222 AROUND AN OLD HOMESTEAD. 



Surely he was a fine poet who wrote that. And he 

 loved Nature otherwise equally as intimately. He was 

 the John Burroughs of the seventeenth century. 



Cowper writes of the squirrel in an interesting way 

 in "The Winter Walk at Noon," in "The Task:" 



Drawn from his refuge in some lonely elm, 



That age or injury has hollow 'd deep, 



W^here, on his bed of wool and matted leaves, 



He has outslept the winter, ventures forth 



To frisk awhile, and bask in the warm sun, 



The squirrel, flippant, pert, and full of play. 



He sees me, and at once, swift as a bird. 



Ascends the neighb'ring beech ; there whisks his brush. 



And perks his ears, and stamps, and cries aloud, 



With all th^ prettiness of feign'd alarm. 



And anger insufficiently fierce." 



There are many other references to the squirrel in 

 poetry. I shall give a few of those that have come 

 across my notice. Mrs. Browning has this passage, 

 in "The Lost Bower:" 



" For you hearken on your right hand, 



How the birds do leap and call 



In the greenwood, out of sight and 



Out of reach and fear of all ; 



And the squirrels crack the filberts through their cheerful madrigal." 



Coventry Patmore also, in "The Angel in the House," 

 has noted the squirrel's love of solitude: 



" Upon the spray the squirrel swung, 

 And careless songsters, six or seven. 

 Sang lofty songs the leaves among. 

 Fit for their only listener. Heaven." 



The present poet laureate, too, Mr. Alfred Austin, 

 in "At the Gate of the Convent," has the squirrel seek- 

 ing the forest cover: 



" The russet squirrel frisked and leapt 



From breadth of sheen to breadth of shade." 



