UNDER THE APPLE-TREES 



does not know me from a stump or a clothes-horse. 

 His cold paws on my warm hand, on my arm, or on 

 my head give him no hint of danger; no odors 

 from my body, or look from my eyes, disturb him; 

 the sound of my voice does not alarm him ; but any 

 movement on my part, and he is off. It is moving 

 things — cats, weasels, hawks, foxes — that mean 

 danger to him. In the little circuit of his life — 

 gathering his winter stores and his daily subsistence, 

 spinning along the fences, threading the woods and 

 bushes, his eye and his ear are evidently his main 

 dependence ; odors and still objects concern him lit- 

 tle, but moving things very much. I once saw a 

 chipmunk rush to his den in the side of a bank with 

 great precipitation, and in a moment, like a flash, a 

 shrike darted down and hovered over the entrance. 

 I can talk to my chipmunk in low, slow tones and 

 he heeds me not, but any unusual sound outside the 

 camp, and he is alertness itself. One day when he 

 was on my table a crow flew over and called sharply 

 and loudly; the squirrel sat up and took notice in- 

 stantly; with his paws upon his breast he listened 

 and looked intently for a few seconds, and then re- 

 sumed his foraging. At another time the sharp call 

 of a red squirrel in a tree near by made him still more 

 nervous. With one raised paw he looked and lis- 

 tened for two or three minutes. The red squirrel 

 hazes him on all occasions, and, I think, often robs 

 him of his stores. 



11 



