Shooting 105 



neighbors. Major Baker and Joe did not in 

 the least grudge the furry fellows the berries, 

 the nuts, nor even a reasonable share of corn, 

 but they did think it wise to keep the share 

 from becoming unreasonable. 



Joe and Patsy often went prospecting for 

 nuts while still everything was green. Thus 

 it happened that more than once they got a 

 chance to watch the squirrels in the hazel 

 bushes, and saw them creep upon the long slen- 

 der nutted boughs, often bending them almost 

 to the ground, reach out fore paws, draw in the 

 pendant green-frilled nut-clusters, gnaw a hole 

 at the base of each young nut, and suck out the 

 milky kernel. When the last nut was empty, 

 the squirrel dropped down on the ground, and 

 either ran up another stem, seeking new clus- 

 ters to plunder, or scampered away. Unless 

 he was frightened, the going away was in 

 little niggling leaps, halting between every two 

 or three to curl the long gray plume of tail 

 up along the back. But if he had spied out 

 the eyes watching him, the leaps were prodi- 

 gious, six feet at the least, and ending at the 

 foot of some big tree, up and around which 

 the leaper whipped in the twinkle of an eye. 



Patsy abused the squirrels for being so 

 lazy — their summer nests, she said, were 

 such shackly affairs, of sticks and leafy twigs 

 — then they sometimes made shift with an 



