UNDER THE APPLE-TREES 



shells of hickory-nuts and cherry-pits, but, dig as we 

 would, we could not find any recess or granary large 

 enough to hold the peck or more of nuts that I had 

 seen him carry in. We searched carefully for side 

 chambers into which he might have stored the sur- 

 plus of his unexpected harvest, but we found none. 

 He would not have prepared in advance for such a 

 contingency, as he could have had no hint of the 

 bounty which a designing and near-by Providence 

 was to bestow upon him. 



The shells we found accounted for only a small 

 fraction of those with which we had supplied him. 

 Not a chestnut or a peach-pit or a hickory-nut did 

 we find, nor any corn, nor wild seeds of any sort. I 

 was much puzzled, and am still, as to just what had 

 happened. The chipmunk either had been plun- 

 dered by his neighbors, or else had freely distributed 

 his supplies among them. What did the new hole 

 signify? The old one was ample, and led to the same 

 chamber. We did not find the chipmunk in his den, 

 nor any convincing evidence that he had recently 

 been there. Although I spent the following summer 

 in the same bush camp, I am not certain that I ever 

 saw my little neighbor that season. But the next fol- 

 lowing season, he or another was again my neighbor 

 under the apple-trees, and disclosed to me a refresh- 

 ing bit of natural history — that of a chipmunk 

 digging his hole. He came and dug it in broad 

 daylight within a few yards of my bush camp under 



26 



