UNDER THE APPLE-TREES 



nothing but man. Little wonder that he looks calm 

 and majestic and always at his ease ! But I am get- 

 ting away from my apple-trees. 



The arch-enemy of the chipmunk is the small red 

 weasel, and I wonder if it is to hide from him that he 

 usually digs his den away from the fences and other 

 cover, in clean open ground, leaving no clue what- 

 ever as to its whereabouts. He carries away all the 

 soil, and either makes a pile of it some feet away, 

 or else hides it completely. The den of my little 

 neighbor is in the open grassy space between the 

 rows of apple-trees, thirty or more yards from either 

 fence. All that is visible of it is a small round hole 

 in the ground nearly concealed by the overhanging 

 grass. I had to watch him in order to find it. 



His chamber is about three feet below the surface 

 of the ground, and has but one entrance, through a 

 long crooked passage eight or ten feet long. If his 

 arch-enemy were to find it, there would be no es- 

 cape. There is no back door, and there are no secret 

 passages. Probably many a tragedy is enacted in 

 those little earth-chambers. The weasel himself 

 fears nothing; he is the incarnation of bloodthirsti- 

 ness, and his victims seem so horrified at the dis- 

 covery that he is pursuing them that they become 

 paralyzed. Even the fleet-footed rabbit in the open 

 woods or fields falls an easy prey. 



One day last summer as I sat at the table in my 

 hay-barn study, tlicre boldly entered through th£ 



17 



