142 OLD PLYMOUTH TRAILS 



abruptly when one of the party produced a pho- 

 tograph of a woodchuck a dozen feet up a big 

 pine sitting on a small stub of a limb, looking 

 somewhat exultant but also as if he wondered 

 not only how he got so high but how on earth he 

 was ever to get down again. I myself would not 

 have believed a woodchuck could climb a tree of 

 that size if I had not seen the photograph, and I 

 fear there are some doubters in-the party to this 

 day. But whether or not a woodchuck can climb 

 a big pine he can go up a bean pole as far as a 

 bean vine can climb, and return with the bean 

 vine inside. It takes but a few mornings for a 

 woodchuck who means to keep fat enough not to 

 shame his tribe to send a fleet of beans, that but 

 now had everything set in living green from 

 main truck to keelson, scudding down the garden 

 under bare poles, a melancholy sight to the ama- 

 teur truck farm navigator. On peas and beans 

 the woodchuck holds his own, and he reckons as 

 his own all that the garden contains. For all 

 that you find frequently one that has a special 

 taste. My last year's most intimate woodchuck 

 climbed the bean poles and romped the rows of 

 early peas as I have described. These were his 

 occupation, his day's work, so to speak, and he 



