The Story of a Gray squirrel 



fierce repulsion, the bodily rejection that 

 men call "nausea." 



This is the law of surfeit. Bannertail 

 had fallen foul of it, and Mother Carey, 

 loving him as she ever loves her strong 

 ones, had meted out the fullest measure 

 of punishment that he, with all his 

 strength, could bear and yet come through 

 alive. 



The Red Moon of harvest was at hand. 

 The Gray coat family was grown, and 

 happy in the fulness of their lives, and 

 Bannertail was hale and filled with the 

 joy of being alive, leading his family be- 

 yond old bounds, teaching them the ways 

 of the farther woods, showing them new 

 foods that the season brings. He, wise 

 leader now, who once had been so un- 

 wise. Then Mother Carey put him to 

 the proof. She led, he led them farther 

 than they had ever gone before, to the re- 

 motest edge of the hickory woods. On 



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