FOUR-FOOTED FORESTERS THE SQUIRRELS 



41 



go into the woods to hunt squirrels with a camera as with 

 a rifle or shotgun; and in many ways this practice is 

 significant. Humanity is to be congratulated if we are 

 coming to think less of giving pain, destroying life, and 

 rendering creatures miserable committing animal mur- 

 der in fact than of giving pleasure, recognizing the rights 

 of others to live, and furthering the ends of happiness. 



Sometimes, when in the tops of the high trees, spring- 

 ing from bough to bough, even the most agile of squir- 

 rels, either red or gray ones, will occasionally miss their 

 footing, and fall down through the tree until they come 

 in contact with some of the limbs or twigs below. To 

 one of these they dextrously cling, instantly continuing 

 their reckless course along the branches of the trees, 

 leaping from the ends of one onto the terminal sprays 

 of another, with a daring that but few of the arboreal 

 animals can equal. Once, in a piece of hickory timber, 

 with a few scattered chestnut trees growing on a hill- 

 side not far from the Zoological Park at Washington, 

 D. C, when the buds were just beginning to swell, and 

 the trees were tall and scraggly, with scraps of upcurled 

 bark on the trunks and branches of the hickory trees, a 

 fine, old red squirrel was seen scampering over the 

 ground and ascending the first tree he came to. There 

 being two persons present to observe his subsequent 

 behavior, he evidently became somewhat suspicious, run- 

 ning out on the end of one of the highest branches, and 

 making a leap into the next tree. Being up so high, he 

 was not very much frightened, and so he passed from 

 treetop to treetop with all the fearlessness of an old 

 hand at it. His observers were watching him closely; 

 and when in the top of a very tall shellbark hickory, some 



BLACK SQUIRREL EATING 



Fig. 



8. Here we have the same animal shown in Fig. 5. 

 curious angulated pose it assumes when so engaged 



PRAIRIE MARMOTS 



Fig. 7. Among the more or less nearly related forms of our squirrels are 

 the Prairie Marmots of the western plains, erroneously called "Prairie 

 Dogs," so named from the "bark" they have, which latter has a sound' 

 not unlike the bark of some of our larger species of squirrels. 



fifty feet from where they stood, a tree at least 140 feet 

 or more high, he ran out, as usual, along one of the 

 uppermost limbs, and in doing so ran over a piece of 

 lightly attached shellbark, about the size of one's hand. 

 His weight was sufficient to have it instantly part com- 

 pany with the tree; and before he could regain his bal- 

 ance, or catch onto anything else, both fell together, it 

 being a sheer drop of something less than 150 feet. 

 Down he came, belly down- 

 ward, with out-stretched tail, 

 convulsively clutching the air 

 with all four of his little paws, 

 without touching another single 

 twig in his fall. He struck the 

 hard ground with a thud that 

 could be heard for a considerable 

 distance, and bounced up over a 

 foot in the air. One would ex- 

 pect, of course, and with very 

 good reason, that he would be 

 completely knocked out by the 

 shock ; but no ! The little chap 

 gave one big gasp for breath, 

 gathered himself together, and in 

 less than five seconds he was off 

 again and up another tree in less 

 time than it takes to tell it. This 

 was the tree he was making for 

 when he fell, and when he 

 reached the middle of it, in he 

 popped into a hole, and that was 

 the last seen of him. Had a man 

 been a victim of a similar fall, 

 he would have been killed for a 



above ; it is eating a part of a nut, and the 

 s remarkably well exhibited in this cut. 



