OUR NEAREST NEIGHBORS 



stone bench. He, too, well knows the brass jar of nuts or corn, 

 and when the stock gets low he has learned that a blow of his paw 

 will send it toppling over, spreading in more convenient fashion 

 its store of food. At first there was great leaping and scurrying at 

 the sound of the falling brass; but now a mere turning of the body, 

 hardly an interruption to the feast, greets it. The squirrels an- 

 beautiful creatures, leaping from branch to branch, making great 

 bounds across the lawn and sitting in such contented fashion, five 

 or six at a time, along the terrace at their midday meal. \Y<- 

 named our first squirrel Mark because one of his ears was slit, so 

 that I imagined I could always recognize him. I became doubt- 

 ful about this later, when I found that nearly all squirrels have one 

 or both ears so cut. As the season advanced I was chagrined to 

 discover that I had mistaken the sex of my neighbor; but we had 

 become attached to the name by this time, so we added Hannah, 

 and Mark-Hannah he no, she is to this day. 



We found the old squirrels more difficult to tame than the 

 chipmunks; but by taking the young ones and keeping them in a 

 box for three months, feeding and handling them, when liberated 

 they were perfectly at home and trusted every man. One of these, 

 Bob, was our special pet; he perched on my shoulder while I 

 weeded, ran down into my pockets for nuts, followed us through 

 the woods like a dog, and even crawled into the house, although 

 that was against the rule. For two years he sat by us at our sew- 

 ing, ate at our meal-time, and we loved him; but his lack of suspi- 



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