AMONG THE ANIMALS OF THE YOSEMITE 195 



not so comically small he would be a dreadful 

 fellow. The gray, Sciurus fossor, is the hand- 

 somest, I think, of all the large American 

 squirrels. He is something like the Eastern 

 gray, but is brighter and clearer in color, and 

 more lithe and slender. He dwells in the oak 

 and pine woods up to a height of about five 

 thousand feet above the sea, is rather common in 

 Yosemite Valley, Hetch-Hetchy, Kings River 

 Canon, and indeed in all the main canons and 

 Yosemites, but does not like the high fir-covered 

 ridges. Compared with the Douglas, the gray 

 is more than twice as large ; nevertheless, he 

 manages to make his way through the trees with 

 less stir than his small, peppery neighbor, and is 

 much less influential in every way. In the 

 spring, before the pine-nuts and hazel-nuts are 

 ripe, he examines last year's cones for the few 

 seeds that may be left in them between the half- 

 open scales, and gleans fallen nuts and seeds on 

 the ground among the leaves, after making sure 

 that no enemy is nigh. His fine tail floats, now 

 behind, now above him, level or gracefully 

 curled, light and radiant as dry thistledown. 

 His body seems hardly more substantial than his 

 tail. The Douglas is a firm, emphatic bolt of 

 life, fiery, pungent, full of brag and show and 

 fight, and his movements have none of the ele- 

 gant deliberation of the gray. They are so 

 quick and keen they almost sting the onlooker, 



