FEBRUARY 



15 



In February another track appears upon the 

 snow, slender and delicate, about a third larger 

 than that of the gray squirrel, indicating no haste 

 or speed, but, on the contrary, denoting the most 

 imperturbable ease and leisure, the footprints so 

 close together that the trail appears like a chain of 

 curiously carved links. Sir Mephitis mephitica, or, 

 in plain English, the skunk, has woke up from his 

 six weeks' nap, and corne out into society again. 

 . . . There is no such word as hurry in his diction- 

 ary, as you may see by his path upon the snow. 

 BURROUGHS : Winter Sunshine. 



16 



The pond began to boom about an hour after 

 sunrise, when it felt the influence of the sun's rays 

 slanted upon it from over the hills ; it stretched 

 itself and yawned like a waking man with a grad- 

 ually increasing tumult, which was kept up three 

 or four hours. It took a short siesta at noon, 

 and boomed once more toward night, as the sun 

 was withdrawing his influence. In the right stage 

 of the weather a pond fires its evening gun with 

 great regularity. 



THOREAU: Walden. 



