286 ADVENTURES AMONG BIRDS 



the pines standing all about me. It was marvellously 

 still in that hidden place in the wood ; after sitting 

 there for half-an-hour, listening and watching, the 

 thought came to me that I might stay there half a day 

 without seeing any living creature or hearing any 

 faintest sound of life. Yet before another minute 

 had passed something living flashed into sight, the 

 woodland creature that is most alive — a beautiful red 

 squirrel with an exceptionally big bushy tail. He 

 slided swiftly down a bole, and straightway began leap- 

 ing, pirouetting, and dashing hither and thither about 

 the floor of the basin, not twenty yards from my feet. 

 As I sat motionless he did not see or did not heed me : 

 he was alone in the wood, and was like the solitary 

 nightingale that asks for no witness to his song, and 

 played his glad, mad game with his whole soul. Now 

 with feet together he arched his body like a stoat, then 

 flung himself out full length and dashed round in a 

 circle, and as he moved there was an undulating motion, 

 as of wave following wave along his back and tail which 

 gave him a serpentine appearance. On coming to 

 a thick bed of pine needles, he all at once became 

 motionless and spread himself out on the ground and 

 looked like the flattened skin of a squirrel, with the 

 four paws visible at the corners. When he had suffi- 

 ciently enjoyed the sensation of pressing on the pine 

 needles with the under surface of his body, he started 

 up to continue his game, until he suddenly caught 

 sight of a large, yellowish- white agaric growing some 

 yards away, and, dashing at it, he tore it violently from 



