A LEAF FROM MY SKETCH HOOK 



65 



any small live things which I captured and 

 needed for observation. It was what in the 

 olden days the showman used to call a 

 "happy family" that occupied this cage, but 

 the happy part represents only the showman's 

 way of putting things. There was a flying 

 squirrel in this cage, and he took a malicious 

 delight in tormenting the black snake. The 

 serpent was a cautions hunter. He would 

 move around so slowly that the motion was 

 scarcely perceptible, in his attempt to gain a 

 vantage ground from which to strike and 

 capture his tormentor, and his care and wood- 

 craft deserved success, but the quarry was 

 shy and wise with the wisdom of the wood 

 folks, and if the black snake could strike 

 quickly the squirrel could jump even more 

 swiftly than the snake could strike. Time 

 and time again the squirrel crept chattering 

 down the sides of the cage until he had 

 tempted the black snake to spring at him — if 

 we can use such an expression to designate 

 the motion, which was simply a sudden 

 straightening out of a loop made in the shiny 

 black neck — and, although the snake's mo- 

 tion when attacking was apparently as rapid 

 as that of the shutter of a camera, his poor 

 nose would come with a bang against the 

 hard, unyielding wires, and the squirrel 

 would be in the top of the cage ready to re- 

 peat the manoeuver. At last, in sheer pity 

 for the snake's wounded nose, I took the rep- 

 tile by the tail and pulled him from the cage 

 and tossed him down on the damp ground 

 under the ferns, where he might find life, 

 liberty and the pursuit of happiness without 

 the company of flying squirrels. It was a 

 fine specimen of black snake. Every motion 

 of his glistening body betokened strength and 

 grace, and I was very anxious to make a 

 careful study of it, for I have none among 

 my sketches, but, because of the unceasing 

 persecution of the flying squirrel, I liberated 

 my model and allowed it to escape. 



While on this subject it may be interesting 

 to my readers to know that one of the largest 

 sized garter snakes stood no show in a tussle 

 with an ordinary chipmunk, because I saw a 

 chipmunk jump upon a garter .snake, and, 

 although the snake wound its sinuous body 

 around the squirrel, the latter iseemed not in 

 the least troubled by the embrace, but quietly 

 gnawed off the head of the snake, and then, 

 taking it in his little paws, it sat on its hind 

 legs and ate it up as it would a hickory nut. 



My readers must not understand by these 

 remarks that I approve of, or even inten- 

 tionally, took a hand in causing any of these 

 sanguinary encounters, 'but when one is col- 



lecting live specimen's for sketching pur 

 poses, even though he gives them .ill theii 

 freedom after they have served him .1 mod 

 els, there are bound to be some unadvertised 

 and unscheduled scrapes where the I 

 problem conies to the front, and tin- heredi 

 tary prejudices and antipathies have .'in op 

 portunity of venting themselves. 



A little white-footed mouse whieli I had iii 

 a cage with a garter snake, bul for which I 

 provided a safe retreat in one corner, so fixed 

 that the snake could not enter lit, became so 

 enraged at the presence of its enemy that it 

 left its safe retreat to attack the monster 

 snake, for monster it was in comparison with 

 the size of the little mouse; but 1 doubt if 

 this would have happened in the open. It 

 was probably the maternal instinct which 

 prompted the little mother mouse to come 

 out and attack 'its great foe, but, whatever it 

 was, out she came and jumped right for the 

 snake, much to the latter's surprise. Her 

 small teeth, although capable of inflicting a 

 painful bite on my finger, were not long 

 enough to do any injury to the garter snake, 

 and before I could open the cage to inter- 

 fere the latter had bitten the mouse severely 

 on one of its hind feet, but, for the comfort 

 of the tender-hearted breeder, I will say that 

 I took the snake from the cage and liberated 

 it; also, that I kept the mother mouse until 

 her foot had healed, and when I let her 

 go in the woods her injury would only be 

 perceptible from a slight limp as she went 

 hopping over a moss-covered log to her old 

 home in the rotten trunk of a tree. 



TO THE CHICKADEE 



BY C. LEON BRUMBAUGH 



Deep in the hemlock gloom, 



When rhododendrons bloom, 



Or snowflakes filter through, 



Awhiting all the sere anew; 



When bold hepaticas first frolic at the heel 



Of lingering chill, in wayward zeal, 



Or when the garniture of wood compels 



To sunset sky to rouse in envious chromic 



spells 

 Your self-announced, piping voice ^ 

 To me intones true wood-bourgeois. 

 No study in convention school of art ! 

 You choose as yours the simple part 

 Of honest woodman, skilled in craft 

 No toil of conning can engraft. 



happy, noisy, tumbling acrobat, 



1 love your black cap and cravat; 



My winter would be long without your glee, 

 You happy, noisy, romping chickadee. 



