256 FAMILIAR lilFB IN FIELD AND FOREST. 



if he is given the chance, for the simple reason that 

 it has been well seasoned with salt water from the 

 ice-cream freezer. He does not hibernate like the 

 woodchuck, but goes abroad both winter and summer 

 on the coldest and hottest nights. He is also a strict 

 vegetarian, feeding on succulent 

 f,,^, bark, the foliage and twigs of 



trees, buds, and beechnuts ; 

 but he is always ready to 

 gnaw a house down if it con- 

 tains a grain of salt ; and in 

 the dead of the night he at- 

 tacks the woodshed door 

 with the vim of a rat and 

 ten times as much assur- 

 ance, for he can not be 

 driven away with the 

 thundering clatter of old 

 boots and sticks of wood 

 against the partition. Nine times in ten he will 

 continue to gnaw until some one opens the door 

 and clubs him away with a respectable-sized piece of 

 cDrd wood ; there is but one thing he heeds, all else 

 fails, that is the firecracker ! Of this mysterious in- 

 vention of a refined civilization he is suspicious; 

 probably the fiery spluttering more than the noise 

 awakens in his dull mind some sense of a danger 



'He is always "''•■^■^^"', 



ready to gnaw '"'^i'^^V;^ 



a house down. 



lV" 



