It was a silent playground, as all animal play- 

 grounds are. The stir of the dead leaves and 

 now and then a faint hiss was all I could hear. 

 Who has ever heard any noise from untamed 

 animals at play? One day I came softly upon 

 two white-footed mice playing in the leaves 

 along a wood-road and squeaking joyously ; but 

 as a rule the children of the wilds, no matter how 

 exciting their games, rarely utter a word. Si- 

 lence is the first lesson they are taught. Or is it 

 now instinctive ? Have not generations of bitter 

 life-struggle made the animals so timid and 

 wary that the young are born with a dread 

 of discovery so strong that they never shout 

 in their play? This softness and silence was 

 the only striking difference to be seen in the 

 play of these young skunks here in the falling 

 twilight, safely hidden among the rocks of the 

 wild ravine, and that of school-children upon a 

 village green. 



The child is much the same, whether the par- 

 ticular species is four-footed or whether it goes 

 on two feet. Here below me one of the little 

 toddlers got a bump that hurt him, and it made 

 him just as mad as a bump ever did me. There 

 [286] 



