64 THE BOOK OF A NATURALIST 
child’s tale came back with a rush to memory, 
for I had read and re-read it when my age was 
seven; though I had never since met with it in 
the hundreds of boxes of old books turned over in 
my time, or in any collection of children’s books 
of the early nineteenth century. I once made a 
small collection of such literature myself, and 
others have collected and still collect it in a large 
way. I sometimes wonder why some enterprising 
publisher doesn’t start an Every Child’s Library, 
and rescue many of the most charming of these 
small publications from total oblivion. Un- 
doubtedly he would find the best period was from 
1800 to about 1840. ‘ 
Once upon a time—so ran the story as I remem- 
bered it, and retold it to myself while walking on— 
a squirrel lived in a wood, as plump and playful 
and happy a squirrel as one would wish to see. He 
had a favourite tree, an old giant oak, which was 
his home, and when summer was nearing its end 
he began to amuse himself by making a warm nest 
in a cavity down at the roots; also by hoarding a 
quantity of hazel-nuts, which were plentiful just 
then in the wood. This he did, not because he 
had any reason for doing it, or thought there was 
any use in it, but solely because it was an old time- 
honoured custom of the squirrel tribe to do these 
things. 
While occupied in this way he all at once 
became aware of a new restlessness and _ excite- 
ment among the birds, and when he asked his 
