UNDER THE APPLE-TREES 



maybe under three or more feet of snow in addition. 

 At any rate, the chipmunk, male or female, is a 

 hermit, and there is no cooperation or true sociabil- 

 ity among them. They are wonderfully provident 

 and industrious, beginning to store up their winter 

 food in midsummer, or as early as the farmer does 

 his. When the nut-crop fails them, as it has this 

 present season, they scour about the neighborhood, 

 gathering all sorts of wild seeds and grains, and 

 wild-cherry pits, working almost as steadily as do 

 the ants and the bees. In the mean time they feed on 

 insects and berries and various green things, but 

 only cured grains and nuts go into their winter 

 stores. 



The wild creatures rarely make an economic 

 blunder. We are told on excellent authority that 

 the coney, or least hare, in the Rocky Mountains 

 spreads its newly cut grass and other green food on 

 the rocks in the sun, and dries it as carefully as the 

 farmer dries his hay before storing it up for winter 

 use. I think we are safe in saying that it is not the 

 coney's individual wisdom or experience that 

 prompts him to do this, but the wisdom of some- 

 thing much older than he is. It is the wisdom of 

 nature, inherent and active as instinct. 



One day, when I paused before my little neigh- 

 bor's mound of earth, I saw that the hole was 

 nearly stopped up, and, while I was looking, the 

 closure was completed from within. Loose earth 



33 



