SQUIRRELS 



rule for distinguishing the edible from the poison- 

 ous varieties; for he recklessly lunches on those 

 doubtful kinds usually avoided by the amateur, 

 the white amanita and some of the pink and 

 scarlet russulas, for example ; and I have never 

 known him to suffer from such indulgence. But 

 the principal harvest consists of the seeds of the 

 different evergreens ; and although these vary 

 greatly in abundance from year to year, there is 

 generally a sufficient supply of one kind or 

 another. The white pine is usually rather spar- 

 ing in its yield ; but once in every ten or fifteen 

 years, perhaps oftener, nearly every tree in the 

 forest bears enormously, even the younger ones 

 showing scattered clusters here and there, while 

 those that have stood for generations present a 

 roughened, shaggy aspect from the thickly 

 crowded cones at their summits. At such tirnes 

 the red squirrels seem determined to gather every 

 cone before it opens and scatters its seeds to the 



winds. 



205 



