preaclier was repeating between strokes : "I^m 

 — truly — sorry — man's — dominion — has — " when 

 suddenly there was a crunch, a crash, and the 

 axman leaped aside with the yell of a fiend ; for, 

 as the tree struck, three tiny, brown-backed, 

 white-footed creatures were dashed into the soft 

 snow. "The prettiest thing I ever saw," he de- 

 clared enthusiastically, as I put into his hand 

 the only mouse captured. 



We traced the chambers up and down the 

 tree as they wound, stairway-like, just inside 

 the hard outer shell. Here and there we came 

 upon garners of acorns and bunches of bird 

 feathers and shredded bark— a complete fortress 

 against the siege of winter. 



That pine had not borne a green needle for a 

 decade. It was too long dead and too much de- 

 cayed to have even a fat knot left. Yet there 

 was not a livelier, more interesting tree in the 

 region that winter, nor one half so full of goings 

 on, as this same old shell of a pine, with scarcely 

 heart enough to stand. 



[276] 



