228 
NATURE NOTES. 
presently and close the cupboard door when I find my entire 
store of nuts is being transferred to the garden and planted all 
over the lawn ; for the squirrels bury nuts for future use, 
although I am very doubtful whether they do really dig them 
up again. 
On cold mornings, when the windows cannot be opened, it is 
touching to see the little furry heads peep in, waiting patiently 
for their daily meal. This they eventually share with several 
very tame nuthatches, these birds seeming very glad of nuts as 
well as fat during the winter months. 
The only drawback to having wild squirrels tamed is the 
distraction they cause when a class of children is being taught 
in the dining-room ! Sydney Smith says that “ A sparrow 
fluttering about the church is an antagonist which the most pro- 
found theologian in Europe is wholly unable to overcome;” and 
certainly the apparition of a bright-eyed squirrel popping up 
at each window in succession is enough to drive a teacher to 
despair. Nothing less than an abundant shower of nuts will 
bribe the little intruders to keep quiet for a time. 
I have given these simple details because I think that possi- 
bly many of the readers of Nature Notes may like to encourage 
these charming little animals when they learn how easily, b}' a 
little patient kindness, they may be attracted from the woods to 
become househeld pets of their own free will, which is, to my 
mind, so much more enjoyable than keeping captive animals or 
birds. It should, perhaps, be added that great quietness and 
calm are needed while the first advances are being made, and 
that a loud voice or a quick gesture will undo a week’s work in 
taming. 
Eliza Brightwen. 
NOTES FROM A FLORIDA DIARY. 
[CTOBER 2nd, 1892. — V. and I drove over from Oakland 
to “ Mallow,” starting at about 5.30 in the morning. 
V. drove us in a buggy with pair of half-broken Texas 
ponies, a coloured man riding before to show the way. 
It is through forest the whole journey — no real roads, but just 
tracks made by wagons through interminable sand, sometimes 
more than a foot deep. The trees are principally pine and 
“ blackjack ” — the latter being a species of oak, very undurable, 
and seldom growing into anything worthy of the name of tree. 
What scrub there is, is formed of palmettoes, which grow in 
hundreds everywhere. The pines and black jacks are hung 
from every branch with “ Spanish moss,” a curious Tillandsia 
hanging in long festoons, sometimes four or five feet from the 
boughs, and very characteristic of the sub-tropical scenery. It 
is the wrong time of year for wild flowers, nevertheless we 
