INTRODUCTION 



relentless war is waged against him — war 

 with guns, which is at least semi-merciful, 

 but also with traps, that crush and torture 

 this, the most delicate and sensitive creature 

 that runs on four legs, leaving him mangled, 

 and perhaps for hours tearing his tender 

 limbs in an exquisite torture which even a 

 tiger should be spared. I do not deny that 

 in times of starvation the squirrel eats the 

 green tips of the twigs of certain trees, but 

 they have always done so, and when Nature 

 ruled the forest and its tenants, were the 

 trees truncated and dwarfed ? I have gone 

 through the Black Forest, looking in vain 

 for the truncated trees, and in the pine- 

 forests, in England, where I have been able 

 to investigate, I have never seen the work 

 of the squirrels' teeth.' Yet I will not deny 

 that when the poor little fellow, intelligent 

 as he is, is hard pushed for food, he may eat 

 young wood and bite into the bark of trees 



I I have seen my squirrels bite off small dry twigs 

 of the fir to make their nest, but never a green twig 

 excepting the tip. In my own wood I have never 

 found a green twig bitten off by them. 



sir 



