The Lay of the Zand 
My skeptic had too many acres. She went to the 
seashore one summer, then to the mountains, then 
to a farm, and now she doubts the existence of crabs 
and woodchucks. Well she may. She might almost 
doubt the reality of the mountains and shore, to say 
nothing of the farm. One can scarcely come to be- 
lieve in a mountain in the course of a mere June. 
The trouble is one of size. As well try to make 
friends with a crowded street. Crabs and woodchucks 
live in little holes. You must hunt for the holes; 
you must wait until the woodchucks come out. 
For more than five years now I have been hunting 
holes here on the farm, and it is astonishing the 
number I have discovered. I doubt if driving past 
you would see anything extraordinary in this small 
farm of mine, —a steep, tree-grown ridge, with a 
house at the top, a patch of garden, a bit of meadow, 
a piece of woods, a stream, a few old apple trees, a 
rather sterile, stony field. But live here as I do, mow 
and dig and trim and chop as I do, know all the paths, 
the stumps, the stone heaps, the tree holes, earth 
holes, — there simply is no end of holes, and they are 
all inhabited. 
By actual count there are forty-six woodchuck 
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