302 Sporting Sketches 



did not object to them in the least so long as they 

 did not force him to shift his position. When they 

 crowded too closely, he merely braced and pushed 

 with all his little might, yet ever good-naturedly, 

 for the whole thing was snugly warm and drowsily 

 pleasant. 



He did not know it, but close around him lay no 

 less than eight small brothers and an even half- 

 dozen of equally small sisters, and all so exactly 

 alike that only their proudly happy mother could 

 tell one from the other. But she knew every one of 

 them, and in some mysterious way her wonderful 

 mother-love was divided into fifteen exactly even 

 shares. The other fourteen youngsters felt precisely 

 as did Robert, so when his damp coat presently dried 

 and fuzzed out all over him to form a beautiful fur- 

 like wrap of rich chestnut and cream, their small 

 covers had done the same. 



This state of affairs continued for some hours, in 

 fact till the burning sun had thoroughly dried even 

 the tangled lower growths. Mother White's beady 

 eyes knew how to read the signs that told when the 

 last drop of dew had evaporated, and at the proper 

 moment the feathery tent was struck, and she daintily 

 stepped forward, leaving the silky mat of crowding 

 youngsters for the first time in their lives entirely 

 uncovered. It is quite safe to say that not one of 

 the lot was either astonished or dismayed by the 

 sudden exposure. It is all very fine for a few pecul- 

 iarly gifted, or otherwise, folk to minutely describe 

 the joys, sorrows, hopes, fears, and aspirations of 

 young wild things, but the important fact remains 

 that at least one-half of such statements is either 



