the trunk, some 

 six or seven feet above the earth, he fixed 

 his trap securely, and left it to show what 

 it could do. 



For a long time, however, it did nothing. 

 It was a new strange thing on the familiar 

 path, and all the little people of the wild 

 avoided it. Till near the first grey of dawn 

 not a flying-squirrel had dared approach its 

 neighbourhood. 



The forest powers seem to have sometimes 

 a mischievous trick of selecting some par- 

 ticular one of their children for special trial, 

 of following up that one for days with a 

 kind of persecution. So it came about that 

 the same adventurous little aeronaut who had 

 fallen foul of both Jabe Smith and the black 

 snake, and had so narrowly escaped the 

 pounce of the brown owl, had the misfortune 

 to be sighted, as he was feasting on the par- 

 tridge-berries not far from the sloping tree, 



