CHILDREN OF THE WILD

by

CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS

Author of "Kings in Exile, " "The Feet of the Furtive, " etc. 

New YorkThe MacMillan Company

1922

CONTENTS

 I. THE LITTLE FURRY ONES THAT SLIDE DOWN HILL

 II. THE BLACK IMPS OF PINE-TOP

 III. YOUNG GRUMPY AND THE ONE-EYED GANDER

 IV. LITTLE SWORD AND THE INKMAKER

 V. ROCKED IN THE CRADLE OF THE DEEP

 VI. TEDDY BEAR'S BEE TREE

 VII. THE SNOWHOUSE BABY

 VIII. LITTLE SILK WING

 IX. A LITTLE ALIEN IN THE WILDERNESS

 X. WHAT HE SAW WHEN HE KEPT STILL

 XI. THE LITTLE VILLAGER AND HIS UNFRIENDLY GUESTS

 XII. THE BABY AND THE BEAR

 XIII. THE LITTLE SLY ONE

 XIV. THE DARING OF STRIPES TERROR-TAIL

 XV. DAGGER BILL AND THE WATER BABIES

CHAPTER I

THE LITTLE FURRY ONES THAT SLIDE DOWN HILL

In the brown, balsam-smelling log cabin on the shores of Silverwater, loveliest and loneliest of wilderness lakes, the Babe's great thirstfor information seemed in a fair way to be satisfied. Young as he was, and city-born, the lure of the wild had nevertheless already caughthim, and the information that he thirsted for so insatiably was allabout the furred or finned or feathered kindreds of the wild. And hereby Silverwater, alone with his Uncle Andy and big Bill Pringle, theguide, his natural talent for asking questions was not so firmlydiscouraged as it was at home. 

But even thus early in this adventurous career, this fascinating andnever-ending quest of knowledge, the Babe found himself confronted by amost difficult problem. He had to choose between authorities. He hadto select between information and information. He had to differentiatefor himself between what Bill told him and what his Uncle Andy toldhim. He was a serious-minded child, who had already passed throughthat most painful period of doubt as to Santa Claus and the Fairies, and had not yet reached the period of certainty about everything. Hewas capable of both belief and doubt. So, naturally, he had hisdifficulties. 

Bill certainly knew an astonishing lot about the creatures of the wild. But also, like all guides who are worth their salt, he knew anastonishing lot of things that weren't so. He had imagination, or hewould never have done for a guide. When he knew--which was notoften--that he did _not_ know a thing, he could put two and twotogether and make it yield the most extraordinary results. He felt itone of his first duties to be interesting. And above all, he felt ithis duty to be infallible. No one could be expected to have implicitfaith in a guide who was not infallible. He never acknowledgedinsufficient information about anything whatever that pertained to thewoods and waters. Also he had a very poor opinion of what others mightprofess to know. He felt convinced that so long as he refrained fromany _too_ lively contributions to the science of animal life, no onewould be able to discredit him. But he was conscientious in hisdeductions. He would never have permitted himself to say that blueherons wore gum boots in wading, just because he had happened to findan old gum boot among the reeds by the outlet of the lake, where theherons did most of their fishing. He remembered that that gum boot wasone of a pair which had been thrown away by a former visitor toSilverwater. 

Uncle Andy, on the other hand, knew that there was an astonishing lot_he didn't_ know about animals, and he didn't hesitate to say so. Hewas a reformed sportsman, who, after spending a great part of his lifein happily killing things all over the earth, had come to the quaintconclusion that most of them were more interesting alive than dead, especially to themselves. He found a kindred spirit in the Babe, whoseeducation, along the lines of maiming cats and sparrows with sling shotor air gun, had been absolutely neglected. 

Uncle Andy was wont to say that there was only one man in all the worldwho knew _all_ about all the animals--and that he was not AndrewBarton, Esq. At this, Bill would smile proudly. At first this modestyon Uncle Andy's part was a disappointment to the Babe. But it ended ingiving him confidence in whatever Uncle Andy told him; especially afterhe came to realize that when Uncle Andy spoke of the only man in theworld who knew _all_ about animals, he did _not_ mean Bill. 

But though the whole field of animal lore was one of absorbing interestto the Babe, from the day when he was so fortunate as to witness amother fish-hawk teaching her rather unwilling and unventuresome youngones to fly, it was his fellow babes of the wild that he was mostanxious to hear about. In this department of woods lore, Bill was sodeeply ignorant that, not caring to lean _too_ heavily on hisimagination, lest it should break and stick into him, he used to avoidit quite obstinately. He would say--"Them youngsters is all alike, anyhow, an' it ain't worth while to waste no time a-studyin' 'em!" Sohere Uncle Andy had the field all to himself. Whenever he undertook toenlighten the Babe on any such subject, Bill would go off somewhere andscornfully chop down trees. 

 * * * * * *

Silverwater was fed by many brooks from the deep-wooded surroundinghills. Toward one of these, on a certain golden afternoon, Uncle Andyand the Babe were betaking themselves along the shadowy trail, wherethe green-brown moss was soft under foot and their careful steps madeno noise. When they spoke it was in quiet undertones; for the spiritof the woods was on the Babe, and he knew that by keeping very quietthere was always the chance of surprising some fascinating mystery. 

The two were going fishing--for Uncle Andy, with a finely humaninconsistency, was an enthusiastic fisherman, and the stream towardwhich they were making their way was one of deep pools and cool"stillwaters" where the biggest fish were wont to lie during the hotweather. Uncle Andy had a prejudice against those good people who werealways sternly consistent, and he was determined that he would neverallow himself to become a crank; so he went on enthusiastically killingfish with the same zest that he had once brought to the hunting ofbeast and bird. 

While they were yet several hundred yards from the stream, suddenlythere came to their ears, unmistakable though muffled by theintervening trees, the sound of a brisk splash, as if something hadfallen into the water. Uncle Andy stopped short in his tracks, motionless as a setter marking his bird. The Babe stopped likewise, faithfully imitating him. A couple of seconds later came anothersplash, as heavy as the first; and then, in quick succession, twolighter ones. 

For a moment or two the Babe kept silence, though bursting withcuriosity. Then he whispered tensely--"What's that?"

"Otter, " replied Uncle Andy, in a murmur as soft as the wind in thesedge-tops. 

"Why?" continued the Babe, meaning to say--"But what on earth are theydoing?" and trusting that Uncle Andy would appreciate theself-restraint of the monosyllable. 

"Sliding down hill, " muttered Uncle Andy, without turning his head. Then, holding up his hand as a sign that there were to be no morequestions asked, he crept forward noiselessly; and the Babe followed athis heels. 

After two or three minutes the sounds were repeated in the samesuccession as before--first two heavy splashes, and then two lighterones. Unable to ask questions, the Babe was obliged to think forhimself. 

He had only a vague idea what otters were like, but he knew a good dealabout sliding down hill. He pictured to himself a high, rough bankleading down to the water; but as not even Bill's daring imaginationwould have represented the gamesome beasts as employing toboggans orhand-sleds, he thought it must be rather bumpy and uncomfortable workcoasting over the roots and rocks on one's own unprotected anatomy. 

The sounds continued, growing louder and louder, till the twoadventurers must have been within thirty or forty feet of the stream;and they were creeping as noiselessly as a shadow slips over the grass, in the hope of catching the merrymakers at their game. But suddenlythere came one great splash, heavy and prolonged, as if all the slidershad come down close together. And then silence. Uncle Andy crouchedmotionless for several minutes, as if he had been turned into a stump. Then he straightened himself up with a disappointed air. 

"Gone!" he muttered. "Cleared out! They've heard us or smelt us!"

"Oh!" exclaimed the Babe in a voice of deep concern; though, as amatter of fact, he was immensely relieved, the strain of the prolongedtension and preternatural stillness having begun to make him feel thathe must make a noise or burst. 

Two minutes later they came out on the banks of the stream. 

The stream at this point was perhaps twenty-five feet in width, deep, dark, and almost without current. Only by noting the bend of the longwatergrasses could one tell which way it ran. The hither bank was lowand grassy, with a fallen trunk slanting out into the water. But theshore opposite was some twelve or fifteen feet high, very steep, andquite naked, having been cut by the floods from a ridge of clay. Downthe middle of this incline a narrow track had been worn so smooth thatit gleamed in the sun almost like ice. 

As he stared across the water a dozen questions crowded to the Babe'slips. But he realized in time that the answers to them were fairlyobvious to himself, and he heroically choked them back. Had he notthat very morning been rebuked by his uncle for asking too many of whathe called "footy" questions? But one burst forth now, in spite ofhimself. 

"What do they do it for?" he demanded--having perhaps a vague idea thatall the motives of the wild creatures were, or ought to be, purelyutilitarian. 

Uncle Andy turned upon him a withering look; and he shifted his feetuneasily, convicted of another "footy" question. 

"What do you slide down hill for?" inquired Uncle Andy sarcastically. 

"Oh!" said the Babe hastily. "I see. And now are we going to catchsome fish?"

But Uncle Andy had stood his rod in a bush and sat down on the fallentree; and now he was getting out his old black pipe. 

"Well now, " he answered presently, "I don't think it would be much usetrying. What do you think?"

"Of course not, " answered the Babe. "Otter have scared 'em all away. "

"You really are doing very well, " said Uncle Andy, "if you _did_ askthat one fool question. When we were creeping up on the otter, to tryand get a look at them while they were playing, you did very wellindeed. You stepped as light as a cat, and that's not easy mind, Itell you, when one's not trained to it. You didn't even breathe toohard--and I know you must have been just bursting with excitement. You've got the makings of a first-rate woodsman in you, if you takepains. "

The Babe's small chest swelled with pride; for commendation from UncleAndy was a scarce article. He too sat down on the fallen trunk andbegan digging at the bark with his knife to hide his exultation. 

"I suppose now, " went on Uncle Andy presently, when his pipe wasdrawing well, "you know quite a lot about otter. "

"Nothing at all but what Bill's told me, " answered the Babe with finediplomacy. 

"Forget it!" said Uncle Andy; and went on smoking in thoughtfulsilence. Presently he remarked--"This otter family appears to havebeen having a pretty good time!"

"Great!" said the Babe laconically. 

"Well, " continued Uncle Andy, regarding him with approval, "there wasonce another otter family, away up on the Little North Fork of theOttanoonsis, that used to have such good times till at last they strucka streak of bad luck. "

"Did you know them?" asked the Babe. 

"Well, not as you might say intimately, " answered Uncle Andy, with afar-away look in his grey eyes. "You see, they had no way of knowinghow nice I was, so they never admitted me into their family circle. But I knew a lot more about them than they ever guessed, I can tellyou. When the flies weren't too bad I used to lie by the hour behind athick bush, never stirring a finger, and watch them. "

"My, but how tired you must have got!" interrupted the Babe feelingly. 

"I don't _have_ to twiddle my fingers, and scratch my head, and jump upand down every two minutes and a half, " said Uncle Andy ratherseverely. "But, as I was going to say, they also got used to seeing mesitting on the bank, quiet and harmless, till they no longer felt soshy of me as they did of Jim Cringle, my guide. They knew Jim was anenemy, and they gave him a wide berth always. But they seemed to thinkI wasn't of much account. "

"Oh!" protested the Babe politely. It did not seem to him quite rightthat Uncle Andy should be regarded lightly, even by an otter. 

"Well, you know, I _wasn't_ of much account. I was neither dangerous, like Jim Cringle, nor good to eat, like a muskrat or a pickerel. So Idon't appear any more in this yarn. If you find yourself wondering howI came to know about some of the things I'm going to tell you, justmake believe I got it from the chickadee, who is the most confidentiallittle chap in the world, or from the whisky-Jack, who makes a point, as you may have observed, of knowing everybody else's business. "

"Or from Jim Cringle?" inquired the Babe demurely. 

But Uncle Andy only frowned. He always discouraged the Babe's attemptsat raillery. 

"The two Little Furry Ones, " he continued, after pressing down thetobacco in his pipe, "were born in a dry, warm, roomy den in the bank, under the roots of an old birch that slanted out over the water. Thefront door was deep under water. But as the old otters had few enemiesto dread, being both brave and powerful, they had also a back entranceon dry land, hidden by a thicket of fir bushes. The two furry 'pups'were at first as sprawling and helpless as newborn kittens, though ofcourse a good deal bigger than any kittens you have ever seen. Andbeing so helpless, their father and mother never left them alone. Onealways stayed with them while the other went away to hunt trout ormuskrat. "

"Why, what _could_ get at them in there?" interrupted the Babe. 

"You see, " explained Uncle Andy graciously, "either a fox or a weasel_might_ come in by the back door--if they were hungry enough to takethe risk. Or what was much more likely, that slim, black, murderousrobber, the mink, might come swimming in by the front entrance, pop hisnarrow, cruel head above the water, see the youngsters alone, and be attheir throats in a twinkling. The old otters, who were very devotedparents, were not running any risks like that, I can tell you. "

"I guess not!" agreed the Babe, wagging his head wisely. 

"Well, " went on Uncle Andy, "just _because_ those level-headed oldotters were always ready for it, nothing happened. You'd better make anote of that. If you are always ready for trouble when the otherfellow makes it, he will be pretty shy about beginning. That's why thefoxes and the weasels and the minks never came around. 

"When the Little Furry Ones were about the size of five months' kittensthey were as handsome a pair of youngsters as you are ever likely toset eyes upon. Their fur, rich and soft and dark, was the finest everseen. Like their parents, they had bodies shaped for going through thewater at a tremendous speed--built like a bulldog's for strength, andlike an eel's for suppleness. "

"Not _slimy_!" protested the Babe, who had hated eels whole-heartedlyever since the day when he had tried to take one off the hook. 

"Of course not!" answered Uncle Andy impatiently. "As I was going tosay, they were shaped a good deal like those seals you've seen in theZoo, only that instead of flippers they had regulation legs and feet, and also a tail. It was a tail worth having, too, and not merelyintended for ornament. It was very thick at the base and tapering, something like a lizard's, and so powerful that one twist of it coulddrive its owner through the water like a screw. "

"Wish I could swim that way!" murmured the Babe, trying to do themovement, as he imagined it, with his legs. 

"But though the Little Furry Ones were just built for swimming, "continued Uncle Andy, graciously overlooking the interruption, "theywere actually afraid of it. They liked to see their father or theirmother dive smoothly down into the clear, goldy-brown water of theirfront door, and out into that patch of yellow sunlight shimmering onthe weedy bottom. But when invited to follow, they drew back into thecorner and pretended to be terribly busy. 

"One fine morning, however, to their great delight they were led out bythe back door, under the bush, and introduced to the outside world. How huge and strange it looked to them! For a few minutes they stoleabout on their absurdly short, sturdy legs, poking their noses intoeverything, and jumping back startled at the strange smells theyencountered; while their parents, lying down nearby, watched themlazily. At last, beginning to feel more at home in this big, airyworld, they fell to romping with each other on the sunny bank, closebeside the water. Presently their parents got up and came over besidethem. The father slipped gracefully in, and began diving, darting thisway and that, and throwing himself half-way out of the water. It wasmost interesting, I can tell you, and the two little Furry Ones stoppedtheir play, at the very edge of the bank, to watch him. But when hecalled to them coaxingly to come in with him and try it, they turnedaway their heads and pretended to think it wasn't worth looking atafter all. They would rather look at the trees and the sky, and keptstaring up at them as if perfectly fascinated. And _while_ they werestaring upwards in this superior way, they got a great surprise. Theirmother slily slipped her nose under them and threw them, one after theother, far out into the water. "

"Ow!" exclaimed the Babe with a little gasp of sympathy. He himselffelt the shock of that sudden, chill plunge. 

Uncle Andy chuckled. 

"That's just the way they felt, " said he. "When they came to the topagain they found, to their surprise, that they could swim; and feelingmost indignant and injured they struck out straight for shore. Butthere, between them and the good dry ground, swam their mother, andwould not let them land. They did not see how mothers could be soheartless. But there was no help for it; so they swam out again veryhaughtily and joined their father in mid-stream. And before they knewit they were enjoying themselves immensely. 

"And now life became much more interesting to them. For a bit it washarder to keep them out of the water than it had been to get them intoit. They had their first lessons in fishing. And though they were tooclumsy at first to catch even a slow, mud-grubbing sucker, they foundthe attempt most interesting. The stream just opposite their home wasdeep and quiet, but a little way below, the current ran strong; andonce, having ridden down it gaily for a couple of hundred yards, theyfound themselves unable to swim back against it. At first they battledbravely and were most surprised to find themselves making so littleprogress. Then they grew tired; and then frightened, and they werejust being carried off down stream by this strange, soft, irresistibleforce when their mother arrived. The current was nothing to her. Shetook them on her back, and shot off up stream again with them. Afterthat they would ride on her back, or on their father's whenever theygot tired. And their parents began to take them on long trips up anddown stream. You see, their housekeeping being so simple, they didn'tmind going away even for a couple of days at a time, and leaving thehouse to look after itself. "

"I don't think I'd like to be wet like that _all_ the time, even insummer, " remarked the Babe, shaking his head thoughtfully. 

"Oh, they weren't that. They used to go ashore and, in spite of theirridiculously short legs, make most respectably long journeys throughthe woods to some other stream, pretending, I suppose, that the fishover there had a different flavor. Sometimes, too, when they came upona patch of smooth, mossy ground, they would have a wild romp, as ifthey had just been let out of school--a sort of game of tag, in whichthe father and mother played just as hard as the youngsters. Or theywould have a regular tug of war, pulling on opposite ends of a stick, till the moss was all torn up as if a little cyclone had loafed alongthat way. Then one day they came to a clay bank, something like thatone across yonder. The old ones had been there before, but not forsome time, and the clay had got all dry and hard. But the father andmother knew very well how to fix that. When they had slid down acouple of times with their fur all dripping the track was smooth asoil. As for the youngsters, you may depend upon it they did not needany coaxing or persuasion to make them believe _that_ was a good game. "

"I should think not!" murmured the Babe, looking longingly over thestream to where the wet slide glistened in the sun, and wishing that hemight try it without any regard whatever to the seat of his littletrousers. 

"Taking it all together it was a pretty jolly life, I can tell you, there in the sweet-smelling, shadowy woods and sunny waters. Then oneday all at once, as quick as falling off a log, everything was changed. "

Uncle Andy paused to relight his pipe. After a few seconds the Babe'simpatience got the better of him; and before he could stop himself heblurted out "Why?" The moment he had spoken he knew it was a foolquestion to ask, and he flushed. But to his grateful relief Uncle didnot seem to hear. 

"A hunter from the city came that way. He had a good eye, a repeatingrifle, and no imagination whatever. With the luck that sometimes comesto those fellows, he was sitting under a tree near the bank, staringacross at the otter-slide (which did not mean anything whatever orsuggest anything to him, but was merely a strip of bare clay), when theotter family came to slide. The father started down. It was mostinteresting--so the stranger under the tree, who was as spry as asparrowhawk, shot instantly; and the otter came down in a crumpledheap. The mother might have escaped; but for just one second shehesitated, glancing round to see if her little ones were out of danger. That second was enough for the smart shot across the water. Shedropped. It was good shooting, of course. The two little ones, horrified by the spiteful noise, and quite unable to understand whathad happened, shrank away into some thick bushes and lay very still, waiting for their mother to come and tell them the danger was past. "

"And she could never come!" murmured the Babe thoughtfully. 

"Well, she didn't, " snorted Uncle Andy, the discourager of sentiment. Fairly reeking with sentiment himself, at heart, he disliked allmanifestation of it in himself or others. He liked it left to theimagination. "They never stirred for an hour or more, " he went on. "Then at last they stole out and began looking everywhere for thoselost parents. All about the slide they hunted--among the bushes at thetop, in the water and the rushes at the bottom--but they found nothing. For the man had come in his canoe and carried off his victims. 

"All day long the two Little Furry Ones continued their search. Butyou would not have known them for the same creatures as those which hadstarted out that morning. Then they had played carelessly and goneboldly, thinking not of enemies and fearing none. Now they creptnoiselessly, sniffing this way and that, and never showing their nosesoutside a thicket without first taking observations. For life was nowa very different matter with them. Never in all their lives before hadthey come across so many hostile and threatening smells as theyencountered this one afternoon. But then, to be sure, they had neverlooked for them before. They were all the time running into trails ofmink, or weasel, or wildcat; and it seemed to them as if the world hadsuddenly become quite full of foxes. They were painfully surprised, for they had never thought there were so many disagreeable creatures inthe world. You see, being so young and inexperienced, it neveroccurred to them that one fox or one weasel could make quite a lot oftrails. So they kept having palpitations every other minute. 

"It was just as well, however, that they got such an exaggerated ideaof the numbers of their enemies. For it was astonishing how quicklythe news got around that the old otters were dead. Toward sunset thatevening, when the two lonely youngsters, puzzled and miserable, stoleback to their old den under the bank, they found that a mink had daredto kill a big trout in their own pool. There were the remains, and thepresumptuous intruder's tracks, almost at their very door. They wereindignant, and the thick hair bristled on their necks. But, realizingsuddenly how hungry they were, they did not scorn to eat the stranger'sleavings. Then they dived into their den; and after sniffing about andwhimpering lonesomely for a while, they curled themselves up closetogether and went to sleep. It had been a strange and dreadful day. 

"As you may imagine, these two youngsters had never yet been trained tothe useful habit of sleeping with one ear open. They had left that totheir parents. But to-night, even while they slept most soundly, something within them seemed to keep watch. Whatever it was, suddenlyit woke them. And instantly they were tremendously wide awake. Beforethey knew why they did it, they were uncurled from the ball in whichthey slept and, crouching side by side, glaring savagely up the narrowpassage that led to their back door. 

"There they saw a pair of cruel eyes, small and flaming, and set veryclose together, which seemed to float slowly down towards them. "

Here Uncle Andy was so inconsiderate as to pause, as if he wanted tothink. The Babe could not hold himself in. 

"Was it a snake?" he demanded breathlessly. 

"There you go again, interrupting, " growled Uncle Andy, most unfairly. "And who ever heard of a snake's eyes flaming? But the Little FurryOnes knew what it was at once; and the hair stood straight up on theirnecks. Of course they were frightened a little. But most of all werethey in a rage at such an impudent intrusion. There was no sign offear, I can tell you, in the low growl which came from between theirlong, white, snarling teeth. And those stealthy eyes halted. For halfa minute, motionless, they studied the crouching and defiantyoungsters, evidently surprised to see how big and strong they hadgrown. Then, very slowly and with dignity, they withdrew and presentlydisappeared. For the weasel, though perhaps the most fearless assassinthat prowls the woods, is no fool. And he saw that the otter childrenhad grown too big for him to handle. 

"The youngsters were a good deal set up, of course, by thisunexpectedly easy rebuff of so venomous an enemy; but there was no morethought of sleep for them. It made them terribly anxious, the idea ofanything stealing in on them that way, by the back door. For a longtime they lay there motionless, their wide eyes staring into the dark, their ears straining to every faint, mysterious sound, their sensitivenoses questioning every scent that came breathing in to them from thestill night forest. At last they heard a stealthy footfall outside theback door. It was as light--oh, lighter than a falling leaf. But_they_ heard it. If you and I had such ears as that, maybe we couldhear the grasses growing. "

"_That_ would be fun, " muttered the Babe. 

"And then, " continued Uncle Andy, "they smelt a faint, musky scent. I_don't_ think it would be fun if we had such noses as that. We'd smellso many smells we did not want to. Eh? And I tell you, the youngstersdid not want to smell that smell. It was a fox. They couldn't fight afox. Not yet. With their hearts in their throats they backed softlydown to the front door, and waited, ready to slip into the water. 

"But fortunately the fox was cunning, and proud of it. He had heard arumor that the old otters were dead. But he was much too cunning tobelieve all he heard. It would be just like them, he thought, topretend they were dead, so that he might come in and get caught. Assuredly there was a good, strong, live otter smell coming up out ofthat hole. He poked his nose down and gave a very loud sniff, thencocked his ear sharply and listened. Nothing stirred. Had it beenonly the little ones, down there all by themselves, he thought, theywould have been frightened enough to jump. So, it was plainly a trap. Waving his great bushy tail complaisantly, he tiptoed off to huntrabbits, pleased with the notion that somebody else was going to gettaken in. 

"The youngsters stayed where they were, close beside the water. Thefirst glimmer of dawn, striking on the misty surface of the pooloutside, struggled up into the den. The youngsters turned to greet it, with the thought, perhaps, that it was time to go fishing. Just atthis moment the mink, who had been looking for the remnants of histrout where he had left them on the bank (he was a fool, of course, ever to have left them there), came diving into the deep front door ofthe den to avenge himself on the unprotected little ones. His slimblack form was visible as it rose through the greying water. As thepointed head popped above the surface, it was confronted by twogrinning heads which snarled savagely in its face and snapped at it infearless defiance. The mink was surprised and pained. He had expectedto find those two youngsters huddled together and already halffrightened to death just at being alone. He had _not_ expected to findthem half so big. In fact, there at home, and guarding their owndomain, they looked to him much bigger than they really were. A verysmall man, you know, may look about seven feet high when he stands inhis own door and tells you to keep out. Eh, what? Well, the minksuddenly felt sort of bashful about intruding. He discreetly withdrew, without thinking to make inquiry about the fish. And his suddendiffidence was very fortunate for the two Little Furry Ones. For themink, let me tell you, would have been a tough proposition for them totackle. 

"This sudden departure of the terrible mink made the two youngstersfeel almost bigger than was good for them. But the otter, fortunately, is born cautious, no matter how courageous he may be. So theyoungsters were not spoiled by their good luck. They waited a fewminutes, to give the mink a chance to get good and far away. Then theydived forth into the misty pool. Never before had they seen onequarter so many fish in it. They breakfasted very well on a couple ofplump, silvery chub--though they would have preferred trout, ofcourse--and then, just for sport, began killing as many as they could, only swallowing a bite out of each, from the thick, flaky meat behindthe head. They were young, you see--though not more foolish than lotsof sportsmen we hear about. In a very few minutes, of course, everyfish that could get away had got away as far as possible from thatdeadly pool. And then the two reckless fishermen crawled ashore andbegan a tug of war with a stick. They could just not help playing, yousee, any more than kittens or puppies could; though they were stilllonely and anxious. And in their play they kept very close to thewater's edge, in case the fox should happen along to inquire aftertheir parents. 

"The fox did not turn up. But after some time they caught sight of agreat, dark bird winnowing his way slowly above the tree tops. Just tobe on the safe side, they got into the water so quickly that one ofthem, to save time, threw himself in backwards. They did not know thatit was only a fishhawk, an amiable soul, quite indifferent to suchdelicacies as young otters. Another thing they did not know was thatif the fishhawk _had_ wanted them, he could have caught them morecomfortably in the water than on shore. 

"When the great bird was well out of sight they started off downstream, partly to have another look for their lost parents, partlybecause they had nothing better to do. But they did not go very farthat day, or have any more very exciting adventures. They spent mostof their time in the water, where they had no foe to watch out forexcept the mink. And, as the fish had now learned to beware of them, they had enough to do in satisfying their lively appetites. That nightthey slept in the den, lying close to the water's edge, lest the foxshould come. And they had no visitors. 

"The next day they were feeling more confident, more sure ofthemselves. So they set out on a longer expedition. In the course ofthe morning they killed a big muskrat, after a sharp fight, and feltterribly proud of themselves. They got bitten, of course, and hadtheir fur all mussed up, so it meant a long, elaborate toilet in thewarm grass by the water's edge. And it was not till early in theafternoon that they came once more to the fateful slide where theirparents had so mysteriously vanished. 

"At the sight of it, as they came upon it suddenly around a bend of thestream, their fur bristled and they crouched flat, glancing angrilythis way and that. Then they stole forward, and once more explored thewhole place minutely. At last, finding nothing to alarm them, in anabsent-minded way one of the two went down the slide, splash into thecool brown water. The other followed at once. The temptation wassimply not to be resisted, you know. And in a minute more they wereboth hard at it, having the time of their lives--hawks, foxes, minks, and vanished parents alike forgotten. "

"Oh!" protested the Babe in a shocked voice. 

"You may say 'Oh!'" retorted Uncle Andy, "but let me tell you, if thewild creatures hadn't pretty short memories, they would have a veryunhappy time. 

"Well, they had been enjoying themselves and forgetting their troublesfor some little time, when, just as it came down the slide, one of themwas grabbed and pulled under. The mink had arrived and decided tosettle accounts with the youngsters. He had probably been thinking itover, and come to the conclusion that they were getting too bumptious. Darting up through the water, he had snapped savagely at the carelessplayer's throat. 

"But the latter--it was the female, and spry, I can tell you--had feltthat darting terror even before she had time to see it, and twistedaside like an eel. So instead of catching her by the throat, as he hadso amiably intended, the mink only got her leg, up close by theshoulder. It was a deep and merciless grip; but instead ofsquealing--which she could not have done anyhow, being already underwater--the Little Furry One just sank her sharp white teeth into theback of her enemy's neck, and held on for dear life. It was _exactly_the right thing to do, though she did not know it. For she had got hergrip so high up on the mink's neck that he could not twist his headaround far enough to catch her by the throat. Deep down at the bottomof the pool the two rolled over and over each other; and the mink wasmost annoyed to find how strong the youngster was, and how set in herways. Moreover, he had been under water longer than she had, and wasbeginning to feel he'd like a breath of fresh air. He gave a kick withhis powerful hind legs, and, as the Little Furry One had no objection, up they came. 

"Now, the other youngster had not been able, just at first, to make outwhat was happening. He thought his sister had gone down to the bottomfor fun. But when he saw her coming up, locked in that deadly strugglewith their old enemy, his heart swelled with fury. He sprang clear outinto the deep water when the struggling pair reached the surface, lashing and splashing, and the mink had only bare time to snatch asingle breath of air before he found another adversary on his back, andwas borne down inexorably to the bottom. 

"Just about this time a perfectly new idea flashed across the mink'smind, and it startled him. For the first time in his life he thoughtthat perhaps he was a fool. Young otters seemed to be so much olderthan he had imagined them, so much more unreasonable and bad-tempered, and to have so many teeth. It was a question, he decided--while he wasbeing mauled around among the water weeds--that would bear somethinking over. He wanted to think about it right away. There was notime like the present for digesting these new ideas. Seeing a big rootsticking out of the bank, close to the bottom, with a tremendous efforthe clawed himself under it and scraped off his antagonists. Shootingout on the other side, he darted off like an eel through the watergrass, and hurried away up stream to a certain hollow log he knew, where he might lick his bites and meditate undisturbed. The two LittleFurry Ones stared after him for a moment, then crawled out upon thebank and lay down in the sunny grass. "

Uncle Andy got up with an air of decision. "Let's go catch some fish, "he said. "They ought to be beginning to rise about now, over by SpringBrook. "

"But what became of the two Little Furry Ones after that?" demanded theBabe, refusing to stir. 

"Well, _now_, " protested Uncle Andy in an injured voice, "you _know_ Iain't like Bill and some other folk. I don't know everything. ButI've every reason to believe that, with any kind of otter luck, theylived to grow up and have families of their own--and taught every oneof them, you may be sure, to slide down hill. As likely as not, thatvery slide over yonder belongs to one of their families. Now comealong and don't ask any more questions. "

CHAPTER II

THE BLACK IMPS OF PINE-TOP

"I think I'd _like_ to be a bird, " murmured the Babe, wistfully gazingup at the dark green, feathery top of the great pine, certain of whosebranches were tossing and waving excitedly against the blue, althoughthere was not a breath of wind to ruffle the expanse of Silverwater. "I _think_ I'd like it--rather. " He added the qualification as aprudent after-thought, lest Uncle Andy should think him foolish. 

"In _summer_!" suggested Uncle Andy, following the Babe's eyes towardthe agitated pine-top. 

"Of _course_ in summer!" corrected the Babe hastily. "It must be awfulto be a bird in winter!" And he shuddered. 

"You'd better not say 'of course' in that confident way, " said UncleAndy rather severely. "You know so many of the birds go away south inthe winter; and they manage to have a pretty jolly time of it, I shouldthink. "

For a moment the Babe looked abashed. Then his face brightened. 

"But then, it _is_ summer, for _them_, isn't it?" said he sweetly. 

Uncle Andy gave him a suspicious look, to see if he realized thesuccess of his retort. "Had me there!" he thought to himself. But theBabe's face betrayed no sign of triumph, nothing but that eagerappetite for information of which Uncle Andy so highly approved. 

"So it depends on what kind of a bird, eh, what?" said he, deftlyturning the point. Then he scratched a sputtering sulphur match on thelong-suffering leg of his trousers. 

"Yes, " said the Babe, with more decision now. "I'd like to be a crow. "

Uncle Andy smoked meditatively for several minutes before replying, till the Babe began to grow less confident as to the wisdom of hischoice. But as he gazed up at those green pine-tops, so clear againstthe blue, all astir with black wings and gay, excited _ca_-ings, hetook courage again. Certainly _those_ crows, at least, were enjoyingthemselves immensely. 

And he had always had a longing to be able to play in the tops of thetrees. 

"Well, " said Uncle Andy at last, "perhaps you're not so _very_ far off, this time. If I couldn't be an eagle, or a hawk, or a wild goose, orone of those big-horned owls that we hear every night, or ahumming-bird, then I'd rather be a crow than most. A crow has gotenemies, of course, but then he's got brains, so that he knows how tomake a fool of most of his enemies. And he certainly does manage toget a lot of fun out of life, taking it all in all, except when the owlcomes gliding around his roosting places in the black nights, or anextra bitter midwinter frost catches him after a rainy thaw. "

He paused and drew hard on his pipe, with that far-away look in hiseyes which the Babe had learned to regard as the forerunner to a story. There were some interesting questions to ask, of course; but thoughbursting with curiosity as to why anyone should find it better to be awild goose, or even a hummingbird, than a crow, the Babe sternlyrepressed himself. He would ask those questions by and by, that hepromised himself. But he had learned that to speak inopportunely wassometimes to make Uncle Andy change his mind and shut up like anoyster. He was determined that he would not open his mouth till thestory should be well under way, till his uncle should be himself toomuch interested to be willing to stop. And then, to his horror, justas he was recording this sagacious resolution in his mind, he heardhimself demanding:

"But why after a rainy thaw?"

It was out before he could choke it back. There was nothing for him todo but stick to it and gaze at his uncle with disarming innocence. Uncle Andy turned upon him a glance of slow contumely. 

"If you were going to be caught out in a blizzard, would you rather bein dry clothes or in wet ones?" he inquired. 

The Babe smiled apologetically and resumed his study of the agitatedpine-tops, whence, from time to time, a crow, or two or three, wouldburst forth for a brief, whirling flight, as if to show how it wasdone. Then other flights were made, which seemed to the Babe extremelybrief and hesitating, as if the flyers were nervous when they foundthemselves out clear of the branches and suspended on their own wingsover the empty deeps of air. Presently there was a sudden tumultuousoutburst of _ca_-ing, the branches shook, and a whole flock, perhapstwo score or more, swarmed into the air. After a few moments ofclamorous confusion they all flew off in the direction of the muddyflats at the lower end of the lake. The pine-tops subsided intostillness. But an occasional hoarse croak or muttered guttural showedthat a few of their occupants had been left at home. The Babe wonderedwhat it had all been about, but he succeeded in holding his tongue. 

In a moment or two this heroic self-restraint had its reward. 

"Trying to show some of the youngsters how to fly, and jeering at thetimid ones and the stupid ones!" explained Uncle Andy. 

"Oh!" said the Babe, with a long, appreciative inflection. 

Uncle Andy paused, leaving an opening for more questions. But the Baberefused to be drawn, so presently, with a comprehending grin, he wenton:

"It's rather a small affair for crows, you know, this colony of theirshere on Silverwater. I suppose they've been crowded out from theplaces they really prefer, along the skirts of the settlements on theother side of the Ridge. They would rather live always somewhere nearthe farms and the cleared fields. Not that they have any specialaffection for man. Far from it. They dislike him, and distrust him, and seem to think him a good deal of a fool, too. His so-called'scarecrows' are a great joke to them, and have been known at times toafford some fine materials for the lining of their nests. But theyfind him so useful in many really important ways that they establishtheir colonies in his neighborhood whenever they possibly can. "

Here Uncle Andy made another long pause. He looked at the Babesuspiciously. 

"Is anything the matter?" he demanded. 

"No, thank you, Uncle Andy, " replied the Babe politely. 

"But you haven't asked a single question for at least seven minutes, "said Uncle Andy. 

"I was too busy listening to you, " explained the Babe. "But there'sone I'd like to ask, if it's all the same to you. "

"Well, fire away, " said his uncle. 

"_Why_ did they all fly away like that, as if they had just rememberedsomething awfully important? And why would you rather be a little tinyhumming-bird than a crow? And why did it take the whole flock that wayto teach the young ones to fly? And--and why are they afraid, whenthey are _born_ to fly? And why do they make fun of the stupid ones?And why would you like to be a wild goose? And, and--"

"Stop! stop!" cried Uncle Andy. "I didn't know you had a Gatlingabout you when I told you to fire away. You wait and shoot thosequestions at Bill, just like that, to-night. "

"Well, but why--"

"No, you must not interrupt, " insisted Uncle Andy. 

"But you _asked_ me! I was just as quiet--"

"I didn't know what I was doing!" said his uncle. "And I can'tpossibly answer all those questions. Why, I could never begin toremember half of them. "

"I can, " interposed the Babe. 

"Oh, you needn't mind, " said Uncle Andy, hastily. "But perhaps, if youlisten with great care, you _may_ find answers to some of them in whatI am going to tell you. Of course, I don't promise, for I don't knowwhat you asked me. But _maybe_ you'll hear something that will throwsome light on the subject. "

"Thank you very much, " said the Babe. 

"There were only two young ones in the nest, " said Uncle Andy, in hissometimes irrelevant way, which seemed deliberately designed to makethe Babe ask questions. "The nest was a big, untidy structure ofsticks and dead branches; but it was strongly woven for all itsuntidiness, because it had to stand against the great winds sweepingdown over the Ridge. Inside it was very nicely and softly lined withdry grass, and some horse-hair, and a piece of yellow silk from thelining of what had once been a ruffle or something like that that womenwear. The nest was in a tall pine, which stood at one end of a groveof ancient fir trees overlooking a slope of pasture and an old whitefarmhouse with a big garden behind it. Nearly all the trees had crows'nests in their tops, but in most of the other nests there were three orfour young crows. "

As Uncle Andy paused again at this point the Babe, who was alwayspolite, felt that he was really expected to ask a question here. If hedid not, it might look as if he were not taking an interest. He wouldrather ask too many questions than run the risk of seeminginappreciative. 

"_Why_ were there only two young ones in the nest in the pine tree?" heinquired. 

It was very hard to know sometimes just what would please Uncle Andy, and what wouldn't. But this time it was quite all right. 

"Now, that's a proper, sensible question, " said he. "I was just comingto that. You see, there ought to have been four youngsters in thatnest, too, for there had been four greeny-blue, brown-spotted eggs tostart with. But even crows have their troubles. And the pair thatowned this particular nest were a somewhat original and erratic couple. When the mother had laid her last egg and was getting ready to sit, shedecided to take an airing before settling down to work. Though hermate was not at hand to guard the nest, she flew off down to the farmto see if there was anything new going on among those foolish men, orperhaps to catch a mouse among the cornstalks. "

"Do _crows_ eat _mice_?" demanded the Babe in astonishment. 

"Of course they do, " answered Uncle Andy impatiently. "Everybody thateats meat at all eats mice, except us human beings. And in some partsof the world we, too, eat them, dipped in honey. "

"Oh--h--h!" shuddered the Babe. 

"Well, as I was going to say when you interrupted me, no sooner was shewell out of the way than a red squirrel, who had been watching from thenearest fir tree, saw his chance. It was a rare one. Nobody likedeggs better than he did, or got fewer of them. Like a flash he wasover from the fir branches into the pine ones, and up and into the nest. 

"His sharp teeth went into the nearest egg, and he drank its contentsgreedily--and cleverly, let me tell you, for it's not so easy to managewithout getting it all over your fur. He was just going to begin onanother when there was a sharp hiss of wings just above him and a loud_ca-ah_ of alarm. The father bird was back and swooping down upon him. He threw himself clear of the nest, fell to a lower branch, and racedout to its tip to spring into his fir tree. At this moment the furiousfather struck him, knocking him clean off into the air. 

"The air was now full of black wings and angry cries, as the crows fromneighboring nests flocked to the help of their fellow citizen. But thelittle red robber was brave and kept his head. Spreading his legs wideand flat, he made a sort of parachute of himself, and, instead offalling like a stone, he glided down to another branch. Those beatingwings and terrible jabbing beaks were all about him, but they got ineach other's way. And he was a wonder at dodging, I can tell you, nowthat he was among the bigger branches, and, though he got several nastythrusts, which covered his fine coat with blood, he gained his hole, halfway down the tree, and whisked into it safely. 

"Into this narrow retreat, of course, none of the crows dared to followhim, knowing that they would there be at the mercy of his teeth. Butthey gathered in fierce excitement about the entrance, scolding theaudacious thief at the top of their voices, and threatening him withevery kind of vengeance when he should dare to come out. And from timeto time one or another of the boldest would alight on the very edge ofthe hole, cock his head, and peer in, to bounce away again instantlywith a startled squawk as the squirrel would jump up at him, chatteringwith rage. 

"In the midst of all this excitement the careless mother came hurryingback. She had heard the row, of course. One could hear it all overthe parish. Unobserved, she flew straight to the nest. Her big, dark, cunning eyes blazed for an instant, but she knew it was all her fault, and she thought it best to make no fuss. Hastily she dropped the emptyshell over the side of the nest, and then took her place dutifully onthe three remaining eggs. In a few minutes the rest of the crows gottired of scolding the squirrel in his hole and came _ca_-ing back tothe pine tree to talk the matter over. When her mate, all in a fume, hopped onto the edge of the nest, the mother looked up at him with eyesof cold inquiry, as much as to say: 'Well, I'd like to know what allthis fuss is about. You ought to be ashamed of yourself, acting thatway about a wretched squirrel!' Of course, she may not have said allthat. But she certainly gave all the other crows the impression thatthere was nothing wrong about _her_ nest, and that they had better goand look after their own. Thereupon they all said sarcastic things totheir fellow citizen and left him indignantly. He, poor fellow, foundit impossible to explain or justify himself, because his mate wassitting on the eggs; so he flew off in a huff to try and find asparrow's nest to rob. When he came back he had taken pains to forgetjust how many eggs there had ever been in the nest. 

"Oh, yes, I know there were still three. Well, three or four dayslater a boy came up from the farmhouse and climbed the pine tree, Hewas not the kind of a boy that robs birds' nests, but he was making acollection. He wanted just one crow's egg, and he had a theory thatbirds cannot count. He liked crows--in fact, on that farm no one wasever allowed to shoot crows or any other birds except the murderousduck hawk, and he felt that the crows owed him _one_ egg, anyhow, inreturn for the protection they enjoyed on his father's property. 

"Now, you must not think he chose the pine tree because it was theeasiest to climb, " went on Uncle Andy hurriedly, seeing in the Babe'seyes that this point had to be cleared up at once. "In fact, it wasthe _hardest_ to climb. Any one of the fir trees would have beeneasier, and they all had crows' nests in them. But the boy knew thathe could not climb any of them without getting his clothes all overbalsam, which would mean a lot of inconvenient explanations with hismother. So he went up the pine tree, of course, and spared hismother's feelings. 

"The crows displayed no sense of gratitude whatever. He might haveeggs, of course, that boy, but not _their_ eggs! They flapped aroundhim savagely, and made so much noise in his ears that he could not hearhimself think. But he kept his big straw hat pulled down well over hiseyes, and paid no attention whatever to the indignant birds. Andbecause he was so quiet and positive about it, not one of them _quite_dared to actually touch him. The mother bird hopped off the nestsullenly just as he was about to put his hand on her. He took one egg, put it in his pocket, examined the nest with interest, and climbed downagain. Just as he was nearing the ground he broke the egg. This, ofcourse, made him feel not only sticky but somewhat embarrassed. He sawthat he might have some difficulty in explaining that pocket to hismother. Even a great deal of balsam would have been better than _that_egg. But he comforted himself with the thought that he would neverhave been able to blow it, anyhow, on account of its being so advanced. 

"And that's why there were only two young crows in that particular nest. 

"But they were an altogether unusual pair, these two. In the firstplace, receiving all the food and all the attention that were usuallydivided among four or five, they had grown and featheredextraordinarily fast, till now they were ready for flight, while theirfellows in the neighboring nests were still ragged and 'quilly'looking. In the second place, they had inherited from their eccentricparents an altogether surprising amount of originality. Their featherswere beautifully firm and black and glossy, their beaks sharp andpolished; and in their full, dark, intelligent eyes there was animpishness that even a crow might regard as especially impish. "

"What's _impish_?" demanded the Babe. 

"Goodness me! Don't you know what _impish_ is?" exclaimed Uncle Andy. He thought a moment, and then, finding it a little difficult toexplain, he added with convenient severity:

"If you will listen, you'll find out, perhaps. "

"Well, the two grew so fast that, before their parents realized at allwhat precocious youngsters they were, they had climbed out upon theedge of the nest and begun to stretch their fine wings. With hoarseexpostulations their father tried to persuade them back. But theirmother, who was not so conservative, chuckled her approval and flew offto hunt young mice for them. Thus encouraged, they ignored theirfather's prudent counsels, and hopped out, with elated squawks, uponthe branch. Whereupon the father, somewhat huffed, flew up to the verytopmost branch of the tree and perched there, swaying in the breeze, and trying to forget his family cares. From this high post ofobservation he presently caught sight of an eagle, winging his way upfrom the swamp at the lower end of the valley. With a sharp signal cryfor volunteers, he dashed off in pursuit. He was joined by two othercrows who happened to be at leisure; and the three, quickly overtakingthe majestic voyager, began to load him with impertinence and abuse. With their comparatively short but very broad wings the crows coulddodge so nimbly in the air that if was quite impossible for their greatenemy to catch them. He made no attempt to do so. Indignantly hechanged the direction of his flight, and began to soar, climbinggradually into the blue in splendid, sweeping circles; while the crows, croaking mockery and triumph, kept flapping above him and below, darting at his eyes, and dashing with open beaks at the shiningwhiteness of his crown. They dared not come near enough to actuallytouch him, but they succeeded in making themselves most unpleasant. The eagle glared at them steadily with his fierce, black-and-yelloweyes, but otherwise seemed to pay them no attention whatever. Only hekept mounting higher and higher, till at last his impishtormentors--_impish_, I said--dared follow him no farther. They camefluttering down hurriedly to more congenial levels, and flew back tothe grove to boast of their 'great victory. '"

"My, but that eagle must have felt awfully ashamed!" exclaimed the Babe. 

"The _next_ day, " continued Uncle Andy, without noticing theinterruption, "the two old crows began to think it would soon be timeto teach this independent pair of youngsters to fly. And they thought, too, that they'd be able to manage it all by themselves, without anyhelp or advice from the rest of the flock. While they were thinkingabout it, in the next tree, for they were not a great pair to stay athome, you know, one of the youngsters, the female, gave an impatientsquawk, spread her wings, and fell off her branch. She thought it wasflying, you know, but at first she just fell, flapping her wingswildly. In two seconds, however, she seemed to get the hang of it, more or less. With a violent effort, she rose, gained the next tree, alighted, panting, beside her parents and looked at them with asuperior air, as if she thought that they could never have accomplishedsuch a thing at her age. That was perhaps true, of course, but it wasnot for her to think so. "

"Huh! I should think not, indeed!" agreed the Babe severely. 

"Well, " continued Uncle Andy, now quite absorbed in his narrative, "theother youngster, not to be outdone, went hopping up in great excitementfrom branch to branch, till he was some ten feet above the rest of thefamily. Then, launching himself boldly, he went fluttering down tothem with no difficulty at all. He was less impetuous and moresagacious than his sister. 

"After this the parents continued to feed their independent offspringfor a number of days, just because they had been accustomed to feedtheir nestling for a certain length of time, till at last theyoungsters started off to forage on their own account, and the family, as a family, broke up. From habit, however, or from good will, theyoungsters kept coming back to roost on the branches beside the nest, and remained on the most friendly, though easy-going, relations withtheir father and mother. 

"In every crow flock, large or small, there seems to be some kind ofdiscipline, some kind of obedience to the wise old leaders of theflock. But the two black imps of Pine-Top were apparently, for thetime at least, exempted from it. They did about as they liked and werea nuisance to everybody but their two selves, whom they admiredimmensely. Being too young for the old crows to take seriously, theirpranks were tolerated, or they would soon have been pecked and beateninto better manners. Too big and too grown-up for the youngcrows--whom they visited in their nests and tormented till driven awayby the indignant parents--they had no associates but each other. Sothey followed their own whims; and the flock was philosophicallyindifferent as to what might happen to them. 

"You must not think, however, that they did not learn anything, thesetwo. They were sharp. They listened to what was being said aroundthem, and the crows, you know, are the greatest talkers ever; so theysoon knew the difference between a man with a gun and a man withoutone. They knew that an owl in the daytime is not the same thing as anowl at night. They gathered that a scarecrow is not as dangerous as itlooks. And many other things that a crow needs to know and believethey condescended to learn, because learning came easy to them. Butcommon caution they did not learn, because it did not seem to themeither interesting or necessary. So it was often just luck that gotthem out of scrapes, though they always thought it was their owncleverness. 

"It was just lucky, of course, that day when they went exploring in thepatch of dark woods down in the valley, that the big brown owl did notget one or the other of them. He was asleep on a big dead branch asbrown as himself, and looking so like a part of it that they were justgoing to alight, either upon him or within reach of his deadly clutch, when a red squirrel saw them and shrieked at them. Two great, round, glaring orange eyes opened upon them from that brown prong of thebranch, so suddenly that they gave two startled squawks and nearly fellto the ground. How the red squirrel tittered, hating both the owl andthe crows. But the imps, when they got over their start, were furious. Flying over the owl's head, they kept screaming at the top of theirvoices something which probably meant 'an owl! an owl! an owl!'; andimmediately every other crow within hearing took up the cry, till intwo minutes half the flock were gathered in the patch of woods. Theyswarmed screaming about the owl's head, striking at him with theirsharp beaks and strong black wings, but always too wary to come quitewithin his reach. The great night prowler knew that in the daylight hecould not catch them--that, indeed, if he did succeed in catching onein his claws the others would throw caution to the winds and all bedown upon him at once. He sat there, straight and stiff, for a while, snapping his terrible beak and hissing at them like an angry cat. Tillat last, realizing that there was no more chance of a peaceful sleepfor him there, he spread his huge, downy wings and sailed off smoothlyto seek some more secluded neighborhood. The whole flock pursued him, with their tormenting and abuse, for perhaps a couple of miles; andthen, at some signal from their leaders, dropped the chase suddenly andturned their attention to what looked like a sort of game of tag, in awide, open pasture where no enemy could steal upon them unawares. Theimps felt themselves great heroes, but if it had not been for that redsquirrel, the owl, sleepy though he was, would certainly have got oneof them. "

The Babe wanted to ask whether the squirrel had warned them out offriendliness or just out of dislike to the owl, but before he couldframe his question quite satisfactorily, or get out anything more thana hasty "But why--?" Uncle Andy had gone on with an emphasis whichdiscouraged interruption. 

"It was lucky for them, too, that no guns were fired on the big farmbelow the grove--the crows were there believed to earn the corn theystole by the grubs and cutworms and mice they killed. That was _very_lucky for the two imps, for they were forever hanging about thefarmyard and the big locust trees that ran along the foot of thegarden. The farmer himself and his hired hands paid no attention tothem, but the boy, the one who had prevented there being three impsinstead of two, he was tremendously interested. At first they were shyof him, because, perhaps, they felt him watching them out of thecorners of his keen blue eyes. But at last they decided he was no moredangerous than the rest, and made sarcastic remarks about him in alanguage which he couldn't understand. 

"There was always food to be picked up around the farmyard when the menwere absent in the fields, the womenfolk busy in the kitchen, and theboy somewhere out of sight. And it was food doubly sweet because ithad to be stolen from the fussy hens or the ridiculous ducks or thestupid, complacent pigeons. Then there was always somethinginteresting to be done. It was fun to bully the pigeons and to givesly, savage jabs to the half-grown chicks. It was delightful to stealthe bright tops of tin tomato cans--they _thought_ they were stealingthem, of course, because they could not imagine such fascinating thingsbeing thrown away, even by those fool men--to snatch them hurriedly, fly off with them to the tall green pine-top, and hide them in theirold nest till they got it looking quite like a rubbish dump, and goodpasture for a goat. And most of all, perhaps, was it fun to tease thelazy old kitchen cat, till her tail would get as big as a bottle brushwith helpless indignation. "

"The _cat_?" exclaimed the Babe. "Why, weren't they afraid of _her_?"

"Wait and see!" remarked Uncle Andy simply, with no apologies whateverto the Prime Minister. "Well, as I was about to say, their method wassimple and effective. They would wait till they found the cat lyingalong the narrow top of the rail fence, sunning herself. It was herfavorite place, though it can hardly have been comfortable, it was sonarrow. The He imp would alight on the rail, about ten feet in frontof her, and pretend to be very sick, squawking feebly and drooping hisblack wings with a struggling flutter, as if it was all he could do tokeep his perch. The cat, her narrow eyes opening very wide, wouldstart to creep up to him. The She imp would then alight on the railbehind her and nip her sharply by the tail, and go hopping clumsily offdown the rail. The cat would wheel with an angry _pfiff-ff_, and startafter this new quarry. Whereupon the He imp would again nip her tail. This would be repeated several times before the cat would realize thatshe was being made a fool of. Then she would bounce down from thefence and race off to the kitchen in a towering rage, and the impudentyoungsters would fly up into the nearest tree top and _ca_ about itdelightedly. 

"Then there was the scarecrow, in the middle of the big strawberrypatch down at the foot of the huge garden. It did not scare these twoyoung rascals, not in the least. It was an excellently made scarecrow, and did strike terror to the heart of many of the smaller birds. Butits hat was packed with straw, and the imps found it was a pleasantgame pulling the straws out through a couple of holes in the crown, andstrewing them over the strawberry bed. Incidentally, they likedstrawberries, and ate a good many of them as sauce to their ordinarydiet of grubs and mice and chicken feed. And it was this weakness oftheirs for strawberries that led to their misunderstanding with theBoy, and then with the big rat that lived under the tool shed. 

"That strawberry patch was one of the things that the Boy took aparticular interest in. When he saw that the imps also took such aninterest in it, eating the berries instead of the grubs, he began toget annoyed. From his window, which overlooked the garden, he had seenwhat liberties the imps took with the scarecrow, so he realized therewas no help for him in scarecrows. But _something_ must be done, thathe vowed, and done at once, or his strawberries were going to be mightyscarce. He didn't want to do any real harm to even such a troublesomepair of birds as the imps, but he was determined to give them a lessonthat might teach them some respect, not only for strawberry patches, but even for scarecrows. 

"On the crown of the scarecrow's old hat, which he had observed to be afavorite perch of the imps, he arranged a noose of light cord. Fromthe noose he ran the cord down the scarecrow's single leg (scarecrows, you know, have usually only one leg), across to the hedge, along thehedge to the house, and up and into his room. He fixed it so it ranwithout a hitch. He was very proud of it altogether. Much pleasedwith himself, he got a book and a couple of apples, and seated himselfat his window to wait for his chance. 

"As it happened, however, the imps were just then away in the meadow, hunting mice. For a whole hour the Boy saw no sign of them. Then, being called away to go on an errand into the village, he tied the endof the cord to his bedpost, and left it with a word of advice to dowhat it could in his absence. 

"Well, it did! For a mere bit of string, all by itself, it didn't dobadly. First the old brown rat, with his fierce little eyes andpointed, whiskered nose, came out from under the toolhouse and beganexploring the strawberry patch. He didn't think much of strawberriesin themselves, but he was apt to find fat grubs and beetles and sleepyJune bugs under the clustering leaves. He came upon the string, stretched taut. He was just about to bite it through and try to carryit off to his nest when it occurred to him it might be a trap. Heturned away discreetly, and snapped up a plump June bug. 

"Then the imps came sailing along. The He imp, with a loud _ca-ah_, perched in the top of a locust and reconnoitred the situation. The Sheimp alighted on the head of the scarecrow, cocked her head to one side, and peered down upon the rat with a wicked and insulting eye. '_Cr-r-r-r_, ' she said sarcastically. But, as the rat paid noattention to her, she hopped up and down on her toes, half-lifting herwings in the effort to attract his eye. She hated to be ignored. Butstill the rat ignored her, though he saw her perfectly well and wouldhave loved to eat her. At last, in her excitement, she caught sight ofthe cord running over the edge of the scarecrow's hat. Snatching it upin her beak, she gave it an energetic and inquiring tug. She learnedsomething interesting about it at once. It grabbed her by one leg. 

"Startled into a panic, as all wild things are at the least suggestionof restraint, she squawked and flapped into the air. The noosetightened rebukingly and pulled her up short. 

"For one astounded moment she settled back onto the scarecrow's head, frightened into stillness. Then she tweaked savagely at the cord onher leg, but, of course, could do nothing with it. As far as knotswere concerned, her education had been utterly neglected. At last shesprang once more into the air, determined to have nothing more to dowith the treacherous scarecrow who had stuck that thing on her leg. 

"Of course, she didn't fly far--just about six feet--and she was againbrought up with a jerk. And now she went quite wild. Squawking andflapping and whirling round and round, she made an amazing exhibitionof herself. Her brother, in the top of the locust, stared down uponher in astonished disapproval. And the brown rat, interested at last, came creeping stealthily to the scarecrow's foot and looked up at herperformance with cruel, glinting eyes. 

"Now, as you may well imagine, this performance was something whicheven the imp, strong as she was, could not keep up very long. In abouta minute she had to stop and take breath. She was going to alight onthe ground, when she remembered the rat. Yes, there he was. So shehad to take refuge once more on the hated and treacherous scarecrow. But no sooner had she done so, alighting with open beak andhalf-spread, quivering wings, than the rat came darting up the leg ofthe scarecrow's ragged trousers and pounced at her. She _just_escaped, and that was all, leaping into the air with a squawk of terrorand flapping there violently at the end of those six feet of free cord. 

"It was a horrifying position for her, let me tell you--"

"I guess _so_!" muttered the Babe in spite of himself, wagging his headsympathetically. He did not like rats. 

"She was too frightened to save her strength, of course, and so keptflapping with all her might, as if she thought to fly away withscarecrow and all. The rat, however, was impatient. He clutched atthe cord with his handlike claws and began trying to pull the imp downto him. At first he couldn't make much out of it, but as the impweakened with her frantic efforts the cord began to shorten. Justabout now the He imp, who had come down from the locust top andfluttered over the scene in pained curiosity, realized what washappening. He was game, all right, however bumptious andself-satisfied. He set up a tremendous _ca-a-a-ing_, as a signal forall the crows within hearing to come to the rescue, and then made asudden, savage side swoop at the foe. 

"Taken thoroughly by surprise, the rat was toppled from his unsteadyperch and fell among the strawberries. His head ringing from thestroke of that sturdy black wing, his plump flank smarting and bleedingfrom a fierce jab of that pointed beak of the imp's, he squeaked withrage and clambered up again to the battle. Mr. Rat, you know, is nocoward and no quitter. 

"And now he was more dangerous, because he was ready. He sat warily onhis haunches, squeaking angrily, and turning his sharp head from sideto side as he followed every swoop and rush of the He imp, snapping sodangerously that the latter did not dare come quite close enough todeliver another really effective blow. At the same time, being veryclever indeed, the rat kept tugging, tugging, tugging at the cord. Andthe She imp, being quite gone out of her mind with the terror of thatclutch on her leg, kept flapping crazily at the end of the cord insteadof turning to, like a sensible crow, and helping her brother in thefight. 

"As she grew weaker and weaker in her struggles, the cunning rat drewher lower and lower, till at last she seemed fairly within his reach. He lifted himself on his hindquarters to snap his long teeth into herthigh and spring to the ground with her, where he would have hercompletely at his mercy. But as he rose the He imp, at sight of hissister's deadly peril, lost all sense of caution, and struck again withall his strength of beak and wing. And once more the rat, fairlybursting with rage, was swept to the ground. 

"He was back to the attack again in a moment, and now more dangerousthan ever. And at the same time the She imp, utterly worn out at lastby her panic terror and her foolish violence, sank shuddering down uponher perch. Her brother struck the rat again frantically when thelatter was halfway up the scarecrow's leg, but this time failed todislodge him. And it looked as if the poor She imp would never againsteal a strawberry or worry a pigeon. But at this moment the Boyappeared in the garden. He came running up noiselessly, anxious to seeall that was happening. But the rat heard him. The rat had no use forthe Boy whatever. He knew that the whole human race was his enemy. Hedropped from the scarecrow's trouser leg and scurried off to his holebeneath the toolhouse. The Boy, his face a mixture of amusement andconcern, picked up the captive without noticing her feeble pecks, undidthe noose from her leg, and carried her over the hedge to rest andrecover herself. 

"'Now, ' said he, 'you little imp of Satan, maybe you'll not comestealing any more of my strawberries or pulling any more straw out ofmy poor scarecrow's head!'

"And she never did!" concluded Uncle Andy, rising and stretching hislegs. "Those two were not _reformed_, you may be sure. But they keptclear, after that, of the Boy's strawberry patch, and of _allscarecrows_. It's time we were getting back to camp for supper, orBill will be feeling sour. "

"But you haven't told me, " protested the Babe, who had a most tenaciousmemory, "why those crows all flew away out of the pine-top so suddenly, as if they had just remembered something. And you haven't told me whyyou'd rather be a humming-bird than a crow. And you haven't--"

But Uncle Andy stopped him. 

"If you think I'm going to tell you all I know, " said he, "you'remistaken. If I did, you'd know as much as I do, and it wouldn't be anyfun. Some day you'll be glad I've left something for you to find outfor yourself. "

CHAPTER III

YOUNG GRUMPY AND THE ONE-EYED GANDER

"My gracious! What's that?" cried the Babe, and nearly jumped out of hisboots. A gray thing had come right at him, with an ugly, scurrying rush. The bushes and bracken being thick, he had not got a very clear view ofit--and he did not stop to try for a better one. In two seconds he wasback at Uncle Andy's side, where the latter sat smoking on his favoritelog by the water. 

The Babe's eyes were very wide. He looked a bit startled. 

"It ran _straight_ at me!" he declared. "What could it have been?"

"A bear, I suppose!" said Uncle Andy sarcastically. 

"Of course not, " answered the Babe in an injured voice. "If it had beena bear, I'd have been _frightened_. "

"Oh!" said Uncle Andy. "I see. Well, what was it like? Seems to me youdidn't take much time to look at it, even if you weren't frightened. "

"I _did_ look, " protested the Babe, glancing again, a little nervously, at the bushes. "It was like--like a tre-_mend_ous big fat guinea pig, with a fat tail and all kind of rusty gray. "

"Now, that's not at all bad, considering you were in something of ahurry, " said Uncle Andy approvingly. "That's really a very gooddescription of a woodchuck. No one could possibly mistake it for alobster or a lion. "

"Of course, I couldn't see it very _plain_, " added the Babe hastily, wondering if Uncle Andy was laughing at him. "But why did it run at methat way?"

"You see, " said Uncle Andy seriously, repenting of his mockery, "thewoodchuck is a queer, bad-tempered chap, with more pluck than sensesometimes. Once in a while he would run at anything that was new andstrange to him, no matter how big it was, just to see if he couldn'tfrighten it. "

"Would he run at you or Bill that way?" demanded the Babe in a voice ofawe at the very thought of such temerity. 

"Oh, he has seen lots of _men_, " replied Uncle Andy. "We're nothing newto him. But most likely he had never seen a small boy before, and he didnot know what kind of an animal it was. The very fact that he did notknow made him angry--he's sometimes so quick-tempered, you know!"

"I'm glad he didn't frighten me--so _very_ much!" murmured the Babe, beginning to forget the exact degree of his alarm. 

"I noticed you got out of his way pretty smart!" said Uncle Andy, eyeinghim from under shaggy brows. "But perhaps that was just because you werein a hurry to tell me about it!"

"No-o!" answered the Babe, hesitating but truthful. "I thought perhapshe was going to bite my legs, and I didn't want him to. "

"That seems reasonable enough, " agreed Uncle Andy heartily. "No sensibleperson wants a fool woodchuck biting his legs. "

"But would he _really_ have bitten me?" asked the Babe, beginning tothink that perhaps he ought to go back and find the presumptuous littleanimal and kick him. 

"As I think I've already said, you never can tell exactly what awoodchuck is going to do, " replied Uncle Andy. "You know that old rhymeabout him:

 "'How much wood would a woodchuck chuck, If a woodchuck could chuck wood? He'd chuck as much wood as a woodchuck could If a woodchuck could chuck wood. '

"Now that goes to show what uncertainty people have about him. And it'sno more than right. For instance, I was traveling through a wild part ofNew Brunswick once in a big red automobile, when, coming suddenly arounda turn, we saw just ahead of us two old woodchucks sitting up on theirfat haunches by the side of the road. I was beside the chauffeur, andcould see just what happened. How those woodchucks' eyes stuck out! Itwas not more than three seconds before we were right up to them. Thenone of the two, frightened to death, fairly turned a back somersault intothe bushes. But the other was a hero. Perhaps he thought he was St. George and the automobile a dragon. Anyhow, he did all a hero could. Hejumped straight on to the front wheel and bit wildly at the tire. Westopped so short that we almost went out on our heads--but too late! Thewheel had gone clean over him. We felt so sorry that we stopped and duga hole by the roadside and gave the flattened little hero a verydistinguished burial. "

"Oh, but he must have been crazy!" exclaimed the Babe, rubbing his legthoughtfully and congratulating himself that he had not lingered to studythe being which had rushed at him in the underbrush. 

"Perhaps, " said Uncle Andy dryly. "If I remember rightly, that's justwhat has been said of lots of heroes before now. "

He tapped his pipe on the log beside him to knock out the ashes, andproceeded thoughtfully to fill it up again. This second filling the Babehad learned to regard as a very hopeful sign. It usually meant thatUncle Andy was in the vein. Seating himself on the grass directly infront of his uncle, the Babe clasped his arms around his bare littlebrown, mosquito-bitten knees, and stared upward hopefully with grave, round eyes, as blue as the bluebells nodding beside him. 

"Speaking of woodchucks, " began Uncle Andy presently, "I've known a lotof them in my time, and I've almost always found them interesting. Likesome people we know, they're sometimes most amusing when they are mostserious. "

"_Amusing_!" exclaimed the Babe, with a world of meaning in his voice. That was the last word he expected to apply to such a bad-tempered littlebeast. 

But his uncle paid no heed to the interruption. 

"There was 'Young Grumpy, ' now, " he continued musingly. "As sober-mindeda woodchuck as ever burrowed a bank. From his earliest days he took lifeseriously, and never seemed to think it worth his while to play as theother wild youngsters do. Yet in spite of himself he was sometimes quiteamusing. 

"He had the good fortune to be born in the back pasture of Anderson'sFarm. That was where the Boy lived, you know, and where no one wasallowed to shoot the crows. Being a place where no one did any morekilling than was absolutely necessary, it was rather lucky for any of theBabes of the Wild to be born there--except weasels, of course. "

"Why not for weasels?" demanded the Babe. 

"Well, now, you might know that without my having to tell you, " repliedUncle Andy. "The weasels are such merciless and murderous little killersthemselves, killing just for the fun of it when they are already too fullto eat what they have killed, that both Mr. Anderson and the Boy had nosympathy for them, and thought them better out of the way. I don't wantto be too hard, even on a weasel; but I'm bound to say that most of thewild creatures feel much the same way about that blood-thirsty littlepirate. "

"I should think so!" agreed the Babe indignantly, resolving to devote hisfuture largely to the extermination of weasels, and hoping thus to winthe confidence and gratitude of the kindred of the wild. 

"Young Grumpy's home life, " continued Uncle Andy, "with his father andmother and four brothers and sisters was not a pampered one. There arefew wild parents less given to spoiling their young than a pair ofgrumbling old woodchucks. The father, who spent most of his timesleeping, rolled up in a ball at the bottom of the burrow, paid them noattention except to nip at them crossly when they tumbled over him. Theywere always relieved when he went off, three or four times a day, downinto the neighboring clover field to make his meals. The little ones didnot see what he was good for, anyhow, till one morning, when theblack-and-yellow dog from the next farm happened along. The youngsters, with their mother, were basking in the sun just outside the front door. As the dog sprang at them they all fairly fell, head over heels, backinto the burrow. The dog, immensely disappointed, set to workfrantically to dig them out. He felt sure that young woodchuck would bevery good to eat. 

"It was then that Old Grumpy showed what he was made of. Thrusting hisfamily rudely aside, he scurried up the burrow to the door, where the dogwas making the earth fly at a most alarming rate. Without a moment'shesitation he sank his long, cutting teeth into the rash intruder's noseand held on. 

"The dog yelped and choked, and tried to back out of the hole in a hurry. But it was no use. The old woodchuck had a solid grip and was pullingwith all his might in the other direction. Panic-stricken and halfsmothered by the dry earth, the dog dug in his hind claws, bent his backlike a bow, and pulled for all he was worth, yelling till you might havethought there were half a dozen dogs in that hole. At last, afterperhaps three or four minutes--which seemed to the dog much longer--theold woodchuck decided to leave go. You see, he didn't really want thatdog, or even that dog's nose, in the burrow. So he opened his jawssuddenly. At that the dog went right over backward, all four legs in theair, like a wooden dog. But the next instant he was on his feet again, and tearing away like mad down the pasture, ki-yi-ing like a whippedpuppy, although he was a grown-up dog and ought to have been ashamed ofhimself to make such a noise. And never after that, they tell me, couldhe be persuaded under any circumstances to go within fifteen feet ofanything that looked like a woodchuck hole. "

"I'm not one bit sorry for him, " muttered the Babe in spite of himself. "He had no business there at all. "

"The mother of the woodchuck family, " went on Uncle Andy, "was not socross as the father, but she was very careless. She would sit upon herfat haunches in the door of the burrow while the babies were nibblingaround outside, pretending to keep an eye on them. But half the time shewould be sound asleep, with her head dropped straight down on herstomach, between her little black paws. One day, as she was dozing thuscomfortably, a marsh hawk came flapping low overhead, and pounced on oneof the youngsters before it had time to more than squeak. At the soundof that despairing squeak, to be sure, she woke up and made a savage rushat the enemy. But the wary bird was already in the air, with the prizedrooping from his talons. And the mother could do nothing but sit up andchatter after him abusively as he sailed away to his nest. 

"You see, the mother was brave enough, as I said before, but verycareless. She was different from the ordinary run of woodchucks, in thatshe had only three feet. She had lost her left hind paw. "

"Was that because she was so careless?" asked the Babe. 

Uncle Andy looked at him suspiciously. Like so many other story-tellers, he preferred to make all the jokes himself. He was suspicious of otherpeople's jokes. But the Babe's round, attentive eyes were as innocent asthe sky. 

"No, " said he gravely; "_that_ was something she could not help. It wasan accident. It has nothing to do with Young Grumpy, but since you'veasked me about it I had better tell you at once and save interruptions. 

"You see it was this way. Before she came to live on the Anderson Farmshe used to have a burrow over on the other side of the Ridge, where thepeople went in for a good deal of trapping and snaring. One day someoneset a steel trap just in front of her burrow. Of course she put her footinto it at the first chance. It was terrible. You know the grip ofthose steel jaws, for I've seen you trying to open them. She was game, however--they're always game, these woodchucks. Instead of squealing andhopping about and losing her wits and using up her strength, she justpopped back into her hole and dragged the trap in with her as far as itwould go. That was not very far, of course, because the man who set ithad chained it to a stump outside. But she thought it better, in such atrouble, to be out of range of unsympathetic eyes. There in the hole shetugged and wrenched at the cruel biting thing till even her obstinacy hadto acknowledge that it was impossible to pull herself free. Then shetried blocking up the hole behind her, thinking perhaps that the trap, onfinding itself thus imprisoned in the burrow, would get frightened andlet go its hold. Disappointed in this hope, she decided to adopt heroicmeasures. With magnificent nerve she calmly set to work and _gnawed off_the foot which had been so idiotic as to get itself caught. She wouldhave nothing more to do with the fool thing. She just left it there inthe trap, with her compliments, for the man--a poor little, crumpled, black-skinned paw, with a fringe of short brownish fur about the wrist, like a fur-lined gauntlet. "

The Babe shuddered, but heroically refrained from interrupting. 

"Of course the stump soon healed up, " continued Uncle Andy, "but shealways found the absence of that paw most inconvenient, especially whenshe was digging burrows. She used to find herself digging them on thebias, and coming out where she did not at all expect to. 

"But to return to Young Grumpy. While he was yet very young histhree-legged mother, who had seen him and his brothers and sisters eatinggrass quite comfortably, decided that they were big enough to look outfor themselves. She refused to nurse them any more. Then she turnedthem all out of the burrow. When they came presently scurrying backagain, hoping it was all an unhappy joke, she nipped them mostunfeelingly. Their father snored. There was no help in that quarter. They scurried dejectedly forth again. 

"Outside, in the short pasture grass and scattered ox-eye daisies, theylooked at each other suspiciously, and each felt that somehow it was theother fellow's fault. Aggrieved and miserable, they went rambling off, each his own way, to face alone what Fate might have in store for him. And Young Grumpy, looking up from a melancholy but consoling feast whichhe was making on a mushroom, found himself alone in the world. 

"He didn't care a fig. You see, he was so grumpy. Not knowing where togo, he strolled up the hill and into the fir woods. Here he came upon avery old, moth-eaten, feeble-looking woodchuck, who was very busy in ahalf-hearted way digging himself a hole. Suddenly he stopped. YoungGrumpy did not think it was any sort of a hole for a woodchuck, but theold fellow seemed satisfied with it. He curled himself up in it, almostin plain view, and went straight to sleep. Young Grumpy strolled offscornfully. When he came back that way, a few hours later, he found theold woodchuck still in exactly the same position as before. He neverstirred or scolded even when Young Grumpy came up and squeaked quiteclose to his ear. Seized suddenly with a vague uneasiness, Young Grumpynosed at him curiously. The old woodchuck's body was chill and rigid. It created a most unpleasant impression, and, not knowing why he did so, Young Grumpy hurried forth from the dark wood and down into the sunlitpasture to which he was accustomed. 

"For some days he wandered about the pasture, sleeping under stumps andin mossy hollows, and fortunately escaping, by reason of his light, rusty-gray color, the eyes of passing hawks. At last chance, or his nosefor good living, led him down to the clover meadow adjoining Anderson'sbarnyard. 

"It was here that his adventures may be said to have begun. 

"Just as he was happily filling himself with clover, a white dog, withshort-cropped ears standing up stiffly, came by and stopped to look athim with bright, interested eyes. Young Grumpy, though the stranger wasbig enough to take him in two mouthfuls, felt not frightened but annoyed. He gave a chuckling squeak of defiance and rushed straight at the dog. 

"Now, this was the Boy's bull terrier, Major, and he had been severelytrained to let small, helpless creatures alone. He had got it into hishead that all such creatures were the Boy's property, and so to beguarded and respected. He was afraid lest he might hurt this crosslittle animal, and get into trouble with the Boy. So he kept jumping outof the way, stiff-leggedly, as if very much amused, and at the same timehe kept barking, as if to call the Boy to come and see. Young Grumpy, feeling very big, followed him up with short, threatening rushes, till hefound himself just at the open gate leading into the farmyard. 

"Parading solemnly before the gate was a big gray gander with only oneeye. That one eye, extra keen and fierce, caught sight of Young Grumpy, and probably mistook him for an immense rat, thief of eggs and murdererof goslings. With a harsh hiss and neck outstretched till it was like asnake, the great bird darted at him. 

"Young Grumpy hesitated. After the manner of his kind, he sat upon hishaunches to hesitate. The gander seemed to him very queer, and perhapsdangerous. 

"At this critical moment the white dog interfered. In his eyes YoungGrumpy belonged to the Boy, and was therefore valuable property. He ranat the gander. The gander, recognizing his authority, withdrew, haughtyand protesting. Young Grumpy followed with a triumphant rush, and, ofcourse, took all the credit to himself. 

"This led him into the farmyard. Here he promptly forgot both the dogand the gander. It was such a strange place, and full of such strangesmells. He was about to turn back into the more familiar clover when, asluck would have it, he stumbled upon a half-eaten carrot which had beendropped by one of the horses. How good it smelled! And then, how goodit tasted! Oh, no! the place where such things were to be found was nota place for him to leave in a hurry!

"As he was feasting greedily on the carrot the Boy appeared, with thewhite dog at his heels. He did not look nearly so terrible as thegander. So, angry at being disturbed, and thinking he had come for thecarrot, Young Grumpy ran at him at once. 

"But the Boy did not run away. Surprised at his courage, Young Grumpystopped short, at a distance of two or three feet from the Boy's stoutshoes, sat upon his haunches with his little skinny black hands over hischest, and began to gurgle and squeak harsh threats. The Boy laughed, and stretched out a hand to touch him. Young Grumpy snapped so savagely, however, that the Boy snatched back his hand and stood observing him withamused interest, waving off the white dog lest the latter shouldinterrupt. Young Grumpy went on blustering with his muffled squeaks forperhaps a minute. Then, seeing that the Boy was neither going to runaway nor fight, he dropped on all fours indifferently and returned to hiscarrot. 

"There was nothing pleased the Boy better than seeing the harmless wildcreatures get familiar about the place. He went now and fetched a saucerof milk from the dairy, and set it down beside Young Grumpy, who scoldedat him, but refused to budge an inch. The yellow cat--an amiable soul, too well fed to hunt even mice with any enthusiasm--followed the Boy, with an interested eye on the saucer. At sight of Young Grumpy her backwent up, her tail grew big as a bottle, and she spat disapprovingly. Asthe stranger paid her no attention, however, she sidled cautiously up tothe milk and began to lap it. 

"The sound of her lapping caught Young Grumpy's attention. It was aseductive sound. Leaving the remains of his carrot, he came boldly up tothe saucer. The yellow cat flattened back her ears, growled, and stoodher ground till he was within a foot of her. Then, with an angry'_pf-f-f_' she turned tail and fled. The stranger was so calmly sure ofhimself that she concluded he must be some new kind of skunk--and herrespect for all skunks was something tremendous. 

"Having finished the milk and the carrot, Young Grumpy felt a pressingneed of sleep. Turning his back on the Boy and the dog as if they werenot worth noticing, he ambled off along the garden fence, looking for aconvenient hole. The one-eyed gander, who had been watching him withdisfavor from the distance, saw that he was now no longer under theprotection of the white dog, and came stalking up from the other end ofthe yard to have it out with him--thief of eggs and murderer of goslingsas the bird mistook him to be! But Young Grumpy, having found acool-looking hole under the fence, had whisked into it and vanished. 

"As matters stood now, Young Grumpy felt himself quite master of thesituation. His heartless mother was forgotten. Farmyard, clover-field, and cool green garden were all his. Had he not routed all presumptuousenemies but the Boy? And the latter seemed very harmless. But a fewdays the garden occupied all his attention--when he was not busyenlarging and deepening his hole under the fence and digging a secondentrance to it. He noticed that the Boy had a foolish habit of standingand watching him; but to this he had no serious objection, the more so ashe found that the Boy's presence was often accompanied by a saucer ofmilk. 

"It was not till after several days of garden life that, lured by thememory of the carrot, he again visited the barnyard. At first it seemedto be quite deserted. And there was no sign of a carrot anywhere. Thenhe caught sight of the yellow cat, and scurried toward her, thinkingperhaps it was her fault there were no carrots. She fluffed her tail, gave a yowl of indignation, and raced into the barn. Neither the whitedog, nor the Boy, nor the one-eyed gander was anywhere in sight. 

"Young Grumpy decided that it was a poor place, the barnyard. He was onthe point of turning back to the green abundance of the garden, when acurious clucking sound attracted his attention. At the other side of theyard he saw a red hen in a coop. A lot of very young chickens, littleyellow balls of down, were running about outside the coop. Young Grumpystrolled over. The chickens did not concern him in the least. He didn'tknow what they were, and, as no flesh was in his eyes good to eat, hedidn't care. But he hoped they might have such a thing as a carrot aboutthem. "

"Oh-h-h! What would _they_ have a carrot for?" protested the Babe. 

Uncle Andy scorned to notice this remark. "When Young Grumpy approachedthe coop, " he continued, "the red hen squawked frantically, and thechickens all ran in under her wings. Young Grumpy eyed her withcuriosity for a moment, as she screamed at him with open beak and ruffledup all her feathers. But in the coop was a big slice of turnip, at whichshe had been pecking. He knew at once this would be good, perhaps asgood as a carrot, and he flattened himself against the bars trying to getin at it. 

"The next moment he got a great surprise. The red hen hurled herself athim with such violence that, although the bars protected him, he wasalmost knocked over. He received a smart jab from her beak, and herbristling feathers came through the bars in a fashion that rather tookaway his breath. He was furious. Again and again he strove to force hisway in, now on one side, now on the other. But always that fiery bunchof beak and claw and feathers seemed to burst in his face. Had it notbeen for the bars, indeed, the red hen would have given him an awfulmauling. But this, of course, he was too self-confident to suspect. With characteristic obstinacy, he kept up the struggle for fully fiveminutes, while the terrified chickens filled the air with their pipingsand the hen screamed herself hoarse. Then, feeling a little sore, to besure, but very certain that he had impressed the hen, he strolled off tolook for some delicacy less inaccessible than that piece of turnip. 

"At this point the one-eyed gander came waddling up from the goose pond. He was lonely and bad-tempered, for his two wives had been killed by afox that spring, and the Boy had not yet found him a new mate. YoungGrumpy looked at the big gray bird and recalled the little unpleasantnessof their previous encounter. 

"'Oh, ho!' said he to himself--if woodchucks ever _do_ talk tothemselves--'I'll just give that ugly chap beans, like I did the otherday. ' And he went scurrying across the yard to see about it. 

"To his surprise, the gander paid him no attention whatever. You see, hewas on the side of the gander's blind eye. 

"Now, Young Grumpy was so puzzled by this indifference that, instead ofrushing right in and biting the haughty bird, he sat up on his haunchesat a distance of some five or six feet and began to squeak his defiance. The gander turned his head. Straightway he opened his long yellow bill, gave vent to a hiss like the steam from an escape pipe, stuck out hissnaky neck close to the ground, lifted his broad gray-and-white wings, and charged. 

"Before Young Grumpy had time even to wonder if he had been imprudent ornot, the hard elbow of one of those wings caught him a blow on the earand knocked him head over heels. At the same time it swept him to oneside, and the gander rushed on straight over the spot where he had beensitting. 

"Young Grumpy picked himself up, startled and shaken. The thing had beenso unexpected. He would have rather liked to run away. But he was tooangry and too obstinate. He just sat up on his haunches again, intendingto make another and more successful attack as soon as his head stoppedbuzzing. 

"The gander, meanwhile, was surprised also. He could not understand howhis enemy had got out of the way so quickly. He stared around, and then, turning his one eye skyward, as if he thought Young Grumpy might havegone that way, he trumpeted a loud _honka-honka-honk--kah_. 

"For some reason this strange cry broke Young Grumpy's nerve. Hescuttled for his hole his jet-black heels kicking up the straws behindhim. As soon as he began to run, of course, the gander saw him and sweptafter him with a ferocious hissing. But Young Grumpy had got the start. He dived into his hole just as the gander brought up against the fence. 

"Now, the moment he found himself inside his burrow, all Young Grumpy'scourage returned. He wheeled and stuck his head out again, as much as tosay, 'Now come on, if you dare!"

"The gander came on promptly--so promptly, in fact, that the lightningstroke of his heavy bill knocked Young Grumpy far back into the holeagain. 

"In a great rage, the gander darted his head into the hole. Chatteringwith indignation, Young Grumpy set his long teeth into that intrudingbill, and tried to pull it further in. The gander, much taken aback atthis turn of affairs, tried to pull it out again. For perhaps half aminute it was a very good tug-of-war. Then the superior weight andstrength of the great bird, with all the advantage of his beating wings, suddenly triumphed, and Young Grumpy, too pig-headed to let go his hold, was jerked forth once more into the open. 

"The next moment another blow from one of those mighty wing elbows allbut stunned him, and his grip relaxed. He made a groping rush for theburrow, but in that same instant the gander's great bill seized him bythe back of the neck and lifted him high into the air. 

"This was very near being the end of Young Grumpy, for the one-eyedgander would have bitten and banged and hammered at him till he was asdead as a last year's June bug. But happily the Boy and the white dogcame running up in the nick of time. The gander dropped his victim andstalked off haughtily. And poor Young Grumpy, after turning twice aroundin a confused way, crawled back into his hole. 

"The white dog opened his mouth from ear to ear, and looked up at the Boywith an unmistakable grin. The Boy, half laughing, half sympathetic, went and peered into the hole. 

"'I guess you'd better keep out of Old Wall-Eye's way after this!' saidhe. 

"And Young Grumpy did. Whenever the one-eyed gander was in the yard, then Young Grumpy stayed in the garden. "

CHAPTER IV

LITTLE SWORD AND THE INKMAKER

Out across the shining expanse of Silverwater, now lying unruffled byany breath of wind, went flickering a little blue butterfly, as blue asif a gentian blossom had taken to itself wings or a speck of sky hadfluttered down to meet its bright reflection in the lake. It was afoolish expedition for the little explorer, so far from shore, and overthat lonely, treacherous element which has such scant mercy forbutterflies. The turquoise wings dipped and rose, sometimes coming soclose to the water that the Babe caught his breath, thinking the frailvoyager's eyes were unable to distinguish between the crystal purity ofthe water and that of the air. At last a wing tip, or more likely thetip of the velvet tail, brushed the surface. It was only the lightesttouch; and instantly, suddenly, as if startled by the chill contact, the azure flutterer rose again. In the same instant the water swirledheavily beneath her, a little sucking whirlpool appeared shattering themirror, and circular ripples began to widen quickly and smoothly fromthe break. 

"That was a big fellow!" exclaimed Uncle Andy. But the Babe saidnothing, being too intent upon the aerial voyager's career. 

For two or three moments the flake of sky fluttered higher. Then, asthe ripples smoothed themselves out, she seemed to forget, and began todescend again as if lured downward by her own dainty reflection. Yetshe had not quite forgotten, for now she only came within six or seveninches of the traitorous surface. Now her heavenly wings supported herfor a moment almost motionless. 

In that moment a splendid shape, gleaming like a bolt of silver, shot aclear foot into the air and fell back with a massive splash. Theturquoise butterfly was gone. 

"Oh--h!" cried the Babe, almost with a sob in his voice. He loved theblue butterflies as he loved no others of their brilliant and perishingkindred. 

"_Gee_!" exclaimed Uncle Andy. "But he's a _whale_!"

The Babe, in his surprise at this remarkable statement, forgot to mournfor the fate of the blue butterfly. 

"Why, Uncle Andy, " he protested. "I didn't know whales could live herein this little lake. "

Uncle Andy made a despairing gesture. "Oh, " he murmured wearily, "afellow has to be _so_ careful what he says to you! The next time Imake a metaphorical remark in your presence, I'll draw a diagram to gowith it!"

The Babe looked puzzled. He was on the point of asking what "ametaphorical" was, and also "a diagram"; but he inferred that therewere no whales, after all, in Silverwater. He had misunderstood UncleAndy's apparently simple statement of fact. And he felt convicted offoolishness. Anxious to reinstate himself in his uncle's approval byan unexpected display of knowledge he waived "metaphorical" aside, let"diagram" remain a mystery, and remarked disinterestedly:

"Well, I'm glad there ain't any _swordfish_ in Silverwater. "

"Bless the child!" cried Uncle Andy. "Whatever has been puttingswordfish into your head?"

"Bill!" replied the Babe truthfully. 

"And what do you know about swordfish, then?" proceeded his uncle. 

The Babe was much flattered at the unusual favor of being allowed toair his information. 

"They're awful!" he explained. "They're as big as a canoe. Andthey've got a sword as long as your leg, Uncle Andy, right in theirtail, so they can stab whales and porpoises with it, just carelessly, without looking round, so as to make pretend it was an accident. Andthey're quicker than greased lightning, Bill says. So you see, ifthere was one here in the lake, we couldn't ever go in swimming. "

Uncle Andy refrained from smiling. He puffed thoughtfully at his pipefor half a minute, while the Babe waited for his verdict. At length hesaid, between puffs:

"Well, now, there's quite a lot of truth in that, considering that it'sone of Bill's yarns. The swordfish does carry a sword. And he doesjab it into things, whales, sharks, boats, seals, anything whateverthat he thinks might be good to eat or that he does not like the looksof. And _you_ are quite correct in thinking that the lake would not bea health-resort for us if it was occupied by a healthy swordfish. Butin one particular Bill has got you badly mixed up. The swordfishcarries his sword not in his tail, but on the tip of his snout morelike a bayonet than a sword. I don't think Bill has ever been at allintimate with swordfish--eh, what?"

The Babe shook his blonde head sadly over this instance of Bill'sinaccuracy. 

"And are they as big as Bill says?" he inquired. 

"Oh, yes! He's all right _there_!" assented Uncle Andy. "When theyare quite grown up they are sometimes as long as a canoe, a seventeenor eighteen foot canoe. And they _are_ quick as 'greased lightning'all right!"

"But how big are they when they're little?" pursued the Babe, gettingaround to his favorite line of investigation. 

"Well now, that depends on how little you take them!" answered UncleAndy. "As they are hatched out of tiny, pearly eggs no bigger than awhite currant, which the little silver crabs can play marbles with onthe white sand of the sea-bottom till they get tired of the game andeat them up, you've got a lot of sizes to choose from in a growingsword-fish. "

"I don't mean when they're so very little, " answered the Babe, who didnot find things just hatched very interesting. 

"I see, " said Uncle Andy, understandingly. "Of course when they arefirst hatched, and for a long time afterwards, they are kept so busytrying to avoid getting eaten up by their enemies that I don't supposeone in ten thousand or so ever manages to survive to the stage where hebegins to make things interesting for his enemies in turn. But _then_things begin to hum. "

"Tell me how they hum!" said the Babe eagerly, his eyes round withanticipation. 

"Well, " began Uncle Andy slowly, looking far across the lake as if hesaw things that the Babe could not see, "in one way and another, partlyby good luck and partly by good management, Little Sword succeeded indodging his enemies till he had grown to be about two feet in length, without counting the six inches or so of sharp, tapering blade thatstood straight out from the tip of his nose. He was as handsome ayoungster as you would wish to see, slender, gracefully tapering to thebase of the broad, powerful tail, wide-finned, radiant in silver andblue-green, and with a splendid crest-like dorsal fin of vividultramarine extending almost the whole length of his back. His eyeswere large, and blazed with a savage fire. Hanging poised a few feetabove the tops of the waving, rose-and-purple sea-anemones and thebottle-green trailers of seaweed, every fin tense and quivering, he wasready to dart in any direction where a feast or a fight might seem tobe waiting for him. 

"You see, the mere fact that he was alive at all was proof that he hadcome triumphantly through many terrible dangers, so it was no wonder hehad a good deal of confidence in himself. And his shapely little bodywas so packed full of energy, so thrilling with vitality, that he felthimself already a sort of lord in those shoal-water domains. 

"But with all his lively experiences, there were things, lots ofthings, which Little Sword didn't know even yet. "

"I _guess_ so!" murmured the Babe, suddenly impressed with the extentof his own ignorance. 

"For instance, " Uncle Andy went on, ignoring the interruption, "he hadnot yet learned anything about the Inkmaker. "

Here he paused impressively, as if to lure the Babe on. But into thelatter's head popped so many questions all together, at the mention ofa creature with so strange a name, that for the moment he could not forthe life of him get any one of them into words. He merely gasped. AndUncle Andy, delighted with this apparent self-restraint, went ongraciously. 

"You're improving a lot, " said he. "You're getting quite a knack ofholding your tongue. Well, you're going to know all about it in half aminute. 

"Little Sword caught sight of a queer, watery-pinkish, speckledcreature on the bottom, just crossing a space of clear sand. It wasabout twice as long as himself, with a pair of terrible big, ink-blackeyes, and a long bunch of squirming feelers growing out of its headlike leaf-stalks out of the head of a beet. He noticed that two ofthese feelers were twice as long as the rest, which did not seem to hima matter of the least importance. But he noticed at the same time thatthe creature looked soft and good to eat. The next instant, like a rayof light flashed suddenly, he darted at it. 

"But swift as he was, the pale creature's inky eyes had noted him intime. His feelers bunched suddenly tight and straight, and he shotbackwards, at the same moment spouting a jet of black fluid frombeneath his beaked mouth. The black jet spread instantly in a thickcloud, staining the clear, green water so deeply that Little Swordcould not see through it at all. Instead of the soft flesh he hadexpected it to pierce, his sword met nothing but a mass of stickyanemones, shearing them from their base. 

"In a fury, Little Sword dashed this way and that, trusting to luckthat he would strike his elusive enemy in the darkness. But thatenemy's eyes, with their enormous bulging surface and the jettybackground to their lenses, could see clearly where the jewel-like eyesof the young swordfish could make out nothing. Little Sword, emerginginto the half light at the edge of the cloud, was just about to give upthe idle search, when something small but firm fastened itself upon hisside, so sharply that it seemed to bite into the flesh. 

"Little Sword's tense muscles quivered at the shock, and he gave amighty leap which should, by all his customary reckoning, have carriedhim fifty feet from the spot. To his horrified amazement he did not goas many inches, nor the half of it! And then another something, smallbut terrible, fastened itself upon his shoulder. 

"Then the black, murky cloud thinned quite away; and Little Sword sawwhat had happened. The pale creature, having reached a rock to whichhe could anchor himself with a couple of his feelers, had turnedsavagely upon his rash assailant. Little Sword was the prisoner ofthose two longer tentacles. They were trying to drag him down withinreach of the other feelers, which writhed up at him like a lot ofhideous snakes. "

"Ugh!" cried the Babe with a shudder. "But how did they hold on tohim?"

"You see, " said Uncle Andy, "every feeler, long or short, had a row ofsaucer-shaped suckers along its underside, like the heads of thoserubber-tipped arrows which I've seen you shooting at the wall, andwhich stick where they strike. Only _these_ suckers could _hold on_, Ican tell you, so fast that _you_ could never have pulled off even thelittlest of them. 

"Little Sword looked down into the awful eyes of the Inkmaker, andrealized that he had made a great mistake. But he was game allthrough. It was not for a swordfish, however young, to give in to anyodds. Besides, just below those two great eyes, which stared up at himwithout ever a wink, he saw a terrible beak of a mouth, which openedand shut as if impatient to get hold of him. This sight was calculatedto encourage him to exert himself, if he had needed any moreencouragement than the grip of those two, pale, writhing feelers on hisflesh. 

"Now, for his size, Little Sword was putting up a tremendous fight. His broad, fluked tail and immense fins churned the water amazingly, and enabled him to spring this way and that in spite of all the effortsof the two long tentacles to hold him still. Nevertheless, he wasslowly drawn downwards, till one of the shorter feelers reached for ahold upon him. He darted at it, and by a lucky plunge of his sword cutits snaky tip clean off. It twisted back out of the way, like astartled worm; and Little Sword lunged at the next one. He pierced itall right, but at a point where it was so thick that the stroke did notsever it, and the tip, curling over, fastened upon him. At the samemoment another feeler fixed itself upon the base of his tail, halfparalyzing his struggles. 

"Little Sword was now being drawn implacably downwards. In his fiercerage he struck at everything in reach, but he was too closely held toinflict any serious wounds. He was within eight or nine inches ofthose awful, unwinking, ink-black eyes. The great beak opened upwardsat him eagerly. It looked as if his career was at an end--when theFates of the Deep Sea decided otherwise. Apparently they had more usefor Little Sword than they had for the Inkmaker. A long shadow droppedstraight downward. It missed Little Sword by an inch or two. And thegaping, long-toothed jaws of an immense barracouta closed upon the headof the Inkmaker, biting him clean in halves. The blind body curledbackwards spasmodically; and the tentacles, shorn off at the roots, fell aimlessly and helplessly apart. Little Sword flashed away, trailing his limp captors behind him till they dropped off. And thebarracouta ate the remains of the Inkmaker at his leisure. He had noconcern to those swordfish when there was tender and delicious squid tobe had; for the Inkmaker, you know, was just a kind of big squid, orcuttlefish. "

"But what's a barracouta?" demanded the Babe hurriedly. 

"Well, he's just a fish!" said Uncle Andy. "But he's a very savage andhungry fish, some three or four feet long, with tremendous jaws like apickerel's. And he lives only in the salt water, fortunately. _He's_not a nice fellow, either, to have around when you're swimming, I cantell you!"

"Why?" queried the Babe. 

But Uncle Andy ignored the question firmly, and went on with his story. 

"After this adventure Little Sword kept a very sharp look-out for thepallid, squirming tentacles, sometimes reaching out from a dark hole inthe rocks or from under a mantle of seaweed, which he knew to belong toone of the Inkmakers. He hated the whole tribe with bitter hatred; butat the same time his caution was unsleeping. He bided his time forvengeance, and used his sword on crabs and flatfish and fat groupers. And so he grew at a great rate, till in the swelling sense of his powerand swiftness his caution began to fade away. Even the incident itselffaded from his memory, but not the hatred which had sprung from it, orthe knowledge which it had taught him. 

"When Little Sword was about five feet in length he carried a weapon onhis snout not far from a foot long. By this time he was a great rover, hunting in the deep seas or the inshore tides as the whim of the chasemight lead him, and always spoiling for a fight. He would jab hissword into the belly of a twenty-foot grampus just to relieve hisfeelings, and be off again before the outraged monster, bleedingthrough his six inches of blubber, had time to even make a pretense ofcharging him. And he was already a terror to the seals, who, for alltheir speed and dexterity, could neither catch him nor escape him. 

"But he was getting a little careless. And one day, as he wassleeping, or basking, some ten feet below the surface, the broad, darkform of a sawfish arose beneath him and thrust at him with his dreadfulsaw. The pleasant idea of the sawfish was to rip up the sleeper'ssilver belly. But Little Sword awoke in time to just escape the horridattack. He swept off in a short circle, came back with a lightningrush, and drove his sword full length into the stealthy enemy'sshoulder just behind the gills. The great sawfish, heavy muscled andslow of movement, made no attempt to defend himself, but plungedsuddenly downward into the gloomy depths where he loved to lie in wait. After relieving his indignation by a couple more vicious thrusts. Little Sword realized that he was too small to accomplish anythingagainst this sneaking and prowling bulk, and shot off to look for aless dangerous basking place. 

"It was soon after this close shave with the sawfish that Little Swordcame once more across the path of the Inkmaker. He--"

But the Babe could contain himself no longer. He had been burstingwith questions for the last ten minutes, and had heroically restrainedhimself. But this was too much for him. 

"Why, Uncle Andy, " he cried. "I thought the Inkmaker was dead. Ithought the barracouta had eaten him up, feelers and eyes and all. "

"Oh, you're a lot too particular!" grumbled Uncle Andy. "This was_another_ Inkmaker, of course. And a very much bigger and moredangerous one, moreover, as you'll see presently. It was little _he_had to fear from the barracoutas. In fact, he had just fixed one ofhis longer tentacles on a vigorous four-foot barracouta, and was slowlydrawing him down within reach of the rest of the feelers, when LittleSword's shining eyes alighted upon the struggle. 

"This particular Inkmaker was crouching in a sort of shallow basinbetween rocks which were densely fringed with bright-striped weeds, starry madrepores, and sea-anemones of every lovely color. Disturbedby the struggle, however, the madrepores and anemones were nervouslyclosing up their living blooms. The Inkmaker, who always managedsomehow to have his own colors match his surroundings, so that hishideous form would not show too plainly and frighten his victims away, was now of a dirty pinkish-yellow, blotched and striped withpurplish-brown; and his tentacles were like a bunch of striped snakes. Only his eyes never changed. They lay unwinking, two huge round lensesof terrible and intense blackness, staring upwards from the base of thewrithing tentacles. "

The Babe shuddered again, and wished that the beautiful swordfish wouldswim away as quickly as possible from the slimy horror. But herefrained interrupting. It would be dreadful if Uncle Andy should getannoyed and stop at this critical point!

"When Little Sword saw those long feelers dragging the barracoutadown, " went on Uncle Andy, after relighting his pipe, "he dartedforward like a blue flame and jabbed his sword right through thenearest one. "

"Oh, ho!" cried the Babe, forgetting caution. "He remembered how thebarracouta had saved _him_!"

"Not much!" grunted Uncle Andy. "There's no sentiment about aswordfish, I can tell you. He'd have jabbed the barracouta, and eatenhim, too, just as quick as look, but he hated the Inkmaker, and couldnot think of anything else. With a screwing backward pull he wrenchedhis sword out of the feeler, which seemed hardly to notice the wound. In the same instant another feeler snatched at him, for Mr. Inkmaker, you know, had ten tentacles, every one of them spoiling for a fight. It got only a slight hold, however, and Little Sword, whose strengthwas now something amazing, tore himself clear with a great livid, bleeding, burning patch on his side. 

"And now, raging mad though he was, a gleam of sense flashed into hisbrain. He saw that it was not much use stabbing those tough tentacles. Lurching forward as if to stand on his head he shot straight downward, and drove his sword full length into one of those dreadful eyes. 

"In an instant three or four feelers closed upon him. But they werenow thrashing a little aimlessly, so that they did not work welltogether. The monster was confused by that terrible, searching trust. Little Sword was hampered by the feelers clutching at him, but he stillhad room to use his weapon. With all his weight and quivering strengthhe drove his sword again deep into the Inkmaker's head, twisting andwrenching it sideways as he drew it out. Other tentacles closed overhim, but seemed to have lost their clutching power through the attackupon the source of their nervous energy. The struggling barracouta wasdrawn down with them, but blindly; and the water was now utterly blackwith the rank ink which the monster was pumping forth. 

"For a few moments all was one boiling convulsion of fish and tentaclesand ink, Little Sword simply stabbing and stabbing at the soft massunder his weapon. Then, all at once, the tentacles relaxed, fallingaway as slack as seaweed. The barracouta, nearly spent, swam offwithout even waiting to say 'Thank you. ' And Little Sword coming tohis senses as he realized his victory, rose slowly out of the area ofthe ink cloud. He knew that the Inkmaker's flesh was very good to eat, and he merely waited for the cloud to settle before making a meal whichwould completely satisfy his vengeance. "

The Babe was thoughtful for a few moments after Uncle Andy stoppedspeaking. At length he said positively:

"I'm glad we don't have any Inkmakers, either, in the lake. "

"Umph!" grunted Uncle Andy, "there are lots of things we don't havethat we can very well do without. "

CHAPTER V

ROCKED IN THE CRADLE OF THE DEEP

Casting his flies across the eddying mouth of one of those cold streamswhich feed the crystal bosom of Silverwater, Uncle Andy had landed amagnificent pink-bellied trout--five pounds, if an ounce!

"Hi, but isn't he a whopper?" he cried exultantly, holding up his prizefor the inspection of the Babe, who had been watching the strugglebreathlessly. 

"A--whopper?" repeated the Babe doubtfully. His idea of a whopper wassomething that objectionable little boys have been known to tell inorder to get themselves out of a scrape. No full-fledged fisherman asyet, he did not see what it could have to do with a trout. 

Uncle Andy seemed to divine his difficulty. 

"I mean, " he explained, "isn't he a big one? _Tremendous_?"

At this again the Babe looked doubtful. The fish was certainly a verybeautiful one; but to the Babe's eyes it did not seem in any wayremarkable for size. Yet he did not like to appear to disagree withUncle Andy. 

"Is it _big_?" he inquired politely. "Bill says there's some fishbigger than a house. "

Uncle Andy looked at him askance. 

"Seems to me, " said he, "you're mighty hard to please to-day. And, anyhow, Bill talks nonsense. They're not fish, those monsters he wastelling you about. They're _whales_. "

"But they live in the water, don't they?" protested the Babe insurprise. 

"Of course!" agreed Uncle Andy, wrapping his big trout up in wet grassand seating himself on a handy log for a smoke. 

"Then why aren't they fish?" persisted the Babe, ever anxious to get tothe root of a matter. 

"Because they're not, " replied Uncle Andy, impatient at having lethimself in for explanations, which he always disliked. "They'reanimals, just as much as a dog or a muskrat. "

The Babe wrinkled his forehead in perplexity. And Uncle Andy relented. 

"You see, " he continued, "they're not fish, because they cannot breatheunder water like fish can, but have to come to the surface for air, just as we would have to. And they're not fish, because they nursetheir babies as a cow or a cat does. And--and there are lots of otherreasons. "

"What are the other reasons?" demanded the Babe eagerly. 

But Uncle Andy had felt himself getting into deep water. He adroitlyevaded the question. 

"Do you suppose this old trout here, " said he, pointing to the grassybundle, "used to love and take care of its little ones, like the whaleI'm going to tell you about loved and took care of hers? No indeed!The trout had hundreds of thousands, and liked nothing better than toeat them whenever it got the chance. But the whale had only one--at atime, that is--and she always used to think there was nothing else likeit in the world. There are lots of other mothers as foolish as that. Yours, for instance, now. "

The Babe laughed. It pleased him when he understood one of UncleAndy's jokes--which was not always, by any means. He squatted himselfon the moss before the log, where he could stare straight up into UncleAndy's face with his blue, steady, expectant eyes. 

"It was a long way off from Silverwater, " began Uncle Andy in afar-away voice, and with a far-away look in his eyes, "that the whalecalf was born. It was up North, where the summer sun swung low over aworld of cold green seas, low grey shores, crumbling white ice-fields, and floating mountains of ice that flashed with lovely, fairy-liketints of palest blue and amethyst. The calf himself, with his slipperygreyish-black back and under-parts of a dirty cream color, was notbeautiful--though, of course, his mother thought him so, as he laynursing just under her great fin, rocked gently by the long, slowArctic swells. "

"What's Arctic swells?" interrupted the Babe, wrinkling his foreheadmore than ever. He had a vision of tall, smart-looking Eskimos, inwonderful furs; and it seemed to him very curious that the old motherwhale should be so tame as to let them come close enough to rock herbaby for her. 

"Rollers, I mean; Big waves!" grunted Uncle Andy discontentedly. "Afellow has to be so extraordinarily literal with you to-day! Now, ifyou interrupt again, I'll stop, and you can get Bill to tell you allabout it. As I was going to say, he--the calf, not Bill--was abouteight or nine feet long. He looked all head. And his head looked allmouth. And his mouth--but you could not see into that for it was verybusy nursing. His mother, however, lay with her mouth half open, avast cavern of a mouth, nearly a third the length of her body--and itlooked all whalebone. For, you must know, she was of the ancient andhonorable family of the Right Whales, who scorn to grow any teeth, andtherefore must live on soup so to speak. "

Here he paused, and looked at the Babe as much as to say, "Now, Isuppose you're going to interrupt again, in spite of all I've said. "But the Babe, restraining his curiosity about the soup, only satstaring at him with solemn eyes. So he went on. 

"You see, it was a most convenient kind of soup, a _live_ soup, thatthey fed upon. The sea, in great spots and patches, is full of tinycreatures, sometimes jelly-fish, sometimes little squid of variouskinds, all traveling in countless hosts from somewhere-or-other tosomewhere else, they know not why. As the great mother whale lay therewith her mouth open, these swarming little swimmers would calmly swiminto it, never dreaming that it was a mouth. There they would gettangled among those long narrow strips or plates of whale-bone, withtheir fringed edges. Every little while the whale would lazily closeher mouth, thrust forward her enormous fat tongue, and force the waterout through this whalebone sieve of hers. It was like draining a dishof string beans through a colander. Having swallowed the mess ofjellyfish and squid, she would open her mouth again, and wait foranother lot to come in. It was a very easy and comfortable way to geta bite of breakfast, while waiting for her baby to finish nursing. Andevery little while, from the big blowhole or nostril on top of her headshe would 'spout, ' or send up a spray-like jet of steamy breath. Andevery little while, too, the big-headed baby under her flipper wouldsend up a baby spout, as if in imitation of his mother. 

"You must not think, however, that this lazy way of feeding was enoughto keep the vast frame of the mother whale (she was quite sixty feetlong: three times as long as Bill's shanty yonder) supplied with food. This was just nibbling. When she felt that her baby had nursed enough, she gave it a signal which it understood. It fell a little back alongher huge side. Then, lifting her enormous tail straight in the air, she dived slowly downward into the pale, greenish glimmer of the deepertide, the calf keeping his place cleverly behind her protecting flipper. 

"Down here the minute life of the ocean waters swarmed more denselythan at the surface. Swimming slowly, the mother whale filled hermouth again and again with the tiny darting squid, till she hadstrained out and swallowed perhaps a ton of the pulpy provender. Asthey felt the whalebone strainers closing about them, each one tookalarm and let fly a jet of inky fluid, as if thinking to hide itselffrom Fate; and the dim green of the surrounding water grew clouded tillthe calf could hardly see, and had to crowd close to his mother's side. A twist or two of her mighty flukes, like the screw of an ocean liner, drove her clear of this obscurity, and carried her, a moment later, into a packed shoal of southward journeying capelin. "

The Babe's mouth opened for the natural question: "What's capelin?"

But Uncle Andy got ahead of him. 

"That's a little fish something like a sardine, " he explained hastily. "And they travel in such countless numbers that sometimes a storm willthrow them ashore in long windrows like you see in a hay field, so thatthe farmers come and cart them away for manure. Well, it did not takelong for the old whale to fill up even _her_ great stomach, when thecapelin were so numerous. She went ploughing through the shoal lazily, and stopped at last to rub her little one softly with her flipper. 

"All at once she caught sight of a curious-looking creature swimmingjust beneath the shoal of capelin, and every now and then opening itsmouth to gulp down a bushel or so of them. It was about fifteen feetlong, of a ghastly grayish white color, and from its snout stoodstraight out a sharp, twisted horn perhaps six feet in length. It wasonly a stupid narwhal, with no desire in the world to offend hisgigantic neighbor: but she was nervous at the sight of his horn, whichmade her think of her dreaded enemy the swordfish. Tucking her babywell under her fin, she made an hysterical rush at the unoffendingstranger. His little pig-like eyes blinked anxiously, and, darting offat his best pace, he was speedily lost to view in the cloudy myriads ofthe capelin. 

"Having now been under water for some twelve or fifteen minutes, themother whale knew that it was time for her baby to breatheagain--though she herself could have held on without fresh air foranother five or even ten minutes without much trouble. "

The Babe gasped. It was like a bad dream to him, the idea of goingalong without a breath. 

"Oh, how it must hurt!" he burst forth. "I should think it would killthem. "

"It would kill you, of course, in about two minutes, " replied UncleAndy. "But they are built differently. They have a handy way of doingup a lot of breathing all at once, and then not having to think anymore about it for a while. You can readily see what a convenience thatmight be to them. 

"When they got back to the surface, they lay comfortably rocking amongthe green swells, while they both blew all the used-up air and steamout of their lungs. The feathery little jet of the calf rose gravelybeside his mother's high and graceful spout. The calf, always hungry, because he had such a lot of growing to do and was in such a hurry todo it, fell at once to nursing again, while the mother lay basking halfasleep. Overhead, some great white gulls flapped and screamed againstthe sharp blue, now and then dropping with a splash to snatch some fishfrom the transparent slope of a wave. A couple of hundred yards awaythree seals lay basking on an ice-floe, and in the distance could beseen other whales spouting. So the mother knew that she and her babywere not alone in these wide bright spaces of sea and sky. 

"As a general rule, the great whale was apt to stay not more than twoor three minutes at the surface, but to spend most of her time in themoderate depths. Now, however, with her big baby to nurse, she wouldoften linger basking at the surface till her appetite drove her toactivity. In general, also, she was apt to be rather careless aboutkeeping watch against her enemies. But now she was vigilant even whenshe seemed asleep, and anything the least bit out of the ordinary wasenough to make her take alarm. As she lay sluggishly rocking, thegreat blackish round of her head and back now all awash, now risinglike a reef above the waves, she suddenly caught sight of a white furryhead with a black tip to its nose, swiftly cleaving the water. Sheknew it was only a white bear swimming, and she knew also that it wasnot big enough to dare attack her calf. But with her foolish motherfears she objected to its even being in the neighborhood. She swepther dark bulk around so as to hide the little one from the whiteswimmer's eyes, and lay glaring at him with suspicious fury. The bear, however, hardly condescended to glance at her. He was after thosebasking seals on the ice-floes. Presently he dived, a long, long dive, and came up suddenly at the very edge of the ice, caught the nearestseal by the throat just as they were all hurling themselves into thewater. 

"To this unhappy affair the old whale did not give so much as a secondlook. So long as the bear kept a respectful distance from her preciousbaby she didn't care how many silly seals he killed. 

"But presently she observed, far away among her spouting kindred, theblack, slow-moving shape of a steam whaler. In some past experienceshe had learned that these strange creatures, which seemed to haveother creatures, very small, but very, very dangerous, inside of them, were the most to be dreaded of all the whale's enemies. It was atpresent too far off for her to take alarm, but she lay watching theincomprehensible monster so sharply that she almost forgot to blow. Presently she saw it crawl up quite close to the unsuspecting shape ofone of her kinsmen. A spiteful flame leapt from its head. Then asharp thunder came rapping across the waves, and she saw her giantkinsman hurl himself clear into the air. He fell back with a terrificsplash, which set the monster rolling, and, for perhaps a minute, hisstruggles lashed the sea into foam. Then he lay still, and soon shesaw him drawn slowly up till he clung close to the monster's side. This unheard-of action filled her with a terror that was quitesickening. Clutching her calf tremblingly under her fin she plungedonce more into the deep, and, traveling as fast as possible for thelittle one, at a depth of perhaps two hundred feet, she headed foranother feeding ground where she trusted that the monster might notfollow. 

"When she came again to the surface, fifteen minutes later, the monsterand all her spouting kinsfolk were out of sight, hidden behind amile-long mountain of blue ice-berg. But she was not satisfied. Remaining up less than two minutes, to give the calf time for breath, she hurriedly plunged again and continued her journey. When thismanoeuver had been repeated half a dozen times she began to feel moreat ease. At last she came to a halt, and lay rocking in the seas justoff the mouth of a spacious rock-rimmed bay. 

"Here, as luck would have it, she found herself in the midst of thefood which she loved best. The leaden green of the swells was allflushed and stained with pale pink. This unusual color was caused byhordes of tiny, shrimplike creatures--distant cousins of those whichyou like so well in a salad. The whale preferred them in the form ofsoup, so she went sailing slowly through them with her cavernous mouthvery wide open. Every now and then she would shut her jaws and givetwo or three great gulps, and her little eyes, away back at the base ofher skull, would almost twinkle with satisfaction. 

"But, as it appeared, she was not the only one that liked shrimps. Theair was full of wings and screams, where gulls, gannets, and skuasswooped and splashed, quarrelling because they got in one another's wayat the feast. Also, here and there a heavy, sucking swirl on thesmooth slope of a wave would show where some very big fish was takingtoll of the pinky swarms. The whale kept her eye on these ponderousswirls with a certain amount of suspicion, though not reallyanticipating any danger here. 

"She was just about coming to the conclusion that one can have enough, even of shrimps, when, glancing downwards, she caught sight of a long, slender, deadly-looking shape slanting up toward her through a space ofclear water between the armies of the shrimps. She knew that grimshape all too well, and it was darting straight at her baby, itsterrible sword standing out keen and straight from its pointed snout. 

"In spite of her immense bulk and apparently clumsy form, the whale wascapable of marvelously quick action. You see, except for her head shewas all one bundle of muscle. Swift as thought, she whipped herselfclear round, between her calf and the upward rush of the swordfish. She was just in time. The thrust that would have gone clean throughthe calf, splitting its heart in two, went deep into her own side. 

"Withdrawing his terrible weapon, the robber fish whirled about likelightning and made a second dash at the coveted prize. But the mother, holding the little one tight under her flipper, wheeled again in timeto intercept the attack, and again received the dreadful thrust in herown flank. So swift was the swordfish (he was a kind of giantmackerel, with all the mackerel's grace and fire and nimbleness) thathe seemed to be everywhere at once. The whale was kept spinning aroundin a dizzy circle of foam, like a whirlpool, with the bewildered calfon the inside. The mighty twisting thrusts of her tail, with itsflukes twenty feet wide, set the whole surface boiling for hundreds ofyards about. 

"At last, grown suddenly frantic with rage, with terror for her littleone, and with the pain of her wounds, the tormented mother broke into adeep booming bellow, as of a hundred bulls. The mysterious sound sentall the gulls screaming into the air, and frightened the baskingwalruses on the ledges three miles away. Every seal that heard itshuddered and dived, and an old white bear, prowling along the desolatebeach in search of dead fish, lifted his lean head and listenednervously. 

"Only the swordfish paid no attention to that tremendous and desperatecry. In the midst of it he made another rush, missed the calf by ahandbreadth, and buried his sword to the socket in the mother's side. 

"At this the old whale seemed to lose her wits. Still clutching theterrified calf under one flipper, she stood straight on her head, sothat the head and half her body were below the surface, and fell tolashing the water all around her with ponderous, deafening blows of hertail. The huge concussions drove the swordfish from the surface, andfor a minute or two he swam around her in a wide circle, about twentyfeet down, trying to get the hang of these queer tactics. Then, swiftand smooth as a shadow, he shot in diagonally, well below the range ofthose crashing strokes. His sword went clean through the body of thecalf, through its heart, killing it instantly, and at the same timeforcing it from its mother's hold. The lifeless but still quiveringform fixed thus firmly on his sword, he darted away with it, and wasinstantly lost to view beyond the dense, churned hosts of the pinkshrimps. 

"For perhaps a minute the mother, as if bewildered by the violence ofher own exertions, seemed quite unaware of what had happened. Atlength she stopped lashing the water, came slowly to the surface staredabout her in a dazed way, and once more bellowed forth her terriblebooming cry. Once more the seabirds sprang terrified to the upper air, and the old white bear on the far-off shore lifted his head once moreto listen nervously. "

"And she never saw her baby any more, " murmured the Babe mournfully. 

Uncle Andy snorted, disdaining to answer such a remark. 

"Oh, I wish somebody would do something to that swordfish, " continuedthe Babe. And he wiped a tear from his nose. 

CHAPTER VI

TEDDY BEAR'S BEE TREE

They were exploring the high slopes of the farther shore ofSilverwater. It had been an unusually long trip for the Babe's shortlegs, and Uncle Andy had considerately called a halt, on the pretextthat it was time for a smoke. He knew that the Babe would trudge ontill he dropped in his tracks before acknowledging that he was tired. A mossy boulder under the ethereal green shade of a silver birchoffered the kind of resting place--comfortable yet unkempt--whichappealed to Uncle Andy's taste; and there below, over a succession ofthree low, wooded ridges, lay outspread the enchanting mirror of thelake. Uncle Andy's pipe never tasted so good to him as when he couldsmoke it to the accompaniment of a wide and eye-filling view. 

The Babe, who had squatted himself cross-legged on the turf at the footof the boulder, would have appreciated that superb view also, but thathis eager eyes had detected a pair of brown rabbits peering out at himinquiringly from the fringes of a thicket of young firs. 

"Perhaps, " he thought to himself, "if we keep very still indeed, they'll come out and play. "

He was about to whisper this suggestion cautiously to Uncle Andy, when, from somewhere in the trees behind them, came a loud sound ofscrambling, of claws scratching on bark, followed by a thud, a grunt, and a whining, and then the crash of some heavy creature careeringthrough the underbrush. It paused within twenty or thirty paces ofthem in its noisy flight, but the bushes were so thick that they couldnot catch a glimpse of it. 

The rabbits vanished. The Babe, startled, shrank closer to his uncle'sknee, and stared up at him with round eyes of inquiry. 

"He's in a hurry, all right, and doesn't care who knows it!" chuckledUncle Andy. But his shaggy brows were knit in some perplexity. 

"Who's _he_?" demanded the Babe. 

"Well, now, " protested Uncle Andy, as much as to say that the Babeought to have known that without asking, "you know there's nothing inthese woods big enough to make such a noise as that except a bear or amoose. And a moose can't go up a tree. You heard that fellow falldown out of a tree, didn't you?"

"Why did he fall down out of the tree?" asked the Babe, in a tone ofgreat surprise. 

"That's just what I--" began Uncle Andy. But he was interrupted. 

"Oh! _Oh_! It's stung me!" cried the Babe shrilly, jumping to hisfeet and slapping at his ear. His eyes filled with injured tears. 

Uncle Andy stared at him for a moment in grave reproof. Then he, too, sprang up as if the boulder had suddenly grown red-hot, and pawed athis hair with both hands, dropping his pipe. 

"Gee! I see why he fell down!" he cried. The Babe gave another cry, clapped his hand to his leg where the stocking did not quite join theshort breeches, and began hopping up and down on one foot. A heavy, pervasive hum was beginning to make itself heard. 

"Come!" yelled Uncle Andy, striking at his cheek angrily and duckinghis head as if he were going to butt something. He grabbed the Babe byone arm and rushed him to the fir thicket where the rabbits had been. 

"Duck!" he ordered. "Down with you--flat!" And together they crawledinto the low-growing, dense-foliaged thicket, where they lay side byside, face downwards. 

"They won't follow us in here, " murmured Uncle Andy. "They don't likethick bushes. "

"But I'm afraid--we've brought some in with us, Uncle Andy, " repliedthe Babe, trying very hard to keep the tears out of his voice. "Ithink I hear one squealing and buzzing in my hair. _Oh_!" And heclutched wildly at his leg. 

"You're right!" said Uncle Andy, his voice suddenly growing very sternas a bee crawled over his collar and jabbed him with great earnestnessin the neck. He sat up. Several other bees were creeping over him, seeking an effective spot to administer their fiery admonitions. Buthe paid them no heed. They stung him where they would--while he wasquickly looking over the Babe's hair, jacket, sleeves, stockings, andloose little trousers. He killed half a dozen of the angry crawlersbefore they found a chance to do the Babe more damage. Then he pulledout three stings, and applied moist earth from under the moss to eachred and anguished spot. 

The Babe looked up at him with a resolute little laugh, and shookobstinately from the tip of his nose the tears which he would notacknowledge by the attentions of his handkerchief or his fist. 

"Thank you _awfully_, " he began politely. "But _oh_! Uncle Andy, yourpoor eye is just dreadful. Oh-h-h!"

"Yes, they _have_ been getting after me a bit, " agreed Uncle Andy, dealing firmly with his own assailants, now that the Babe was allright. "But this jab under the eye is the only one that matters. Here, see if you can get hold of the sting. "

The Babe's keen eyes and nimble little fingers captured it at once. Then Uncle Andy plastered the spot with a daub of wet, black earth, andpeered over it solemnly at the Babe's swollen ear. He straightened hisgrizzled hair, and tried to look as if nothing out of the way hadhappened. 

"I wish I'd brought my pipe along, " he muttered. "It's over there bythe rock. But I reckon it wouldn't be healthy for me to go and get itjust yet!"

"What's made them so awful mad, do you suppose?" inquired the Babe, nursing his wounds and listening uneasily to the vicious hum whichfilled the air outside the thicket. 

"It's that fool bear!" replied Uncle Andy. "He's struck a bee tree tootough for him to tear open, and he fooled at it just long enough to getthe bees good and savage. Then he quit in a hurry. And we'll justhave to stay here till the bees get cooled down. "

"How long'll that be?" inquired the Babe dismally. It was hard to sitstill in the hot fir thicket, with that burning, throbbing smart in hisear and two little points of fierce ache in his leg. Uncle Andy wasfar from happy himself; but he felt that the Babe, who had behaved verywell, must have his mind diverted. He fished out a letter from hispocket, rolled himself, with his heavy pipe tobacco, a cigarette asthick as his finger, and fell to puffing such huge clouds as woulddiscourage other bees from prying into the thicket. Then he remarkedirrelevantly but consolingly:

"It isn't always, by any means, that the bees get the best of it thisway. Mostly it's the other way about. _This_ bear was a fool. Butthere was Teddy Bear, now, a cub over the foothills of Sugar LoafMountain, and _he_ was _not_ a fool. When he tackled his first beetree--and he was nothing but a cub, mind you--he pulled off the affairin good shape. I wish it had been _these_ bees that he cleaned out. "

The Babe was so surprised that he let go of his leg for a moment. 

"Why?" he exclaimed, "how could a cub do what a big, strong, grown-upbear couldn't manage?" He thought with a shudder how unequal _he_would be to such an undertaking. 

"You just wait and see!" admonished Uncle Andy, blowing furious cloudsfrom his monstrous cigarette. "It was about the end of the blue-berryseason when Teddy Bear lost his big, rusty-coated mother and small, glossy black sister, and found himself completely alone in the world. They had all three come down together from the high blue-berry patchesto the dark swamps to hunt for roots and fungi as a variation to theirfruit diet. The mother and sister had got caught together in adeadfall--a dreadful trap which crushed them both flat in an instant. Teddy Bear, some ten feet out of danger, had stared for two seconds infrozen horror, and then raced away like mad with his mother's warningscreech hoarse in his ears. He knew by instinct that he would neversee the victims any more; and he was very unhappy and lonely. For awhole day he moped, roaming restlessly about the high slopes andrefusing to eat, till at last he got so hungry that he just _had_ toeat. Then he began to forget his grief a little, and devoted himselfto the business of finding a living. But from being the mostsunny-tempered of cubs he became all at once as peppery as could be. 

"As I have told you, " continued Uncle Andy, peering at him with strangesolemnity over the mud patch beneath his swollen eye, "the blue-berrieswere just about done. And as Teddy would not go down to the lowerlands again to hunt for other kinds of rations, he had to do a lot ofhustling to find enough blue-berries for his healthy young appetite. Thus it came about that when one day, on an out-of-the-way corner ofthe mountain, he stumbled upon a patch of belated berries--large, plump, lapis-blue, and juicy--he fairly forgot himself in his greedyexcitement. He whimpered, he grunted, he wallowed as he fed. He hadno time to look where he was going. So, all of a sudden, he fellstraight through a thick fringe of blue-berry bushes and went sprawlingand clawing down the face of an almost perpendicular steep. 

"The distance of his fall was not far short of thirty feet, and hebrought up with a bump which left him not breath enough to squeal. Theground was soft, however, with undergrowth and debris, and he had nobones broken. In a couple of minutes he was busy licking himself allover to make sure he was undamaged. Reassured on this point, he wentprowling in exploration of the place he had dropped into. 

"It was a sort of deep bowl, not more than forty feet across at thebottom, and with its rocky sides so steep that Teddy Bear did not feelat all encouraged to climb them. He went sniffing and peering aroundthe edges in the hope of finding some easier way of escape. Disappointed in this, he lifted his black, alert little nose, andstared longingly upwards, as if contemplating an effort to fly. 

"He saw no help in that direction; but his nostrils caught a savorwhich for the moment put all thought of escape out of his head. It wasthe warm, delectable smell of honey. Teddy Bear had never tastedhoney; but he needed no one to tell him it was good. Instantly he knewthat he was very hungry. And instead of wanting to find a way out ofthe hole, all he wanted was to find out where that wonderful smell camefrom. If he thought any more at all of the hole, it was only to beglad he had had the great luck to fall into it. 

"From the deep soil at the bottom of the hole grew three big trees, together with a certain amount of underbrush. Two of those were firtrees, green and flourishing. The third was an old maple, with severalof its branches broken away. It was quite dead all down one side, while on the other only a couple of branches put forth leaves. About asmall hole near the top of this dilapidated old tree Teddy Bear caughtsight of a lot of bees, coming and going. Then he knew where thatadorable smell came from. For though, as I think I have said, hisexperience was extremely limited, his mother had managed to convey tohim an astonishing lot of useful and varied information. 

"Teddy Bear had an idea that bees, in spite of their altogetherdiminutive size, were capable of making themselves unpleasant, and alsothat they had a temper which was liable to go off at half-cock. Nevertheless, being a bear of great decision, he lost no time inwondering what he had better do. The moment he had convinced himselfthat the honey was up that tree, up that tree he went to get it. "

"Oh!" cried the Babe, in tones of shuddering sympathy, as he felt athis leg and his ear. "Oh! why _didn't_ he stop to think?"

Uncle Andy did not seem to consider that this remark called for anyreply. He ignored it. Stopping just at this critical point heproceeded with exasperating deliberation to roll himself another fatand clumsy cigarette. Then he applied fresh earth to both the Babe'sstings and his own. At last he went on. 

"That tree must have been hollow a long way down, for almost as soon asTeddy Bear's claws began to rattle on the bark the bees suspectedtrouble and began to get excited. When he was not much more thanhalfway up, and hanging to the rough bark with all his claws, _biff_!--something sharp and very hot struck him in the nose. Hegrunted, and almost let go in his surprise. Naturally, he wanted topaw his nose--for _you_ know how it smarted!"

"I guess _so_!" murmured the Babe in deepest sympathy, stroking thepatch of mud on his ear. 

"But that cub had naturally a level head. He knew that if he let gowith even one paw he would fall to the ground, because the trunk of thetree at that point was so big he could not get a good hold upon it. Sohe just dug his smarting nose into the bark and clawed himself aroundto the other side of the tree, where the branches that were still greensheltered him a bit, and there was a thick shadow from the nearest firtree, whose boughs interwove with those of the maple. Here the beesdidn't seem to notice him. He kept very still, listening to theirangry buzz till it had somewhat quieted down. Then, instead of goingabout it with a noisy dash, as he had done before, he worked his way upstealthily and slowly till he could crawl into the crotch of the firstbranch. You see, that bear could learn a lesson. 

"Presently he stuck his nose around to see how near he was to the bees'hole. He had just time to locate it--about seven or eight feet abovehim--when again _biff_! And he was stung on the lip. He drew in hishead again quick, I can tell you--quick enough to catch that bee andsmash it. He _ate_ it, indignantly. And then he lay curled up in thecrotch for some minutes, gently pawing his sore little snout andwhimpering angrily. 

"The warm, sweet smell of the honey was very strong up there. And, moreover, Teddy Bear's temper was now thoroughly aroused. Most cubs, and some older bears, would have relinquished the adventure at thispoint, for, as a rule, it takes a wise old bear to handle a bee treesuccessfully. But Teddy Bear was no ordinary cub, let me tell you. Helay nursing his anger and his nose till he had made up his mind what todo. And then he set out to do it. 

"Hauling himself up softly from branch to branch, he made no more noisethan a shadow. As soon as he was right behind the bees' hole hereached around, dug his claws into the edge of it, and pulled with allhis might. The edges were rotten, and a pawful of old wood came. Sodid the bees!

"They were onto him in a second. He grunted furiously, screwed hiseyes up tight, tucked his muzzle down under his left arm--which wasbusy holding on--and reached around blindly for another pull. Thistime he got a good grip, and he could feel something give. But thefiery torture was too much for him. He drew in his paw, crouched backinto the crotch, and cuffed wildly at his own ears and face as well asat the air, now thick with his assailants. The terrific hum they madesomewhat daunted him. For a few seconds he stood his ground, battlingfrantically. Then, with an agility that you would never have dreamedhis chubby form to be capable of, he went swinging down from branch tobranch, whining and coughing and spluttering and squealing all the way. From the lowest branch he slid down the trunk, his claws tearing thebark and just clinging enough to break his fall. 

"Reaching the ground, he began to roll himself over and over in the dryleaves and twigs till he had crushed out all the bees that clung in hisfur. "

"But why didn't the rest of the bees follow him? They followed thisother bear to-day!" protested the Babe feelingly. 

"Well, they didn't!" returned Uncle Andy quite shortly, with hiscustomary objection to being interrupted. Then he thought better ofit, and added amiably: "That's a sensible question--a very naturalquestion; and I'll give you the answer to it in half a minute. I'vegot to tell you my yarn in my own way, you know--you ought to know itby this time--but you'll see presently just why the bees acted sodifferently in the two cases. 

"Well, as soon as Teddy Bear had got rid of his assailants he claweddown through the leaves and twigs and moss--like _I_ did just now, youremember, till he came to the damp, cool earth. Ah, how he dug hissmarting muzzle into it, and rooted in it, and rubbed it into his earsand on his eyelids! till pretty soon--for the bee stings do not poisona bear's blood as strongly as they poison us--he began to feel mucheasier. As for the rest of his body--well, _those_ stings didn'tamount to much, you know, because his fur and his hide were both sothick. 

"At last he sat up on his haunches and looked around. You should haveseen him!"

"I'm glad I wasn't there, Uncle Andy, " said the Babe, earnestly shakinghis head. But Uncle Andy paid no attention to the remark. 

"His muddy paws drooped over his breast, and his face was all stuckover with leaves and moss and mud--"

"_We_ must look funny, too, " suggested the Babe, staring hard at theblack mud poultice under his uncle's swollen eye. But his unclerefused to be diverted. 

"And his glossy fur was in a state of which his mother would havestrongly disapproved. But his twinkling little eyes burned with wrathand determination. He sniffed again that honey smell. He stared up atthe bee tree, and noted that the opening was much larger than it hadbeen before his visit. A big crack extended from it for nearly twofeet down the trunk. Moreover, there did not seem to be so many beesbuzzing about the hole. "

The Babe's eyes grew so round with inquiry at this point that UncleAndy felt bound to explain. 

"You see, as soon as the bees got it into their cunning heads thattheir enemy was going to succeed in breaking into their storehouse, they decided that it was more important to save their treasures than tofight the enemy. It's like when one's house is on fire. At first onefights to put the fire out. When that's no use, then one thinks onlyof saving the things. That's the principle the bees generally go upon. At first they attack the enemy, in the hope of driving him off. But ifthey find that he is going to succeed in breaking in and burglarizingthe place, then they fling themselves on the precious honey which theyhave taken so much pains to store, and begin to stuff their honey sacksas full as possible. All they think of then is to carry away enough tokeep them going while they are getting established in new quarters. The trouble with the fool bear who has got us into this mess to-day wasthat he tackled a bee tree where the outside wood was too strong forhim to rip open. The bees knew he couldn't get in at them, so they allturned out after him, to give him a good lesson. When he got awaythrough the underbrush so quickly they just turned on us, because theyfelt they must give a lesson to somebody. "

"_We_ didn't want to steal their old honey, " muttered the Babe in aninjured voice. 

"Oh, I'm not so sure!" said Uncle Andy. "I shouldn't wonder if Billand I'd come over here some night and smoke the rascals out. But wecan wait. That's the difference between us and Teddy Bear. Hewouldn't even wait to clean the leaves off his face, he was so anxiousfor that honey, and his revenge. 

"This time he went up the tree slowly and quietly, keeping out of sightall the way. When he was exactly on a level with the entrance hebraced himself solidly, reached his right paw around the trunk likelightning, got a fine hold on the edge of the new crack, and wrenchedwith all his might. 

"A big strip of half-rotten wood came away so suddenly that Teddy Bearnearly fell out of the tree. 

"A lot of bees came with it; and once more Teddy Bear's head was in aswarm of little darting, piercing flames. But his blood was up. Heheld onto that chunk of bee tree. A big piece of comb, dripping withhoney and crawling with bees, was sticking to it. Whimpering andpawing at his face, he crunched a great mouthful of the comb, bees andall. 

"Never had he tasted, never had he dreamed of, anything so delicious!What was the pain of his smarting muzzle to that ecstatic mouthful? Hesnatched another, which took all the rest of the comb. Then he flungthe piece of wood to the ground. 

"The bees, meanwhile--except those which had stung him and were nowcrawling, stingless and soon to die, in his fur--had suddenly left him. The whole interior of their hive was exposed to the glare of daylight, and their one thought now was to save all they could. Teddy Bear's onethought was to seize all he could. He clawed himself around boldly tothe front of the tree, plunged one greedy paw straight into the heartof the hive, snatched forth a big, dripping, crawling comb, and fell tomunching it up as fast as possible--honey, bees, brood-comb, bee-bread, all together indiscriminately. The distracted bees paid him no moreattention. They were too busy filling their honey sacks. "

The Babe smacked his lips. He was beginning to get pretty hungryhimself. 

"Well, " continued Uncle Andy, "Teddy Bear chewed and chewed, finallyplunging his whole head into the sticky mess--getting a few stings, ofcourse, but never thinking of them--till he was just so gorged that hecouldn't hold another morsel. Then, very slowly and heavily, gruntingall the time, he climbed down the bee tree. He felt that he wanted togo to sleep. When he reached the bottom he sat up on his haunches tolook around for some sort of a snug corner. His eyelids were swollenwith stings, but his little round stomach was swollen with honey, so hedidn't care a cent. His face was all daubed with honey, and earth, andleaves, and dead bees. His whole body was a sight. And his claws wereso stuck up with honey and rotten wood and bark that he kept openingand shutting them like a baby who has got a feather stuck to itsfingers and doesn't know what to do with it, But he was too sleepy tobother about his appearance. He just waddled over to a sort of nookbetween the roots of the next tree, curled up with his sticky nosebetween his sticky paws, and was soon snoring. "

"And did he ever get out of that deep hole?" inquired the Babe, alwaysimpatient of the abrupt way in which Uncle Andy was wont to end hisstories. 

"Of course he got out. He climbed out, " answered Uncle Andy. "Do yousuppose a bear like that could be kept shut up long? And now I thinkwe might be getting out, too! I don't hear any more humming outside, so I reckon the coast's about clear. "

He peered forth cautiously. 

"It's all right. Come along, " he said. "And there's my pipe at thefoot of the rock, just where I dropped it, " he added, in a tone ofgreat satisfaction. Then, with mud-patched, swollen faces, and crookedbut cheerful smiles, the two refugees emerged into the golden light ofthe afternoon, and stretched themselves. But, as Uncle Andy surveyedfirst the Babe and then himself in the unobstructed light, his smilefaded. 

"I'm afraid Bill's going to have the laugh on us when we get home!"said he. 

CHAPTER VII

THE SNOWHOUSE BABY

There had been a film of glass-clear ice that morning all round theshores of Silverwater. It had melted as the sun climbed high into thebland October blue; but in the air remained, even at midday, a crispness, a tang, which set the Child's blood tingling. He drew the spicy breathof the spruce forests as deep as possible into his little lungs, andoutraged the solemn silences with shouts and squeals of sheer ecstasy, which Uncle Andy had not the heart to suppress. Then, all at once, heremembered what the thrilling air, the gold and scarlet of the trees, thefairy ice films, the whirr of the partridge wings, and the sharp cries ofthe bluejays all meant. It meant that soon Uncle Andy would take himback to town, the cabin under the hemlock would be boarded up. Bill theGuide would go off to the lumber camps beyond the Ottanoonsis, andSilverwater would be left to the snow and the solitude of winter. Hisheart tightened with homesickness. Yet, after all, he reflected, duringthe months of cold his beloved Silverwater would be none too friendly aplace, especially to such of the little furred and feathered folk as werebold enough to linger about its shores. He shivered as he thought of thedifference winter must make to all the children of the wild. 

"Why so solemn all of a sudden?" asked Uncle Andy, eyeing himsuspiciously. "I thought a minute ago you'd take the whole roof off theforest an' scare the old bull moose across the lake into shedding his newantlers. "

"I was just thinking, " answered the Child. 

"And does it hurt?" inquired Uncle Andy politely. 

But, young as he was, the Child had learned to ignore sarcasm--especiallyUncle Andy's, which he seldom understood. 

"I was just wondering, " he replied, shaking his head thoughtfully, "whatthe young ones of all the wild creatures would do in the winter to keepwarm. Bill says they all go to sleep. But I don't see how _that_ keepsthem warm, Uncle Andy. "

"Oh, _Bill_!" remarked Uncle Andy, in a tone which stripped all Bill'sstatements of the last shreds of authority. "But, as a matter of fact, there _aren't_ many youngsters around in the woods in winter--not enoughfor you to be looking so solemn about. They're mostly born early enoughin spring and summer to be pretty well grown up by the time winter comeson them. "

"Gee!" murmured the Child enviously. "I wish I could get grown up asquick as that. "

Uncle Andy sniffed. 

"There are lots of people besides you, " said he, "that don't know whenthey're well off. But, " he continued, seating himself on Bill's choppinglog and meditatively cleaning out his pipe bowl with a bit of chip, "there _are_ some youngsters who have a fashion of getting themselvesborn right in the worst of the cold weather--and that not here inSilverwater neither, but way up north, where weather is weather, let metell you--where it gets so cold that, if you were foolish enough to cry, the tears would all freeze instantly, till your eyes were shut up in aregular ice jam. "

"I wouldn't cry, " declared the Child. 

"No? But I don't want you to interrupt me any more. "

"Of course not, " said the Child politely. Uncle Andy eyed himsearchingly, and then decided to go on. 

"Away up north, " he began abruptly--and paused to light his pipe--"awayup north, as I was saying, it was just midwinter. It was alsomidnight--which, in those latitudes, is another way of saying the samething. The land as far as eye could see in every direction was flat, dead white, and smooth as a table, except for the long curving windrowsinto which the hard snow had been licked up by weeks of screaming wind. Just now the wind was still. The sky was like black steel sown withdiamonds, and the stars seemed to snap under the terrific cold. Suddenlytheir bitter sparkle faded, and a delicate pale green glow spread itself, opening like a fan, till it covered half the heavens. Almost immediatelythe center of the base of the fan rolled itself up till the strange lightbecame an arch of intense radiance, the green tint shifting rapidly toblue-white, violet, gold, and cherry rose. A moment more and the stillarch broke up into an incalculable array of upright spears of light, pointing toward the zenith, and dancing swiftly from side to side with athin, mysterious rustle. They danced so for some minutes, ever changingcolor, till suddenly they all melted back into the fan-shaped glow. Andthe glow remained, throbbing softly as if breathless, uncertain whetherto die away or to go through the whole performance again. "

"I know--" began the Child, but checked himself at once with adeprecating glance of apology. 

"Except for the dancing wonder of the light, " continued Uncle Andy, graciously pretending not to hear the interruption, "nothing stirred inall that emptiness of naked space. Of life there was not the least signanywhere. This appeared the very home of death and intolerable cold. Yet at one spot, between two little, almost indistinguishable ridges ofsnow, might have been noticed a tiny wisp of vapor. If one had put hisface down close to the snow, so that the vapor came between his eyes andthe light, he would have made it out quite distinctly. And it would havecertainly seemed very puzzling that anything like steam should be comingup out of that iron-bound expanse. "

Now the Child had once seen, in the depth of winter, a wreath of mistarising from the snowy rim of an open spring, and for the life of him hecould not hold his tongue. 

"It was a boiling spring, " he blurted out. 

Uncle Andy gazed at him for some seconds in a disconcerting silence, tillthe Child felt himself no bigger than a minute. 

"It was a bear, " he announced at length coldly. Then he was silent again. 

And the Child, mortified at having made such a bad guess, was silent too, in spite of his pangs of curiosity at this startling assertion. 

"You see, " went on Uncle Andy, after he was satisfied that the Child wasnot going to interrupt again, at least for the moment, "you see, underthose two ridges of frozen snow there was a little cavern-like crevice inthe rock. It was sheltered perfectly from those terrific winds whichsometimes for days together would drive screaming over the levels. Andin this crevice, at the first heavy snowfall, a big white bear had curledherself up to sleep. 

"She had had a good hunting season, with plenty of seals and salmon toeat, and she was fat and comfortable. Though very drowsy, she did not goquite to sleep at once, but for several days, in a dreamy half-doze, shekept from time to time turning about and rearranging her bed. All thetime the snow was piling down into the crevice, till at last it was levelfull and firmly packed. And in the meantime the old bear, in her sleepyturnings, had managed to make herself a sort of snowhouse--decidedlynarrow, indeed, but wonderfully snug in its way. There was no room totake exercise, of course, but that, after all, was about the last thingshe was thinking of. A day or two more and she was too fast asleep to doanything but breathe. 

"The winter deepened, and storm after storm scourged the naked plain; andthe snow fell endlessly, till the snowhouse was buried away fairly out ofremembrance. The savage cold swept down noiselessly from outer space, till, if there had been any such things as thermometers up there, themercury would have been frozen hard as steel and the thin spirit to asticky, ropy syrup. But even such cold as that could not get down to thehidden snow-house where the old bear lay so sound asleep. "

The Child wagged his head wistfully at the picture, and then cheeredhimself with the resolve to build just such a snowhouse in the back yardthat winter--if only there should fall enough snow. But he managed tohold his tongue about it. 

"Just about the middle of the winter, " went on Uncle Andy, after a pauseto see if the Child was going to interrupt him again, "the old bear beganto stir a little. She grumbled, and whimpered, and seemed to be havinguneasy dreams for a day or two. At last she half woke up--or perhaps alittle more than half. Then a little furry cub was born to her. She wasjust about wide enough awake to tell him how glad she was to see him andhave him with her, and to lick him tenderly for a while, and to get himnursing comfortably. When she had quite satisfied herself that he was acub to do her credit, she dozed off to sleep again without any anxietywhatever. You see, there was not the least chance of his being stolen, or falling downstairs, or getting into any mischief whatever. And thatwas where she had a great advantage over lots of mothers whom we could, think of if we tried. "

"But what made the steam, Uncle Andy?" broke in the Child, somewhatirrelevantly. He had a way, sometimes rather exasperating to thenarrator, of never forgetting the loose ends in a narrative, and ofcalling attention to them at unexpected moments. 

"Can't you see that for yourself?" grunted Uncle Andy impatiently. "Itwas breath. Try to think for yourself a little. Well, as I was tryingto say, there was nothing much for the cub to do in the snowhouse butnurse, sleep, and grow. To these three important but not excitingaffairs he devoted himself entirely. Neither to him nor to his big whitemother did it matter in the least whether the long Arctic gales roaredover their unseen roof, or the unimaginable Arctic cold groped for themwith noiseless fingers. Neither foe could reach them in their warmrefuge. Nothing at all, indeed, could find them, except, once in awhile, when the Northern Lights were dancing with unusual brillianceacross the sky, a dim, pallid glow, which would filter down through thesnow and allow the cub's eyes (if they happened to be open at the time)to make out something of his mother's gigantic white form. 

"For the youngster of so huge a mother, the snowhouse baby was quiteabsurdly small. But this defect, by sticking closely to his business, heremedied with amazing rapidity. In fact, if his mother had cared to stayawake long enough to watch, she could fairly have seen him grow. But, ofcourse, this growth was all at his mother's expense, seeing that he hadno food except her milk. So as he grew bigger and fatter, she grewthinner and lanker, till you would hardly have recognized this long, gaunt, white fur bag of bones for the plump beast of the previous autumn. 

"But all passes--even an Arctic winter. The sun began to make shortdaily trips across the horizon. It got higher and higher, and hotter andhotter. The snow began to melt, crumble, shrink upon itself. Up towithin a couple of hundred yards of the hidden snowhouse, what had seemedto be solid land broke up and revealed itself as open sea, crowded withhuge ice cakes, and walrus, and seals. Sea birds came splashing andscreaming. And a wonderful thrill awoke in the air. 

"That thrill got down into the snowhouse--the roof of which was by thistime getting much thinner. The cub found himself much less sleepy. Hegrew restless. He wanted to stretch his sturdy little legs to find outwhat they were good for. His mother, too, woke up. She found herself sohungry that there was no temptation to go to sleep again. Moreover, itwas beginning to feel too warm for comfort--that is, for a polar bear'scomfort, not for yours or mine--in the snowhouse. She got up and shookherself. One wall of the snowhouse very civilly gave way a bit, allowingher more room. But the roof, well supported by the rock, still held. The snowhouse was full of a beautiful pale-blue light. 

"Just at this particular moment a little herd of walrus--two old bullsand four cows with their fat, oily-looking calves--came sprawling, floundering and grunting by. They were quite out of place on land, ofcourse, but for some reason known only to themselves they were crossingover the narrow neck of low ground from another bay, half a mile away. Perhaps the ice pack had been jammed in by wind and current on that side, filling the shallow bay to the bottom and cutting the walrus off fromtheir feeding grounds. If not that, then it was some other equallyurgent reason, or the massive beasts, who can move on land only by aseries of violent and exhausting flops, would never have undertaken anenterprise so formidable as a half-mile overland journey. They wereaccomplishing it, however, with a vast deal of groaning and wheezing anddeep-throated grunting, when they arrived at the end of the crevicewherein the snowhouse baby and his mother were concealed. 

"Lifting their huge, whiskered and tusked heads, and plunging forwardlaboriously on their awkward nippers, the two old bulls went by, followedby the ponderous cows with their lumpy, rolling calves. The hindermostcow, a few feet to the right of the herd, came so close to the end of thecrevice that the edge of the snow gave way and her left nipper slippedinto it, throwing her forward upon her side. As she struggled to recoverherself, close beside her the snow was heaved up, and a terrible, grinning white head emerged, followed by gigantic shoulders and huge, claw-armed, battling paws. 

"This sudden and dreadful apparition startled the walrus cow into newvigor, so that with a convulsive plunge she tore herself free of thepitfall. For a couple of seconds the old bear towered above her, withsagacious eyes taking in the whole situation. Then, judiciously ignoringthe mother, she sprang over her, treading her down into the snow, fellupon the fat calf, and with one tremendous buffet broke its neck. 

"With a hoarse roar of grief and fury the cow wheeled upon her haunches, reared her sprawling bulk aloft, and tried to throw herself upon theslayer. The bear nimbly avoided the shock, and whirled round to seewhere her cub was. Blinking at the light and dazed by the sudden uproar, but full of curiosity, he was just crawling up out of the ruins of thesnowhouse. His mother dragged him forth by the scruff of the neck, andwith a heave of one paw sent him rolling over and over along the snow, adozen paces out of danger. At the same time something in her savagegrowls conveyed to him a first lesson in that wholesome fear which it isso well for the children of the wild to learn early. As he pulledhimself together and picked himself up he was still full of curiosity, but at the same time he realized the absolute necessity for keeping outof the way of something, whatever it was. 

"He soon saw what it was. At the cry of the bereaved mother the twogreat walrus bulls had turned. Now, with curious, choked roars, whichseemed to tear their way with difficulty out of their deep chests, theycame floundering back to the rescue. The cub, a sure instinct assertingitself at once, looked behind him to see that the path of escape wasclear. Then he sat up on his haunches, his twinkling little eyesshifting back and forth between those mighty oncoming bulks and the long, gaunt, white form of his mother. 

"For perhaps half a minute the old bear stood her ground, dodging theclumsy but terrific onslaughts of the cow, and dealing her two or threebuffets which would have smashed in the skeleton of any creature lesstough than a walrus or an elephant. But she had no notion of risking herhealth and the future of her baby by cultivating any more intimateacquaintance with those two roaring mountains of blubber which werebearing down upon her. When they were within just one more crashingplunge, she briskly drew aside, whirled about, and trotted off to joinher cub. They were really so clumsy and slow, those walruses, that shehardly cared to hurry. 

"For a few yards the two bulls pursued her; so she and the cub strolledoff together to a distance of some fifty paces, and there halted to seewhat would happen next. Even creatures so dull-witted as those walrusbulls could see they would waste their time if they undertook to chasebears on dry land, so they turned back, grumbling under their long tusks, and joined the cow in inspecting the body of the dead calf. Soon comingto the conclusion that it was quite too dead to be worth bothering about, they all three went floundering on after the other cows, who had by thistime got their own calves safely down to the water, and were swimmingabout anxiously, as if they feared that the enemy might follow them eveninto their own element. Then, after as brief an interval as discretionseemed to require, the old bear led the way back, sniffed at the body ofthe fat walrus calf, and crouched down beside it with a long _woof_ ofdeepest satisfaction. For it is not often, let me tell you, that a polarbear, ravenous after her long winter's fast, is lucky enough to make akill like that just at the very moment of coming out of her den. "

Uncle Andy knocked the ashes out of his pipe with that air of finalitywhich the Child knew so well, and sometimes found so disappointing'. 

"But what became of the snowhouse baby?" he urged. 

"Oh, " replied Uncle Andy, getting up from the chopping-log, "you see, hewas no longer a snowhouse baby, because the snowhouse was all smashed up, and also rapidly melting. Moreover, it was no longer winter, you know;so he was just like lots of other wild babies, and went about gettinginto trouble, and getting out again, and growing up, till at last, whenhe was almost half as big as herself and _perfectly_ well able to takecare of himself, his mother chased him away and went off to find anothersnowhouse. "

CHAPTER VIII

LITTLE SILK WING

The first of the twilight over Silverwater. So ethereal were the thinwashes of palest orange and apple-green reflection spreading over thesurface of the lake, out beyond the fringe of alder bushes, sobubble-like in delicacy the violet tones of the air among the trees, just fading away into the moth-wing brown of dusk, that the Child wasafraid to ask even the briefest questions, lest his voice should breakthe incomparable enchantment. Uncle Andy sat smoking, his eyeswithdrawn in a dream. From the other side of the point, quite out ofsight, where Bill was washing the dishes after the early camp supper, came a soft clatter of tins. But the homely sound had no power to jarthe quiet. 

The magic of the hour took it, and transmuted it, and made it a note inthe chord of the great stillness. From the pale greenish vault of skycame a long, faint twang as of a silver string, where the swoop of anight hawk struck the tranced air to a moment's vibration. A minute ortwo later the light splash of a small trout leaping, and then, from theheart of the hemlock wood further down the shore, the mellow_hoo-hoo-hoo-oo_ of a brown owl. 

The Child was squatting on the mossy turf and staring out, round-eyed, across the water. Suddenly he jumped, clapped both grimy little handsto his face, and piped a shrill "Oh!" A bat's wing had flittered pasthis nose so close that he might have caught it in his teeth if he hadwanted to--_and_ been quick enough. 

Uncle Andy turned, took his pipe from his mouth with markeddeliberation, and eyed the Child severely. 

"What on earth's the matter?" he inquired, after a disapproving pause. 

"I thought it was trying to bite my nose, " explained the Childapologetically. 

"There's not very much to bite, you know, " said Uncle Andy, in acarping mood at having had his reveries disturbed. 

"I know it's pretty little, and turns up--rather, " agreed the Child;"but I don't want anything to bite it. "

"Nonsense!" said Uncle Andy. "Who'd want to?"

"It was that bat!" declared the Child, pointing to the shadowy formzigzagging over the fringe of bushes at the edge of the water. "Hecame down and hit me right in the face--almost. "

"That bat bite you!" retorted Uncle Andy with a sniff of scorn. "Why, he was doing you the most friendly turn he knew how. No doubt therewas a big mosquito just going to bite you, and that little chap theresnapped it up in time to save you. There are lots of folk beside batsthat get themselves misunderstood just when they are trying hardest todo some good. "

"Oh, I see!" murmured the Child politely--which, of course, meant thathe did not see at all what Uncle Andy was driving at. "_Why_ do batsget themselves misunderstood, Uncle Andy?"

His uncle eyed him narrowly. He was always suspecting the Child ofmaking game of him--than which nothing could be further from theChild's honest and rather matter-of-fact intentions. The question, tobe sure, was rather a poser. While he pondered a reply toit--apparently absorbed in the task of relighting his pipe--the Child'sattention was diverted. And forever the question of why bats getthemselves misunderstood remained unanswered. 

The bat chanced at the moment to be zig-zagging only a dozen feet or soaway, when from the empty air above, as if created on the instant outof nothingness, dropped a noiseless, shadowy shape of wings. It seemedto catch the eccentric little flutterer fairly. But it didn't--for thebat was a marvelous adept at dodging. With a lightning swerve itemerged from under the great wings and darted behind Uncle Andy's head. The baffled owl, not daring to come so near the hated man-creatures, winnowed off in ghostly silence. 

At the same moment a tiny, quivering thing, like a dark leaf, floatedto the ground. There, instead of lying quiet like a leaf, it flutteredsoftly. 

"What's that?" demanded the Child. 

"_Hush_!" ordered Uncle Andy in a peremptory whisper. 

The shadowy leaf on the ground continued to flutter, as if trying torise into the air. Presently the bat reappeared and circled over it. A moment more and it dropped, touched the ground for a second withwide, uplifted wings, and then sailed off again on a long, swift, upward curve. The fluttering, shadowy leaf had disappeared. 

For once the Child had no questions ready. He had so much to ask aboutall at once. His eyes like saucers with interrogation, he turnedappealingly to his uncle and said nothing. 

"That was the little one--one of the two little ones, " said Uncle Andyobligingly. 

"But what?--why?--"

"You see, " went on Uncle Andy, hastening to explain before he could beoverwhelmed, "your poor little friend was a mother bat, and she wascarrying her two young ones with her, clinging to her neck with theirwings, while she was busy hunting gnats and moths and protecting yournose from mosquitoes. When the owl swooped on her, and so nearlycaught her, she dodged so violently that one of the little ones wasjerked from its hold. Being too young to fly, it could do nothing butflutter to the ground and squat there, beating its wings till themother came to look for it. How she managed to pick it up again soneatly, I can't say. But you saw for yourself how neat it was, eh?"

The Child nodded his head vigorously and smacked his lips in agreement. 

"But why does she carry them around with her that way?" he inquired. "It seems to me awfully dangerous. I don't think _I'd_ like it. "

He pictured to himself his own substantial mamma swooping erraticallythrough the air, with skirts flying out behind and himself clingingprecariously to her neck. And at the thought he felt a sinkingsensation at the pit of his stomach. 

"Well, you know, you're not a bat, " said Uncle Andy sententiously. "Ifyou were you'd probably think it much pleasanter, and far _less_dangerous, than being left at home alone while your mother was outswooping 'round after moths and June bugs. '"

"Why?" demanded the Child promptly. 

"Well, you just listen a bit, " answered Uncle Andy in his exasperatingway. He hated to answer any of the Child's most innocent questionsdirectly if he could get at them in a roundabout way. "Once upon atime"--("Ugh!" thought the Child to himself, "_this_ is going to be afairy story!" But it wasn't). "Once upon a time, " went on Uncle Andyslowly, "there was a young bat--a baby bat so small you might have puthim into your mother's thimble. He lived high up in the peak of theroof of an old barn down in the meadows beside the golden, rushingwaters of the Nashwaak stream, not more than five or six miles fromFredericton. We'll call him Little Silk Wing. "

"_I_'ve been to Fredericton!" interjected the Child with an importantair. 

"Really!" said Uncle Andy. "Well, Little Silk Wing hadn't. And now, who's going to tell this story, you or I?"

"I won't interrupt any more!" said the Child penitently. "But why washe called Little Silk Wing, Uncle Andy?"

His uncle looked at him in despair. Then he answered, with unwontedresignation, "His wings weren't really any silkier than those of histiny sister. But he got hold of the name _first_, that's all. So itwas his!

"When the two were first born they were so tiny as to be quiteridiculous--little shriveled, pale mites, that could do nothing buthang to their mother's breasts, and nurse diligently, and grow. Theygrew almost at once to the same color as their mother, plumped out tillthey were so big as to be not quite lost in a thimble and developed amarvelous power of clinging to their mother's body while she wentcareering through the air in her dizzy evolutions. 

"But when they were big enough for their weight to be a seriousinterference with their mother's hunting, then she was forced, mostreluctantly, to leave them at home sometimes. She would take them bothtogether into the narrow crevice between the top beam and the slope ofthe roof, and there they would lie motionless, shrouded in theirexquisitely fine, mouse-colored wing membranes, and looking for all theworld like two little bits of dry wood. It was not always lonely forthem, because there were usually at least two or three grown-up batshanging by their toes from the edge of a nearby crack, taking briefrest from the toil of their aerial chase. But it was alwaysmonotonous, unless they were asleep. For all movement was rigorouslyforbidden them, as being liable to betray them to some foe. "

"Why, what could get at them, away up there?" demanded the Child, towhom the peak of a lead always seemed the remotest, most inaccessible, and most mysterious of spots. 

"Wait and see!" answered Uncle Andy, with the air of an oracle. "Well, one night a streak of moonlight, like a long white finger, came inthrough a crack above and lit up those two tiny huddled shapes in theircrevice. It came so suddenly upon them that Little Silk Wing, underthe touch of that blue-white radiance, stirred uneasily and halfunfolded his wings. The movement caught the great, gleaming eyes of animmense brown hunting spider who chanced at that moment to be prowlingdown the underside of the roof. He was one of the kind that does notspin webs, but catches its prey by stealing up and pouncing upon it. He knew that a little bat, when young enough, was no stronger than abig butterfly, and its blood would be quite good enough to suck. Stealthily he crept down into the brightness of that narrow ray, wondering whether the youngster was too big for him to tackle or not. He made up his mind to have a go at it. In fact, he was just gatheringhis immense, hairy legs beneath him for that fatal pounce of his, whenhe was himself pounced upon by a flickering shadow, plucked from hisplace, paralyzed by a bite through the thorax, and borne off to bedevoured at leisure by a big bat which had just come in. "

"Oh, I see, " muttered the Child feelingly. He was himself a good dealafraid of spiders, and he meant that he understood now why it was lessdangerous for little bats to go swinging wildly through the twilightclinging to their mother's necks than to stay at home alone. 

But Uncle Andy paid no heed to the interruption. 

"On the following night, " he continued, "Little Silk Wing and hissister found themselves once more alone in the crevice at the end ofthe beam. They knew nothing of the peril from which they had beensaved the night before, so they had learned no lesson. On this nightthey were restless, for their mother had fluttered away, leaving themboth a little hungry. Hunting had been bad, and she had somewhat lessmilk for them than their growing appetites demanded. When once morethat slender finger of moonlight, feeling its way through a chink inthe roof, fell upon them in their crevice, it was the little sisterthis time that stirred and fluttered under its ghostly touch. Shestretched one wing clear out upon the beam, and it was with difficultythat she restrained herself from giving vent to one of herinfinitesimally thin squeaks, tiny as a bead that would drop throughthe eye of a needle. 

"There was no great prowling spider to catch sight of her to-night. But a very hungry mouse, as it chanced, was just at that momenttip-toeing along the beam, wondering what he could find that would begood to eat. A lump of toasted cheese, or an old grease rag, or awell-starched collar, or a lump of cold suet pudding would have suitedhim nicely, but inexorable experience had taught him that suchdelicacies were seldom to be found in the roof of the barn. Under thecircumstances, any old moth or beetle or spider, dead or alive, wouldbe better than nothing. 

"How his little black, beadlike eyes glistened as they fell upon thatfrail membrane of a wing fluttering on the beam! He darted forward, straight and swift as a weaver's shuttle, seized the delicate wing inhis strong white teeth, and dragged the baby bat from her hiding place. Baby as she was, she was game. For one moment she sat up and chatteredangry defiance, in a voice like the winding of a watch, but so thin andhigh-pitched that only a fine ear could have caught it. Then the mouseseized her, bit her tiny neck through, and dragged her off, sprawlinglimply, along the beam. "

The Child nodded vigorously. He needed nothing more to convince him ofthe superior security of a life of travel and adventure, as comparedwith the truly appalling perils of staying at home. 

"I see you take me!" said Uncle Andy approvingly. "But this, as youwill observe, was not Little Silk Wing, but his sister. For LittleSilk Wing life became now more interesting. Having only one baby left, his mother was able to carry him with her wherever she went. And shewould not have left him alone again for the world, lest the unknown butdreadful fate which had befallen his sister should overtake him also. 

"He was old enough and wide awake enough by this time to appreciate hisadvantages. He could feel the thrill of his mother's long, swingingswoops through the dewy coolness of the dusk. He could thrill insympathy with her excitement of the chase, when she went fluttering upinto the thin pallor of the upper air, following inexorably thedesperate circlings of some high-flying cockchafer. When she droppedlike lead to snap up some sluggish night moth, its wings were not yetquite dry from the chrysalis, as he clung to the swaying grass tops, his tiny eyes sparkled keenly. And when she went zigzagging, withbreathless speed and terrifying violence, to evade the noiseless attackof the brown owl, he hung on to her neck with the tenacity of despairand imagined that their last hour had come. But it hadn't, for hismother was clever and expert. She had fooled many owls in her day. 

"This adventurous life of his, of course, was lived entirely at night. During the day he slept, for the most part, folded in his mother's wingmembranes, while she hung by her toes from the edge of a warped boardin the warm goldy-brown shadows of the peak of the old barn. Outside, along the high ridge pole, swallows, king birds, jays, and pigeonsgathered under the bright blue day to scream, chatter or coo theirideas of life, each according to the speech of its kind. And sometimesa cruel-eyed, hook-beaked, trim, well-bred looking hawk would perchthere on the roof--quite alone, let me tell you--and gaze around as ifwondering where all the other birds could have gone to! And once in awhile also a splendid white-headed eagle would come down out of theblue, and wing low over the barn, and scream his thin, terrifying yelp, as if he were hoping there might be something like spring lambs hiddenin the barn. But none of these things, affairs of the garish, dazzling, common day, moved in the least the row of contented littlebats, all drowsing the useless hours of day away as they hung by theirtoes in the soft gloom under the roof. They would wake up now andagain, to be sure, and squeak, and crowd each other a little. Orperhaps rouse themselves enough to make a long and careful toilet, combing their exquisitely fine fur with their delicate claws, andpassing every corner of the elastic silken membrane of their wingsdaintily between their lips. But as for what went on in the gaudylight on the outer side of the roof, it concerned them not at all. 

"But Little Silk Wing seems to have been born to illustrate the dangerswhich beset the life of the stay-at-home. For two days there had beenan unwonted disturbance in the deep-grassed meadow that surrounded thebarn. There had been the clanking of harness, the long, shrill, vibrant clatter of the scarlet mowing machine, the snorting of horses, and the shouting and laughter of men turning the fresh hay with theirforks. Then came carts and children, with shrill laughter and screamsof merriment, and the hay was hauled into the barn, load after load, fragrant, crackling with grasshoppers; and presently the mows began tofill up till the men with the pitchforks, sweating over the hot work ofstowing the hay, came up beneath the eaves. 

"Reluctantly and indignantly the bats woke up. Some of them, as theloads came in with noisy children on top, bestirred themselvessufficiently to shake the sleep out of their eyes, unfold their drapedwings, flutter down into the daylight, and fly off to the peacefulgloom of the nearest woods. 

"But the mother of Little Silk Wing was not so easily disturbed. Sheopened her tiny black beads of eyes as wide as she could, but gave noother sign of having noticed the invaders of the old barn's drowsypeace. She had seen such excitement before, and never known any harmto come of it. And she hated flying out into the full glare of the sun. 

"But there is such a thing, you know, as being a bit too calm andself-possessed. As the hay got higher up in the mow, beyond the eaves, and almost up to the level of the topmost beam, one of the farm handsnoticed the little bat hanging under the ridgepole. He was one ofthose dull fools, not cruel at heart, perhaps, but utterly withoutimagination, who, if they see something interesting, are apt to kill itjust because they don't know any other way to show their interest. Heup with the handle of his pitchfork and knocked the poor little motherbat far out into the stubble. "

"_Oh_!" cried the Child. "Didn't it hurt her _dreadfully_?"

"It killed her, " replied Uncle Andy simply. "But by chance it didn'thurt Little Silk Wing himself, as he clung desperately to her neck. The children, with cries of sympathy and reprobation, rushed to pick upthe little dark body. But the black-and-white dog was ahead of them. He raced in and snatched the queer thing up, gently enough, in histeeth. But he let it drop again at once in huge surprise. It had comeapart. All of a sudden it was two bats instead of one. He couldn'tunderstand it at all. And neither could the children. And while theystood staring--the black-and-white dog with his tongue hanging out andhis tail forgetting to wag, and the children with their eyes quiteround--Little Silk Wing fluttered up into the air, flew hesitatinglythis way and that for a moment till he felt sure of himself, and thendarted off to the shelter of those woods where he had so oftenaccompanied his mother on her hunting. "

The Child heaved a sigh of relief. "I'm so glad he got off, " hemurmured. 

"I thought you would be. That's why he did, " said Uncle Andyenigmatically. 

CHAPTER IX

A LITTLE ALIEN IN THE WILDERNESS

It was too hot and clear and still that morning for the most expert offishermen to cast his fly with any hope of success. The broadpale-green lily pads lay motionless on the unruffled breast ofSilverwater. Nowhere even the round ripple of a rising minnow brokethe blazing sheen of the lake. The air was so drowsy that those sparksof concentrated energy, the dragonflies, forgot to chase their aerialquarry and slept, blazing like amethysts, rubies and emeralds, on thetops of the cattail rushes. Very lazily and without the slightestreluctance, Uncle Andy ruled in his line, secured his cast, and leanedhis rod securely in a forked branch to await more favorable conditionsfor his pet pastime. For the present it seemed to him that nothingcould be more delightful and more appropriate to the hour than to lieunder the thick-leaved maple at the top of the bank, and smoke and gazeout in lotus-eating mood across the enchanted radiance of the water. Even the Child, usually as restless as the dragonflies themselves orthose exponents of perpetual motion, the brown water skippers, waslying on his back, quite still, and staring up with round, contemplative blue eyes through the diaphanous green of the mapleleaves. 

Though his eyes were so very wide open, it was that extreme butephemeral openness which a child's eyes so frequently assume justbefore closing up very tight. In fact, in just about three-eights of aminute he would have been, in all probability, sound asleep, with arose-pink light, sifted through his eyelids, dancing joyously over hisdreams. But at that moment there came a strange cry from up thesweeping curve of the shore--so strange a cry that the Child sat upinstantly very straight, and demanded, with a gasp, "What's that?"

Uncle Andy did not answer for a moment. Perhaps it was because he wasso busy lighting his pipe, or perhaps he hoped to hear the sound againbefore committing himself--for so experienced a woodsman as he was hadgood reason to know that most of the creatures of the wild have manydifferent cries, and sometimes seem to imitate each other in thestrangest fashion. He had not long to wait. The wild voice soundedagain and again, so insistently, so appealingly that the Child becamegreatly excited over it. The sound was something between the bleat ofan extraordinary, harsh-voiced kid and the scream of a badly frightenedmirganser, but more penetrating and more strident than either. 

"Oh, it's frightened, Uncle Andy!" exclaimed the Child. "What do youthink it is? What does it want? Let's go and see if we can't help it!"

The pipe was drawing all right now, because Uncle Andy had made up hismind. 

"It's nothing but a young fawn--a baby deer, " he answered. "Evidentlyit has got lost, and it's crying for its mother. With a voice likethat it ought to make her hear if she's anywhere alive--if a bear hasnot jumped on her and broken her neck for her. Ah! there she comes, "he added, as the agitated bellowing of a doe sounded from further backin the woods. The two cries answered each other at intervals for acouple of minutes, rapidly nearing. And then they were silent. 

The Child heaved a sigh of relief. 

"I'm so glad he found his mother again!" he murmured. "It must beterrible to be lost in the woods--to be _quite_ alone, and not know, when you cried, whether it would be your mother or a bear that wouldcome running to you from under the black trees!"

"I agree with you, " said Uncle Andy, with unwonted heartiness. It wasnot too often that he was able to agree completely with the Child'ssuggestions in regard to the affairs of the wild. "Yes, indeed, " headded reminiscently; "I tried it myself once, when I was about yourage, away down in the Lower Ottanoonsis Valley, when the countrythereabouts was not settled like it is now. And I didn't like it atall, let me tell you. "

"What came ?" demanded the Child breathlessly. "Was it your mother, ora bear?"

"Neither!" responded Uncle Andy. "It was Old Tom Saunders, Bill'suncle--only he wasn't old, or Bill's uncle, at that time, as you mayimagine if you think about it. "

"Oh!" said the Child, a little disappointed. He had rather hoped itwas the bear, since he felt assured of his uncle's ultimate safety. 

"And I knew a little Jersey calf once, " continued Uncle Andy, being nowfairly started in his reminiscences and unwilling to disappoint theChild's unfailing thirst for a story, "in the same woods, who thoughtshe was lost when she wasn't, and made just as much noise over it as ifshe had been. That, you see, was what made all the trouble. She was agood deal of a fool at that time--which was not altogether to bewondered at, seeing that she was only one day old; and when her motherleft her sleeping under a bush for a few minutes, while she went downthrough the swamp to get a drink at the brook a couple of hundred feetaway, the little fool woke up and thought herself deserted. She set upsuch a bleating as was bound to cause something to happen in that wildneighborhood. "

"Yes!" said the Child, almost in a whisper. "And which came _this_time--her mother or the bear?"

"Both!" replied Uncle Andy, most unexpectedly. 

"Oh!" gasped the Child, opening his mouth till it was as round as hiseyes. And for once he had not a single question ready. 

"You see, it was this way, " went on Uncle Andy, prudently giving him notime to think one up. "When the bear heard that noise he knew verywell that the calf was all alone. And, being hungry, he lost no timein coming to seize the opportunity. What he didn't know was that themother was so near. Naturally, he would never think the calf wouldmake such a fuss if the mother were only down by the brook getting adrink. So he came along through the bushes at a run, taking noprecautions whatever. And the mother came up from the brook at a run. And they met in a little open spot, about fifty feet from where thefoolish calf stood, bawling under her bush. She stopped bawling andstood staring when she saw the bear and her mother meet. 

"The bear was a big one, very hungry, and savage at the slightest hintthat his meal, right there in sight, was going to be interfered with. The mother was a little fawn-colored Jersey cow, with short, sharphorns pointing straight forward, and game to the last inch of her trimmake-up. Her fury, at sight of that black hulk approaching her foolishyoung one, was nothing short of a madness. But it was not a blindmadness. She knew what she was doing, and was not going to let ragelose her a single point in the game of life and death. 

"In spite of her disadvantage in being down the slope and so having tocharge straight uphill, she hurled herself at the enemy with a ferocitythat rather took him aback. He wheeled, settled upon his haunches, andlifted a massive forepaw, to meet the attack of a blow that shouldsettle the affair at once. But the little cow was not to be caught so. Almost as the bear delivered his lunging stroke she checked herself, jumped aside with a nimbleness that no bull could have begun to match, and sank both horns deep into her great antagonist's flank. Before shecould spring back again beyond his reach, however, with a harsh groanhe swung about, and with the readiness of an accomplished boxer broughtdown his other forepaw across her neck, smashing the spine. Without asound the gallant little cow crumpled up and fell in a heap against thebear's haunches. 

"Throwing her off violently, he struck her again and again, as if in apanic. Then, realizing that she was quite dead, he drew away, bitfiercely at the terrible wound in his flank, and dragged himself away, whimpering. For the time, at least, his appetite was quite gone. 

"Uncomprehending, but very anxious, the calf had watched the swiftduel. The finish of it dismayed her, but, of course, she did not knowwhy. She could only feel that, in spite of the disappearance of thebear, it was not altogether satisfactory. She had trembledinstinctively at sight of the bear. And now, curiously enough, shetrembled at the sight of her mother, lying there in a heap, so still. "

Uncle Andy's way of putting it was somehow so vivid that the Childtrembled too at that. 

"After a while, " continued Uncle Andy, "when she saw that her mothermade no sign of rising and coming to her, she came staggering down fromher place under the bush, her long, awkward legs very difficult tomanage. Reaching her mother's side, she poked her coaxingly with herwet little muzzle. Meeting no response, she poked her impatiently, andeven butted her. When even this brought no response, a suddenoverwhelming terror chilled her heart, and her weak knees almost gaveway. She had an impulse to run from this thing that looked like hermother and smelled like her mother, and yet was evidently, after all, not her mother. She was afraid to stay there. But she was also afraidto go away. And then she just began to bawl again at the top of hervoice, for she was not only frightened and lonely, but also hungry. 

"Of course, everything in the woods for half a mile around heard herbawling. "

And just here Uncle Andy had the heartlessness to pause and relight hispipe. 

"And then--another bear came!" broke in the Child breathlessly. 

"No, not exactly, " responded Uncle Andy at last. "Of course, lots ofthings came to see what all that queer noise was about--stealthythings, creeping up silently and peering with round bright eyes fromthickets and weed tufts. But the calf did not see or notice any ofthese. All she saw was a tall, dark, ungainly looking, long-leggedcreature, half as tall again as her mother had been, with no horns, along clumsy head, thick overhanging nose, and big splay hooves. Shedidn't quite know whether to be frightened at this great, dark form ornot. But she stopped her noise, I can tell you. 

"Well, the tall stranger stood still, about thirty or forty paces away, eyeing the calf with interest and the fawn-colored heap on the groundwith suspicion. Then, all at once, the calf forgot her fears. She wasso lonely, you know, and the stranger did not look at all like a bear. So, with a little appealing _Bah_, she ran forward clumsily, straightup to the tall stranger's side, paused a moment at the alien smell, andthen, with a cool impudence only possible at the age of twenty-fivehours, began to help herself to a dinner of fresh milk. The tallstranger turned her great dark head far around, sniffed doubtfully fora few seconds, and fell to licking the presumptuous one's backassiduously. "

"I know, " said the Child proudly. "It was a moose. "

"I'd have been ashamed of you, " said Uncle Andy, "if you hadn't knownthat at once from my description. Of course, it was a cow moose. Butwhere the calf's great piece of luck came in was in the fact that themoose had lost her calf, just the day before, through its falling intothe river and being swept away by the rapids. Her heart, heavy withgrief and loneliness, her udder aching with the pressure of its milk, she had been drawn up to see what manner of baby it was that dared tocry its misery so openly here in the dangerous forest. 

"And when the calf adopted her so confidently, after a briefshyness--the shyness of all wild things toward the creatures who havecome under man's care--she returned the compliment of adopting the calf. 

"After a little, when the calf had satisfied its appetite, she led itaway through the trees. It followed readily enough for a while--forperhaps half a mile. Then it got tired, and stopped with its legssprawled apart, and bawled after her appealingly. At first she seemedsurprised at its tiring so soon. But with a resigned air she stopped. The calf at once lay down and resolutely went to sleep. Its wildmother, puzzled but patient, stood over it protectingly, licking itssilky coat (so much softer than her own little one's had been), andsmelling it all over as if unable to get used to the peculiar scent. When it woke up she led it on again, this time for perhaps a good milebefore it began to protest against such incomprehensible activity. Andso, by easy stages and with many stops, she led the little alien on, deep into her secret woods, and brought it, about sunset, to the shoreof a tiny secluded lake. 

"That same evening the farmer, looking for his strayed cow, came uponthe dead body on the slope above the stream. He saw the marks of thefight and the tracks of the bear, and understood the story in part. But he took it for granted that the bear, after killing the mother, hadcompleted the job by carrying off the calf. The tracks of the moose hepaid no attention to, never dreaming that they concerned him in theleast. But the bear he followed, vowing vengeance, till he lost thetrail in the gathering dusk, and had to turn home in a rage, consolinghimself with plans for bear traps. 

"In her home by the lake, caressed and tenderly cared for by her tallnew mother, the calf quickly forgot her real mother's fate. She forgotabout the whole affair except for one thing. She remembered to beterribly afraid of bears--and that fear is indeed the beginning ofwisdom, as far as all the children of the wild are concerned. Shewould start and tremble at sight of any particularly dense and bulkyshadow, and to come unexpectedly upon a big black stump was for someweeks a painful experience. But the second step in wisdom--the valueof silence--she was very slow to learn. If her new mother got out ofher sight for half a minute she would begin bawling after her in a waythat must have been a great trial to the nerves of a reticent, noiseless moose cow. The latter, moreover, could never get over theidea that to cause all that noise some dreadful danger must bethreatening. She would come charging back on the run, her mane stiffon her back and her eyes glaring, and she would hunt every thicket inthe neighborhood before she could feel quite reassured. Meanwhile, thecalf would look with wonder in her big, velvet-soft eyes, with probablyno slightest notion in her silly head as to what was making her newmother so excited. "

"How inconvenient that they couldn't talk, " exclaimed the Child, whohad great faith in the virtue of explanations. 

Uncle Andy rubbed his chin thoughtfully. 

"I suppose, " he said, after a pause, "that the wild creatures _do_ talkamong themselves, more or less and after a fashion. But, you see, suchsimple speech as the calf possessed was only what she had inherited, and that, of course, was cow language and naturally unintelligible to amoose. However, babies learn easily, and it was not long before sheand her new mother understood each other pretty well on most points ofimportance. 

"There were wildcats and foxes and a pair of big, tuft-eared, wild-eyedlynxes living about the lake, and these all came creeping up one afteranother, under the cover of the thickets, to stare in amazement at thealien little one so tenderly mothered by the great cow moose. They hadseen calves, on the farms of the settlement, and they regarded this onenot only with the greed of the hungry prowler, but with a particularlycruel hostility as one of the retainers of feared and hated Man. Butfor all their anger they took care not to thrust themselves upon theattention of the moose. They appreciated too well the fury of hermother wrath, the swiftness and deadliness of the stroke of herknife-edged forehooves. They were not going to let their curiosityobscure their discretion, you may be sure, like some of the childishdeer and antelope often do. "

"Why?" interrupted the Child eagerly, being all at once consuminglyanxious to know what the deer and antelope were curious about. ButUncle Andy paid no attention whatever. 

"Then, one morning, " he continued, "two other moose cows came along upthe lake shore, followed by their long-legged, shambling youngsters. They stopped to discuss the condition of lily roots with their tallsister; but at the sight of her nursing and petting and mothering a_calf_--a baby of the cattle tribe whom they despised and hated for itssubservience to man and for living tamely behind fences, they becamequite disagreeable. They sniffed loudly and superciliously. The calf, however, looking very small and neat and bright in her clean coat offawn color beside the gaunt, awkward moose babies, was not in the leastafraid of the disagreeable strangers. She pranced up boldly toinvestigate them. 

"They wouldn't be investigated by the saucy little alien, and in amoment of folly one of them struck at her. The foster mother had beenwatching their attitude with jealous eyes and rising wrath, and now herwrath exploded. With a hoarse bleat she sprang upon the offender andsent her sprawling down the bank clean into the water. Then she turnedupon the other. But this one, with quick discretion, was alreadytrotting off hastily, followed by the two awkward youngsters. Thetriumphant foster mother turned to the calf and anxiously smelled itall over to make sure it had not been hurt. And the rash cow in thewater, boiling with wrath, but afraid to risk a second encounter, picked herself up from among the lily pads and shambled off after herretreating party. 

"As the summer deepened, however, the calf began to feel and act morelike a moose calf--to go silently and even to absorb some of her fostermother's smell. The other moose began to get used to her, even quiteto tolerate her; and, the wild creatures generally ceased to regard heras anything but a very unusual kind of moose. Of course, she _thought_she _was_ a moose. She grew strong, sleek and nimble-footed on herfoster mother's abundant milk, and presently learned to browse on thetender leaves and twigs of the fresh green shrubbery. She soon, however, found that the short, sweet grasses of the forest glades weremuch more to her taste than any leaves or stringy twigs. But the lilyroots which her foster mother taught her to pull from the muddy lakebottom, as they wallowed luxuriously side by side in the cool water, defying flies and heat, suited her admirably. The great black moosebulls--hornless at this season and fat and amiable as sheep--regardedher with a reserved curiosity; and the moose calves, the strangeness ofher form and color once worn off, treated her with great respect. Though she was so much smaller and lighter than they, her quickness onher feet and her extremely handy way of butting made her easily masterof them all. Even the supercilious young cow who had been sodisagreeable to her at first grew indifferently friendly, and all waspeace around the secluded little lake. 

"Late one afternoon, however, when the shadows were getting long andblack across the forest glades, the peace was momentarily broken. Thecalf was pasturing in one of the glades, while her foster mother waswallowing and splashing down among the lilies. A bear creeping upthrough the thickets so noiselessly that not even a sharp-eyedchick-a-dee or a vigilant red squirrel took alarm, peered out betweenthe branches and saw the calf. 

"As luck would have it, it was the same old bear! He had recoveredfrom his wound, but naturally he had not forgotten the terrible hornsof the little fawn-colored Jersey cow. When he saw the fawn-coloredcalf he flew into a rage, and hurled himself forth at her to avenge inone stroke the bitter and humiliating memory. 

"But the calf was too quick for him. At the first crackling of thebranches behind her she had jumped away like a deer. From the cornerof her eye she saw the great black shape rushing upon her, and, with awild cry, half the bawl of a calf, half the bleat of a young moose, shewent racing, tail in air, down to the water, with the bear at her heels. 

"With a terrific splashing the cow moose hurried to the rescue. Shewas a very big moose and she was in a very big rage; and veryformidable she looked as she came plowing her way to shore, sending upthe water in fountains before her. He knew well that a full-grown cowmoose was an awkward antagonist to tackle when she was in earnest. This one seemed to him to be very much in earnest. He hesitated andstopped his rush when about halfway down the bank. Caution began tocool his vengeful humor. After all, it seemed there was really no luckfor him in a fawn-colored calf. He'd try a red one or ablack-and-white one next time. As he came to this conclusion, theindignant moose came to shore. Whereupon, he wheeled with a grunt andmade off, just a little faster, perhaps, than was _quite_ consistentwith his dignity, into the darkness of the fir thickets. The moose, with the coarse hair standing up stiffly along her neck, shook herselfand stood glaring after him. 

"Through the summer and autumn the calf found it altogether delightfulbeing a moose. As the cold began to bite her hair began to thicken upa protection against it; but, nevertheless, with her thin, delicateskin she felt it painfully. After the first heavy snowfall she had alot of trouble to get food, having to paw down through the snow forevery mouthful of withered grass. When the snow got to be three orfour feet deep, and her foster mother, along with a wide-antlered bull, three other cows, and a couple of youngsters had trodden out a 'mooseyard' with its maze of winding alleys, her plight grew sore. All alongthe bottom edges of these alleys she nibbled the dead grass and dryherbage, and she tried to browse, like her companions, on the twigs ofpoplar and birch. But the insufficient, unnatural food and the sharpcold hit her hard. She would huddle up beneath her mother's belly orcrowd down among the rest of the herd for warmth, but long beforeChristmas she had become a mere bag of bones. "

The Child shivered sympathetically. But, remembering the SnowhouseBaby, he could not help inquiring:

"Why didn't she make herself a house in the snow?"

"Didn't know enough!" answered Uncle Andy shortly. "Did you ever hearof any of the cow kind having sense enough for that? Well, it's apretty sure thing, you may take it, that she would never have pulledthrough the winter if something unexpected hadn't happened to changeher luck. 

"It was the farmer--the one who had owned her mother, and who, ofcourse, really owned her, too. 

"With his hired man and a team of two powerful backwoods horses and abig sled for axes and food, he had come back into the woods to cut theheavy spruce timber which grew around the lake. A half-mile back fromthe lake, on the opposite shore, he had his snug log camp and his warmlittle barn full of hay. He and his man had everything they needed fortheir comfort except fresh meat. And when they came upon the windingpaths of the 'moose yard' they knew they were not going to lack meatfor long. 

"On the following day, on snowshoes, the two men explored the 'yard, 'tramping along beside the deep-trodden trails. Soon they came upon theherd, and marked the lofty antlers of the bull towering over a bunch oflow fir bushes. The farmer raised his heavy rifle. It was an easyshot. He fired, and the antlered head went down. 

"At the sound of the shot and the fall of their trusted leader, theherd scattered in panic, breasting down the walls of their paths andfloundering off through the deep snow. The two men stared after themwith interest, but made no motion for another shot, for it was againstthe New Brunswick law to kill a cow moose, and if the farmer hadindulged himself in such a luxury it would have cost him a hundredpounds by way of a fine. 

"Among the fleeing herd appeared a little fawn-colored beast, utterlyunlike any moose calf that the farmer or his man had ever heard of. Itwas tremendously nimble at first, bouncing along at such a rate that itwas impossible to get a really good look at it. But its legs were muchtoo short for such a depth of snow, and before it had gone fifty yardsit was quite used up. It stopped, floundered on another couple ofyards, and then lay down quite helplessly. The two men hurried up. Itturned upon them a pair of large, melting, velvet eyes--frightened, indeed, but not with that hopeless, desperate terror that comes to theeyes of the wild creatures when they are trapped. 

"'Well, I'll be jiggered if that ain't old Blossom's calf that we madesure the bear had carried off!' cried the farmer, striding up andgently patting the calf's ribs. 'My, but you're poor!' he went on. 'They hain't used yer right out here in the woods, have they? I reckonye'll be a sight happier back home in the old barn. '"

Uncle Andy knocked the ashes out of his pipe and stuck it back in hispocket. 

"That's all!" said he, seeing that the Child still looked expectant. 

"But, " protested the Child, "I want to know--"

"Now, you know very well all the rest, " said Uncle Andy. "What's theuse of my telling you how the calf was taken back to the settlement, and got fat, and grew up to give rich milk like cream, as every goodJersey should? You can think all that out for yourself, you know. "

"But the moose cow, " persisted the Child. "Didn't she feel _dreadful_?"

"Well, " agreed Uncle Andy, "perhaps she did. But don't you go worryingabout that. She got over it. The next spring she had another calf, areal moose calf, to look after, you know. "

CHAPTER X

WHAT HE SAW WHEN HE KEPT STILL

The Child was beginning to feel that if he could not move very soonhe'd burst. 

Of course, under Uncle Andy's precise instructions he had settledhimself in the most comfortable position possible before starting uponthe tremendous undertaking of keeping perfectly still for a long time. To hold oneself perfectly still and to keep the position as tirelesslyas the most patient of the wild creatures themselves--this, he had beentaught by Uncle Andy, was one of the first essentials to theacquirement of true woodcraft, as only such stillness and such patiencecould admit one to anything like a real view of the secrets of thewild. Even the least shy of the wilderness folk are averse to goingabout their private and personal affairs under the eyes of strangers, and what the Child aspired to was the knowledge of how to catch themoff their guard. He would learn to see for himself how the rabbits andthe partridges, the woodchucks and the weasels, the red deer, theporcupines, and all the other furtive folk who had their habitationsaround the tranquil shores of Silverwater, were really accustomed tobehave themselves when they felt quite sure no one was looking. 

Before consenting to the Child's initiation, Uncle Andy had impressedupon him with the greatest care the enormity of breaking the spell ofstillness by even the slightest and most innocent-seeming movement. 

"You see, " had said Uncle Andy, "it's this way! When we get to theplace where we are going to hide and watch, you may think that we'requite alone. But not so. From almost every bush, from surely everythicket, there'll be at least one pair of bright eyes staring atus--maybe several pairs. They'll be wondering what we've come for;they'll be disliking us for being so clumsy and making such a racket, and they'll be keeping just as still as so many stones in the hope thatwe won't see them--except, of course, certain of the birds, which flyin the open and are used to being seen, and don't care a hang for usbecause they think us such poor creatures in not being able to fly--"

At this point the Child had interrupted:

"Wouldn't they be surprised, " he murmured, "if we did?"

"I expect they've got some surprises coming to them that way one ofthese days!" agreed Uncle Andy. "But, as I was saying, we'll be wellwatched ourselves for a while. But it's a curious thing about the wildcreatures, or at least about a great many of them, that for all theirkeenness their eyes don't seem to _distinguish_ things as sharply as wedo. The very slightest movement they detect, sometimes at anastonishing distance. But when a person is perfectly motionless for along time, they seem to confuse him with the stumps and stones andbushes in a most amazing fashion. Perhaps it is that the eyes of someof them have not as high a power of differentiation as ours. Perhapsit is that when a fellow is a long time still they think he's dead. We'll have to let the scientists work that out for us. But if you goon the way you're beginning (and I'm bound to say you're doing verywell indeed, considering that you're not _very_ big), you'll often haveoccasion to observe that some of the wild creatures, otherwise nofools, are more afraid of a bit of colored rag fluttering in the windthan of an able-bodied man who sits staring right at them, if only hedoesn't stir a finger. But only let him wiggle that finger, his verylittlest one, and off they'll be. "

The Child put his hand behind his back and wiggled his little fingergently, smiling to think what sharp eyes it would take to see _that_motion. But his Uncle, as if divining his thoughts, went on to say:

"It's not as if those sly, shy watchers were all in front of you, youknow. The suspicious eyes will be all around you. Perhaps it may be atiny wood-mouse peering from under a root two or three steps behindyou. You have been perfectly still, say, for ten minutes, and themouse is just beginning to think that you may be something quiteharmless. She rubs her whiskers, and is just about to come out when, as likely as not, you move your fingers a little, behind yourback"--here the Child blushed guiltily, and thrust both his grimylittle fists well to the front--"feeling quite safe because you don'tsee the movement yourself. 

"Well, the mouse sees it. She realizes at once that you aren't dead, after all--in fact, that you're a dangerous deceiver. She wisksindignantly back into her hole. Somebody else sees her alarm, andfollows her example, and in two seconds it's gone all about the placethat you're not a stump or a stone or a harmless dead thing waiting tobe nibbled at, but a terrible enemy lying in wait for them all. So yousee how important it is to keep still, with the real stillness of deadthings. "

The Child winked his eyes rapidly. "But I can't keep from _winking_, Uncle Andy, " he protested. "I'll promise not to wiggle my fingers orwrinkle my nose. But if I don't wink my eyes sometimes they'll beginto smart and get full of tears, and then I won't be able to seeanything--and then all the keeping still will be just wasted. "

"Of course, you won't be able to keep from winking, " agreed Uncle Andy. "And, of course, you won't be able to keep from _breathing_. But youmustn't make a noise about either process. "

"How can I make a noise winking?" demanded the Child in a voice ofeager surprise. If such a thing were possible he wanted to learn howat once. 

"Oh, nonsense!" returned Uncle Andy. "Now, listen to me! We're nearlythere, and I don't want to have to do any more talking, because thequieter we are now the sooner the wild folk will get over their firstsuspiciousness. Now, after we once get fixed, you won't move a muscle, not even if two or three mosquitoes alight on you at once and begin tohelp themselves?"

"No!" agreed the Child confidently. He was accustomed to lettingmosquitoes bite him, just for the fun of seeing their gray, scrawnybodies swell up and redden till they looked like rubies. 

"Well, we'll hope there won't be any mosquitoes!" said Uncle Andyreassuringly. "And if a yellow-jacket lights on your sock and startsto crawl up under the leg of your knickers, you won't stir?"

"N-no!" agreed the Child, with somewhat less confidence. He had hadsuch an experience before, and remembered it with a pang. Then heremembered that he had enough string in his pockets to tie up both legsso securely that not the most enterprising of wasps could get under. His confidence returned. "No, Uncle Andy!" he repeated, with earnestresolution. 

"Umph! We'll see, " grunted Uncle Andy doubtfully, not guessing whatthe Child had in mind. But when he saw him, with serious face, fishtwo bits of string from the miscellaneous museum of his pocket andproceed to frustrate the problematical yellow-jacket he grinnedappreciatively. 

The place for the watching had been well chosen by Uncle Andy--a biglog to lean their backs against, a cushion of deep, dry moss to situpon, and a tiny, leafy sapling of silver poplar twinkling itslight-hung leaves just before their faces, to screen them a littlewithout interfering with their view. Their legs, to be sure, stuck outbeyond the screen of the poplar sapling, in plain sight of every forestwayfarer. But legs were of little consequence so long as they were notallowed to kick. 

For just about a minute the Child found it easy to keep still. In thesecond minute his nose itched, and he began to wonder how long they hadbeen there. In the third minute he realized that there was a hardlittle stick in the moss that he was sitting on. In the fourth minuteit became a big stick, and terribly sharp, so that he began to wonderif it would pierce right through him and make him a cripple for life. He feared that perhaps Uncle Andy had never thought of a danger likethis, and he felt that he ought to call attention to it. But before hehad quite made up his mind to such a desperate measure the fifth minutecame--and with it the yellow-and-black wasp, which made the Childforget all about the stick in the moss. The wasp alighted on the red, mosquito-bitten, naked skin above the top of the Child's sock, andthen, sure enough, started to go exploring up under the leg of hisknickers. The Child felt nervous for a moment--and then triumphant. He just saved himself from laughing out loud at the thought of how hehad fooled the inquisitive insect. 

And so passed the fifth and sixth minutes. The seventh and eighth wereabsorbed in bitter doubts of Uncle Andy. The Child felt quite surethat he had been quite still for at least an hour. If nothinginteresting had happened in all that time, then nothing interesting wasgoing to happen, nothing interesting could happen. An awful distrustassailed him. Was it possible that Uncle Andy had merely adopted thisbase means of teaching him to keep still? Was it possible that evennow Uncle Andy (whose face was turned the other way) was eitherlaughing deeply in his sleeve or sleeping the undeservedly peacefulsleep of the successful deceiver?

To do the Child justice, he felt ashamed of such doubts as soon as hehad fairly confronted himself with them. Then, in the ninth minute, both legs began to fill up with pins and needles. This occupied hisattention. It was an axiom with him that under such painful conditionsone should at once get up and move around. Placed thus between twodirectly conflicting duties, his conscience was torn. Then heremembered his promise. His grit was good, and he determined to keephis promise at all costs, no matter at what fatal consequence to hislegs. And he derived considerable comfort from the thought that, ifhis leg should never be any use any more, his Uncle Andy would at leastbe stricken with remorse. 

Then, as the tenth minute dragged its enormous, trailing length along, came that terrible feeling already alluded to--that he must either moveor burst. With poignant self-pity he argued the two desperatealternatives within his soul. But, fortunately for him, before he felthimself obliged to come to any final decision, something happened, andhis pain and doubts were forgotten. 

Two big yellow-gray snowshoe rabbits came hopping lazily past, one justahead of the other. One jumped clean over Uncle Andy's out-stretchedfeet, as if they were of no account or interest whatever to a rabbit. The other stopped and thumped vigorously on the ground with his stronghind foot. At this signal the first one also stopped. They both satup on their haunches, ears thrust forward in intense interrogation, andgazed at the two moveless figures behind the poplar sapling. 

The one immediately in front of him absorbed all the Child's attention. Its great, bulging eyes surveyed him from head to foot, at first withsome alarm, then with half-contemptuous curiosity. Its immensely longears see-sawed meditatively, and its queer three-cornered mouthtwinkled incessantly as if it were talking to itself. At last, apparently having decided that the Child was nothing worth takingfurther notice of, it dropped on all fours, nibbled at a leaf, discarded it, and hopped off to find more tasty provender. Itscompanion, having "sized up" Uncle Andy in the same way, presentlyfollowed. But being of the more suspicious disposition, it stoppedfrom time to time to glance back and assure itself that the strange, motionless things behind the poplar sapling were not attempting tofollow it. 

The Child was immensely interested. He thought of a lot of questionsto ask as soon as he should be allowed to speak, and he resolved toremember every one of them. But just as he was getting them arranged asmall, low, long-bodied, snaky-slim, yellowish beast came gliding byand drove them all clean out of his head. It was a weasel. It almostbumped into the Child's feet before it noticed them. Then it jumpedback, showing its keen teeth in a soundless snarl of its narrow, pointed muzzle, and surveyed the Child with the cruellest little eyesthat he had ever even imagined. The savage eyes stared him full in theface, a red light like a deep-buried spark coming into them, till hethought the creature was going to spring at his throat. Then graduallythe spark died out, as the little furry reassured itself. Thetriangular face turned aside. The working, restless nose sniffedsharply, catching the fresh scent of the two rabbits, and in the nextinstant the creature was off, in long, noiseless bounds, upon the hottrail. The Child knew enough of woodcraft to realize at once themeaning of its sudden departure, and he murmured sympathetically in hisheart, "Oh, I do hope he won't catch them!"

All thoughts of the weasel and the rabbits, however, were speedilydriven from his mind, for at this moment he noticed a fat, yellowishgrub, with a chestnut-colored head, crawling up his sleeve. He hatedgrubs, and wondered anxiously if it had any unpleasant design ofcrawling down his neck. He squirmed inwardly at the idea. But just ashe was coming to the conclusion that _that_ was something he'd _never_be able to stand, a most unexpected ally came to his rescue. With ablow that _almost_ made him jump out of his jacket, something lit onthe fat grub. It was a big black hornet, with white bands across itsshining body. She gave the grub a tiny prick with the tip of herenvenomed sting, which caused it to roll up into a tight ball and liestill. Then straddling it, and holding it in place with her front pairof legs, she cut into it with her powerful mandibles and began to suckits juices. The Child's nose wrinkled in spite of himself at sight ofthis unalluring banquet, but he stared with all eyes. There wassomething terrifying to him in the swiftness and efficiency of thegreat hornet. Presently the grub, not having received quite a bigenough dose of its captor's anaesthetic, came to under the devouringjaws and began to lash out convulsively. Another touch of the medicinein the hornet's tail, however, promptly put a stop to that, and oncemore it tightened up into an unresisting ball. Then straddling itagain firmly, and handling it cleverly with its front legs as a raccoonmight handle a big apple, she bit into it here and there, suckingeagerly with a quick, pumping motion of her body. The fat ball gotsmaller and smaller, till soon it was very little bigger than anordinary sweet pea. The hornet turned it over and over impatiently, tosee if anything more was to be got out of it; then she spurned itaside, and bounced into the air with a deep hum. She had certainlybeen very amusing, but the Child drew a breath of relief when she wasgone. He had caught the copper-red flicker of her sting, as it barelytouched the victim, and it seemed to him like a jet of live flame. 

When the hornet was gone the Child began once more to remember thatlittle stick in the soft moss beneath him. How had he ever forgottenit? He decided that he must have been sitting on it for hours andhours. But just as it was beginning fairly to burn its way into hisflesh, a queer little rushing sound close at his side brought his heartinto his throat. It was such a vicious, menacing little sound. Glancing down, he saw that a tiny wood-mouse had darted upon a bigbrown-winged butterfly and captured it. The big wings flappedpathetically for a few seconds; but the mouse bit them off, to saveherself the bother of lagging useless material home to her burrow. Shewas so near that the Child could have touched her by reaching out hishand. But she took no more notice of him than if he had been a rottenstump. Less, in fact, for she might have tried to gnaw into him if hehad been a rotten stump, in the hope of finding some wood-grubs. 

The mouse dragged away the velvety body of the butterfly to her holeunder the roots. She was no more than just in time, for no sooner wasshe out of sight than along came a fierce-eyed little shrew-mouse, themost audacious and pugnacious of the mouse tribe, who would undoubtedlyhave robbed her of her prey, and perhaps made a meal of her at the sametime. He nosed at the wings of the butterfly, nibbled at them, decidedthey were no good, and then came ambling over to the Child's feet. Shoe-leather! That was something quite new to him. He nibbled at it, didn't seem to think much of it, crept along up to the top of the shoe, sniffed at the sock, and came at last plump upon the Child's bare leg. "Was he going to try a nibble at that, too?" wondered the Childanxiously, his blue eyes getting very big and round. But no. Thislive, human flesh--_unmistakably_ alive--and the startling Man smell ofit, were too much for the nerves of his shrewship. With a squeak ofindignation and alarm he sprang backward and scurried off among theweed-stalks. 

"_There_, now!" thought the Child, in intense vexation. "He's gone andgiven the alarm!" But, as good luck would have it, he had done nothingof the kind. For a red fox, trotting past just then at a distance ofnot more than ten or a dozen feet, served to all observers as a morethan ample explanation of the shrew's abrupt departure. The fox turnedhis head at the sound of the scurry and squeak, and very naturallyattributed it to his own appearance on the scene. But at the same timehe caught sight of those two motionless human shapes sitting rigidbehind the poplar sapling. They were so near that his nerves receiveda shock. He jumped about ten feet; and then, recovering himself withimmense self-possession, he sat up on his haunches to investigate. Ofcourse, he was quite familiar with human beings and their ways, and heknew that they never kept still in that unnatural fashion unless theywere either asleep or dead. After a searching scrutiny--head sagely toone side and mouth engagingly half open--he decided that they might beeither dead or asleep, whichever they chose, for all he cared. He roseto his feet and trotted off with great deliberation, leaving on thestill air a faint, half-musky odor which the Child's nostrils were keenenough to detect. As he went a bluejay which had been sitting on thetop of a near-by tree caught sight of him, darted down, and flew alongafter him, uttering harsh screeches of warning to the rest of the smallfolk of the wilderness. It is not pleasant even in the wilderness tohave "Stop thief! Stop thief! Thief! Thief! Thief!" screeched afteryou by a bluejay. And the fox glanced up at the noisy bird as if hewould have been ready to give two fat geese and a whole litter ofrabbits for the pleasure of crunching her impudent neck. 

All this while there had been other birds in view besides thebluejay--chick-a-dees and nut-hatches hunting their tiny prey among thedark branches of the fir-trees, Canada sparrows fluting their clearcall from the tree tops, flycatchers darting and tumbling in theirzig-zag, erratic flights, and sometimes a big golden-wing woodpeckerrunning up and down a tall, dead trunk which stood close by, and_rat-tat-tat-tatting_ in a most businesslike and determined manner. But the Child was not, as a rule, so interested in birds as in thefour-footed kindreds. Just now, however, a bird came on the scenewhich interested him extremely. It was a birch-partridge (or ruffledgrouse) hen, accompanied by a big brood of her tiny, nimble chicks. They looked no bigger than chestnuts as they swarmed about her, crowding to snatch the dainties which she kept turning up for them. The Child watched them with fascinated eyes, not understanding howthings so tiny and so frail as these chicks could be so amazingly quickand strong in their movements. Suddenly, at a little distance throughthe bushes, he caught sight of the red fox coming back, with an air ofhaving forgotten something. The Child longed to warn the littlepartridge mother, but, realizing that he must not, he waited withthumping heart for a tragedy to be enacted before him. 

He had no need to worry, however. The little mother saw the fox beforehe caught sight of her. The Child saw her stiffen herself suddenly, with a low _chit_ of warning which sounded as if it might have comefrom anywhere. On the instant every chick had vanished. The Childrealized that it was impossible for even such active creatures as theywere to have run away so quickly as all that. So he knew that they hadjust made themselves invisible by squatting absolutely motionless amongthe twigs and moss which they so exactly resembled in coloring. 

The fox, meanwhile, had been gazing around in every direction but theright one, to try and see where that partridge cry had come from. Heliked partridge, and it was some time since he had had any. All atonce he was surprised and pleased to see a hen partridge, apparentlybadly wounded, drop fluttering on the moss almost under his nose. Hesprang forward to seize her, but she managed to flutter feebly out ofhis reach. It was obviously her last effort, and he was not in theleast discouraged. She proved, however, to have many such lastefforts, and the last the Child saw of the fox he was still hopefullyjumping at her, as he disappeared from view among the underbrush. About three minutes later there was a hard whirr of wings, and thetriumphant little mother reappeared. She alighted on the very spotwhence she had first caught sight of the fox, stood for a momentstiffly erect, while she stared about her with keen, bright eyes, andthen she gave a soft little call. Instantly the chicks were all abouther, apparently springing up out of the ground as at the utterance of aspell. And proudly she led them away to another feeding ground. 

What more the Child might have seen had time been allowed him willnever be known, for now the session was interrupted. He was hoping fora porcupine to come by, or a deer, or a moose. He was half-hoping, half-fearing that it might be a bear, or a big Canadian lynx withdreadful eyes and tufted ears. But before any of these more formidablewonders arrived he heard a sound of rushing--of eager, desperateflight. Then a rabbit came into view--he felt sure it was one of thetwo who appeared at the beginning of his watch. The poor beast wasplainly in an ecstasy of terror, running violently, but as it wereaimlessly, and every now and then stopping short, all of a-tremble, asif despair were robbing it of its powers. It ran straight past thepoplar sapling, swerved off to the right, and disappeared; but theChild could hear the sound of its going and perceived that it wasmaking a circle. A couple of seconds later came the weasel, runningwith its nose in the air, as if catching the scent from the air ratherthan from the fugitive's tracks. 

The weasel did not seem to be in any hurry at all. It was the pictureof cool, deadly, implacable determination. And the Child hated itsavagely. Just opposite the poplar sapling it paused, seeming tolisten. Then it bounded into the bushes on a short circle, savingitself unnecessary effort, as if it had accurately estimated thetactics of its panic-stricken quarry. A few moments later the rabbitreappeared, running frantically. Just as it came once more before thepoplar sapling--not more than a couple of yards from the Child's feet, out from under a neighboring bush sprang the weasel, confronting itfairly. With a scream the rabbit stopped short and crouched in itstracks, quivering, to receive its doom. 

The weasel leaped straight at its victim's throat. But it neverarrived. For at that moment the Child gave vent to a shrill yell ofindignation and jumped at the slayer with hands, eyes and mouth wideopen. He made such a picture that Uncle Andy exploded. The astonishedweasel vanished. The rabbit, shocked back into its senses, vanishedalso, but in another direction. And the Child, pulling himselftogether, turned to his uncle with a very red face. 

"I'm sorry!" he said sheepishly. "I'm so sorry, Uncle Andy. But Ijust _couldn't_ help it. I didn't think. "

"Oh, well!" said Uncle Andy, getting up and stretching, and rubbing hisstiffened legs tenderly. "I can't say that I blame you I came mightynear doing the same thing myself when that fool of a rabbit squealed. "

CHAPTER XI

THE LITTLE VILLAGER AND HIS UNFRIENDLY GUESTS

Across the still surface of Silverwater, a-gleam in the amber andviolet dusk, came a deep booming call, hollow and melancholy andindescribably wild. _Tooh-hoo-oo-whooh-ooh-oo_, and again_whooh-ooh-ooh-oo_, it sounded; and though the evening was warm theChild gave a little shiver of delicious awe, as he always did when heheard the sunset summons of the great horned owl. 

"That's a bad fellow for you, the Big Horned Owl, " growled Uncle Andy. "He's worse than a weasel, and that's a hard thing to say about any ofthe wild folk. He's everybody's enemy, and always ready to kill muchmore than he can eat. "

"_Some_ owls aren't bad, " suggested the Child. He had a soft spot inhis heart for owls, because they were so downy, and had such roundfaces and such round eyes, and looked as if they thought of suchwonderful, mysterious things which they would never tell. 

"How do you know that?" demanded Uncle Andy suspiciously. "Mind, I'mnot saying off-hand that it isn't so, but I'd like to know where youget your information. "

"Bill told me, " said the Child, with more confidence in his tones thanhe usually accorded to this authority. 

"Oh, Bill!" sniffed Uncle Andy. "And haven't you got used to Billy'sfairy stories yet?"

There was an obstinate look in the Child's earnest blue eyes whichshowed that this time the imaginative guide had told him a tale whichhe was unwilling to discredit. 

"I know very well, Uncle Andy, " said he with a judicial air, "that Billloves to yarn, and often pretends to know a lot of things that aren'tso. But I think he's telling the truth this time. He said he was. It's a little owl that lives out West on the big sandy plains. And itmakes its nest in holes on the ground. It knows how to dig these holesitself, you know; but it can't dig them half, or a quarter, so well asthe prairie dogs can. So it gets the prairie dogs to let it live intheir big, comfortable burrows; and in return for this hospitality itkills and eats some of the rattlesnakes, the very small ones, Isuppose, of course, which come round among the burrows looking for theyoung prairie dogs. Well, you know, Uncle Andy, Bill has been out Westhimself, and he's seen the villages of the prairie dogs, and the littleowls sitting on the tops of the hillocks which are on the roofs of theprairie dogs' houses, and the rattlesnakes coiled up here and there inthe hot, sunny hollows. There were lots and lots of the prairie dogs, millions and millions of them, Bill said. "

"There'd have been still more if it hadn't been for the little owls, "said Uncle Andy with a grin. But seeing a grieved look on the Child'sface, and remembering that he himself was none too fond of having hisnarratives broken in upon, he hastened to add politely, but pointedly, "I beg your pardon for interrupting. Please go on!"

"Well, as I was going to say, " continued the Child, in quite hisUncle's manner, "Bill saw--he saw them himself, with his owneyes--these millions and thousands of prairie dogs, and quite a lot ofthe little owls, and only just a very few of the rattlesnakes. So, yousee, it looks as if the owls must have eaten some of the snakes, and, anyhow, I think Bill was telling the truth _this_ time. "

"Well, " said Uncle after puffing at his pipe for a few complimentarymoments of reflection, "there's one important thing which Bill appearsto have neglected. He doesn't seem to have inquired the views of theprairie dogs on the subject. Now, if he'd got _their_ opinion--"

"But how _could_ he?" protested the Child reproachfully. He was alwaystroubled when Uncle Andy displayed anything like a frivolous strain. 

"To be sure! To be sure! You _couldn't_ have expected that of Bill, "agreed Uncle Andy. "Still, you know, the opinion of the prairie dogswould have been interesting, wouldn't it? Well, I'll tell you a storyjust as soon as I can get this old pipe to draw properly, and then youcan judge the opinion of the prairie dogs as to whether the LittleBurrowing Owl is 'good' or not. If their opinion does not agree withBill's, why you can choose for yourself between the two. "

"Prairie Dog Village was of considerable size, covering as it didperhaps a dozen acres of the dry, light prairie soil. Its houses werecrowded together without any regard to order or arrangement, and soclosely as to suggest that their owners imagined land was scarce in theneighborhood. It wasn't. For hundreds of miles in every direction theplains stretched away to the dim horizon. There was room everywhere, nothing much, in fact, _but_ room, with a little coarse grass andplenty of clear air. But the population went in for crowding bypreference, and didn't care a cactus whether it was hygienic or not. 

"The houses were ail underground, each with a rounded hillock of earthbeside its front door; and the size of these hillocks was an indicationof the size of the houses beneath, for they were all formed by theearth brought to the surface in the process of excavating the rooms andpassages. On the tops of these hillocks the owners sat up in the sunto bark and chatter and gossip with their nearest neighbors, alwaysready to dive headlong down their front doors, with a twinkling oftheir hind feet, at the approach of danger, "But if the village was large, the Little Villager himself wasdecidedly small. Some twelve or fifteen inches in length from the tipof his innocent-looking nose to the end of his short and quiteundistinguished-looking tail, he seldom had occasion to stretch himselfout to his full length, and therefore he seldom got the credit of suchinches as he actually possessed. His ears were short and rounded, hiseyes were large, softly bright, and as innocent-looking as his nose. His body was plump and rounded, and he looked almost as much a babywhen quite grown up as he had looked when he was still a responsibilityto his talkative little mother. In color he was of a grayish-brown ontop, and of a dingy white underneath, with a black tip to his tail togive a finish which his costume would otherwise have lacked. 

"Except for unimportant variations in size, there was perhaps somehundreds of thousands of others, just like the Little Villager, sittingon their hillocks, or popping in and out of their round doorways, andchattering and barking in shrill chorus under the pale blue dome of alovely sky. But on the hillock next door to the Little Villager sat nogarrulous, furry gossip like himself. That mound top was deserted. But at its foot, curled up and basking in the still blaze of the sun, close beside the doorway, lay a thick-bodied, dusty-colored rattler, the intricate markings on his back dimmed as if by too much light andheat. His venomous, triangular head, with the heavy jaw base thatshowed great poison pockets, lay flat on his coils, and he had thelazy, well-fed appearance of one who does not have to forage for hismeals. Here and there, scattered at wide intervals throughout thevillage, were to be seen other rattlers, of all sizes, from foot-longyoungsters up to stout fellows over a yard in length, either basking inthe hollows or lazily wriggling their way between the hillocks. Theyseemed to pay no attention whatever to the furry villagers; for arattler likes to make a huge meal when he's about it, and thereforedoes not bother often about the, to him, rather laborious process ofdining. The villagers, on their part, also seemed to pay littleattention to the snakes; except that those who chanced to be foragingon the coarse herbage which grew between the hillocks always got out ofthe way with alacrity if a wriggling form approached, and not one ofthe coiled baskers ever woke up and shifted its position but that ahundred pairs of bright, innocent eyes would be fixed upon it until itsintentions became quite clear. 

"The Little Villager, who had just come out of his burrow, sat straightup on his hind-quarters, on the top of his hillock, with his forepawshanging meekly over his breast, and glared all about him to see if anydanger was in sight. The big rattler beside the door of the nexthillock underwent his careful scrutiny, which convinced him that thereptile had recently made a good meal, and would not be dangerous untilhe had slept it off. Then he glanced skyward. A great hawk waswinging its way up from the southern horizon, almost invisible in thestrong, direct glare, but the Little Villager's keen eyes detected it. He barked a warning, and the sharp signal went around from hillock tohillock; and in half a minute all the big, babyish eyes were fixed uponthe approach of the skying marauder. Everybody chattered about itshrilly till the hawk was straight over the village. Then suddenly thenoise was hushed. The great bird half folded its wings and swooped, the air making a hissing hum in its rigid pinion tips. The swoop waslightning swift, but even swifter was the disappearance of the LittleVillager, and of all his neighbors for fifty feet about him. Beforethe hawk reached earth they had dropped into their burrows. 

"Checking himself abruptly, the hawk flew on over the tops of thehillocks, making unexpected zigzag rushes to right and left. Butwherever he went, there the villagers had vanished, almost as if thewind of his approach had whisked them away. Baffled and indignant, heat last gave up the hope of a dinner of prairie dog, and dropped on asmall rattler which was too sluggish from overeating to have noticedthat there was any particular excitement in the village. Gripping thereptile in inexorable talons just behind its head, the great bird bitits backbone through, carried it to the nearest hillock, and proceededto tear it to pieces. Calmly he made his meal, glancing around witheyes glassy hard and fiercely arrogant, while from every burrow in theneighborhood round, innocent heads peered forth, barking insult anddefiance. They were willing enough that the rattler should bedestroyed, but they wished the hawk to understand that his continuedpresence in the villages was not desired. Of the two foes, theypreferred the rattler, to whose methods of administering fate they hadgrown so accustomed that they could regard them with something likephilosophy, especially where only a neighborhood was concerned. Butthe hawk's attack was so abrupt and violent as to be upsetting to thenerves of the whole village. 

"When the hawk had finished his meal and wiped his beak on the hardearth he flew off; and long before he was out of sight all the furryhouseholders were out on top of their hillocks and chattering at thetops of their voices about the affair. The Little Villager himself, having been first to give the alarm, was particularly excited andimportant. But even he managed to calm himself down after a while. And then, feeling hungry from excess of emotion, he descended from hishillock and fell to nibbling grass stems. 

"He had been but a few minutes at this engrossing occupation when fromthe door of a nearby burrow popped suddenly a small brown owl. Thebird appeared with a haste which seemed to ruffle its dignityconsiderably. It was followed at once by its mate. The two blinked inthe strong light, and turned to peer down the hole from which theyemerged, as if expecting to be followed. They were snapping theirstrong hooked beaks like castanets, and hissing indignantly. Butnothing more came out of the hole. They glared about them for severalminutes with their immense, round, fiercely bright eyes. Then, liftingthemselves like blown thistledown, with one waft of their broad, downywings they floated over to the door of the Little Villager's burrow. They looked at it. They looked at the Little Villager where he satholding a half-nibbled grass stem between his paws. They snapped theirbeaks once more, with angry decision, and with two or three awkward, scuttling steps, like a parrot walking on the floor of his cage, theyplunged down, quite uninvited, into the burrow. 

"The Little Villager sat just where he was for perhaps half a minute, barking with indignation. Then he followed the impertinent visitors. As he entered he heard a confused sound of shrill, angry chattering, explosive hissing, and savage snapping of beaks. Being able to seequite comfortably in the gloom, he distinguished his companion, thelady villager who was at that time occupying the burrow with him, doingher best to make the visitors understand that they were not welcome. Her language might have seemed clear enough. She made little rushes atthem with open mouth and gnashing teeth, and her tones were just asunpleasant as she knew how to make them. But the guests confronted herwith claws and beaks so ready and so formidable that she did not liketo come to close quarters. 

"Nor, indeed, when the Little Villager himself arrived was thesituation very much altered. One of the owls turned and faced him, whereupon he, too, lost his resolution and confined himself to threats. The two owls, for their part, seemed to consider it wise to stand onthe defensive rather than to force a battle to a finish with theirunwilling hosts. For some minutes, therefore, the war of threats andbad language went on, without fur or feathers actually flying. Then atlast the Little Villager, who was by nature an easy-going, unresentfulsoul, chanced to glance aside from his adversary; and it flashed intohis mind that, after all, there was some room to spare in the burrow. Anyhow, he was tired of the argument. He turned away indifferently andbegan to nibble at some tough grass stems which he had brought down incase of a rainy day. Seeing him thus yield the point at issue, hismate was not going to fight it out alone. She, too, turned her backwith ostentatious indifference upon her rude guests, and went out andsat on the top of the hillock to let her feelings calm down. The pairof owls, well satisfied to have forced themselves upon the LittleVillager's hospitality, huddled together in their own corner, andresumed the nap which had been so unpleasantly interrupted in theirprevious residence. "

"What was it that interrupted?" broke in the Child, glad that it wasnot he that could be accused of it, _that_ time. "What was it thatdrove them out of their own burrow in such a hurry?"

"It was a big rattlesnake, " answered Uncle Andy, quite politely, remembering that he himself had recently been guilty of aninterruption. "I ought to have explained that before, but I wasinterested in the Little Villager and forgot it. It was a bigrattlesnake which had got tired of its old hole and taken a fancy tothat of the owls. So the owls had had nothing to do but get out, without even a half-minute to talk over the matter. And hating to stayout in the full glare of the sun, which was very hard on their eyes, they had invited themselves to live with the Little Villager justbecause his house was the first they came to. 

"All the rest of the day the Little Villager and his companion wereextremely discontented. Their burrow was a very roomy and comfortableone, but it was spoiled for them by the presence of those twomoon-eyed, hook-beaked, solemn persons sitting side by side in theopposite corner. So they spent most of their time outside on thehillock, gossiping about it to their neighbors, who were extremelyinterested and full of suggestions, but showed no inclination whateverto come and help turn the intruders out. That was a thing which hadnever been attempted in their village, and the prairie dogs were notnoted for their initiative. In learning to get together and live invillages they had apparently exhausted it all. They were always readyto chatter, from morning to night, about anything, and protest againstit, and declare that it must not be permitted, but they always shirkedthe bother of united action, even to suppress the most dangerous anddestructive of nuisances. 

"When evening came, however, they had the house to themselves. Theowls, getting lively as the sunset colors faded from the sky, scuttledforth and sat up side by side on the top of the hillock. As soon as itwas full night, and the stars had come out clear and large in thedeeply crystalline sky, they began hovering hither and thither on theirwide, soundless wings, hunting the tiny prairie mice, which swarmedamong the hillocks after dark. 

"While they were thus pleasantly occupied, the Little Villager and hiscompanion had an idea. It was not a very usual thing with them, andthey hastened to act upon it lest it should get away. They proceededto block up their entrance tunnel about three feet from the door. Theypacked the earth hard, and made a good job of it, and flatteredthemselves that their guests would not get in in a hurry, even if theywere pretty good burrowers themselves. Then at the extreme oppositecorner of their central chamber they tunneled a new passageway, whichbrought them out quite on the other side of the hillock. This done, they felt very pleased with themselves, and settled down for awell-earned sleep, curled up in a furry ball together. 

"At daybreak the owls came home. Confidently they ducked their big, round heads and dived down the old entrance, only to be brought up witha bump when they had gone about three feet. Out they came in a rage, fluffing their feathers and snapping their beaks, and stood on eachside of the hole to talk the affair over. First, one and then theother reentered to investigate. They found it quite inexplicable. They felt sure this _was_ the way they had previously entered--so sure, in fact, that again and again they tried it, only growing more and morepuzzled and indignant with each attempt. Finally they came to theconclusion that they must have made some mistake. They scuttledsolemnly round the hillock, and came upon the new entrance. Ah, ofcourse, they _had_ been mistaken. Their indignation vanished. Theyscurried in cheerfully, one hard upon the other's tail, and took uptheir place in their adopted corner. The Little Villager and his mateopened disgusted eyes upon them for a second, then went to sleep again, relinquishing all thought of further protest. 

"After this, for a time, there was perfect peace in the house, thepeace of mutual aversion. Hosts and guests ignored each otherscrupulously. But after a while a family was born to the LittleVillager, a litter of absurd, blind, tiny whimperers, all heads andhungry mouths. The two owls were immensely interested at once, buttheir efforts to show their interest were met by such an astonishingdisplay of ferocity on the part of both the Little Villager and hismate that they discreetly withdrew their advances and once more keptstrictly to themselves. They knew their business, these owls; and theyknew they would lose nothing in the long run by a little temporaryforbearance. They were well aware, from past experience with prairiedogs, that the vigilance of the happy parents would relax in course oftime, and that all the while the little ones, growing larger andplumper every day, would be getting better worth the interest of anappreciative owl. 

"The event proved they were right. As the days went by, and the youngones grew lively and independent, the Little Villager and his mate grewless and less anxious about them. Their soft eyes now wide open, theywould leave the nest and wander about the burrow, in spite of all thattheir mother or their father (whichever happened to be in charge at thetime) could do to prevent them. There were so many of them, moreover, that it was quite impossible to keep an eye on them all at once. 

"Late one afternoon, in that debatable time when the owls in theircorner were just beginning to wake up, two of the youngsters ran overquite near them. The temptation was irresistible. There was a lightpounce, a light squeak instantly strangled, and _one_ of theyoungsters, badly frightened, ran back to the mother. The otherremained, limp and motionless, in the owl's corner, with a set ofsteel-like talons clutching it. 

"The mother started to the rescue boldly. But the moment she left therest of the litter the second owl hopped over toward them. She pausedin an agony of irresolution. Then she turned and scurried back. Shecould not sacrifice all for the sake of one. But as she gathered thesurvivors to her she barked and chattered furious defiance at themurderer. Her clatter brought down the Little Villager himself, andtogether they hurled all the insults they could think of at the owl, who, however, calmly turned his feathery back upon them and proceededto devour his easy prey. 

"For some days there was renewed vigilance, and the little ones keptclose to their parents' side. But the memory of a prairie dog, especially of a young prairie dog, is distinctly short. Soon there wasmore wandering from the nest, and then a lot of childish racing aboutthe floor of the burrow. Again a youngster went too near the owls'corner and remained there. This time there was no fuss about it, because the slaughter was accomplished quite silently, and the motherdid not happen to see. After this there would never be more than twoor three days go by without the sudden disappearance of one or anotherof the litter, which, after all, kept the burrow from becoming toocrowded. The youngsters were getting so big by now that their parentsbegan to lose all interest in them. It became time for them to beweaned. But as the interest of the owls had been increasing as that ofthe parents diminished, it happened by this time that there was not oneleft to wean. So the duty of the furry little mother, with her sillynose and her big, childish eyes, was singularly simplified. It was nouse making more trouble with her unfriendly guests over a matter thatwas now past remedy. So all was overlooked, and the burrow settleddown once more to the harmony of mutual aversion. "

Uncle Andy stopped and proceeded to refill his pipe, waiting for theChild's verdict. The Child's face wore the grieved look of one who hashad an illusion shattered. 

"I shan't ever believe a word Bill tells me again, " said he, withinjured decision. 

"Oh, " said Uncle Andy, "you mustn't go so far as that. Bill tells lotsof interesting things that are true enough as far as they go. You mustlearn to discriminate. "

The Child did not know what "discriminate" meant, and he was at themoment too depressed to ask. But he resolved firmly to learn it, whatever it was, rather than be so deceived again. 

CHAPTER XII

THE BABY AND THE BEAR

A stiffish breeze was blowing over Silverwater. Close inshore, wherethe Babe was fishing, the water was fairly calm--just sufficientlyruffled to keep the trout from distinguishing too clearly that small, intent figure at the edge of the raft. But out in the middle of thelake the little whitecaps were chasing each other boisterously. 

The raft was a tiny one, of four logs pinned together with two lengthsof spruce pole. It was made for just the use which the Babe was nowputting it to. A raft was so much more convenient than a boat or acanoe when the water was still and one had to make long, delicate castsin order to drop one's fly along the edges of the lily pods. But theBabe was not making long, delicate casts. On such a day as this thesomewhat unsophisticated trout of Silverwater demanded no subtleties. They were hungry, and they were feeding close inshore, and the Babe washaving great sport. The fish were not large, but they were clean, trim-jawed, bright fellows, some of them not far short of thehalf-pound; and the only blue-bottle in the ointment of the Babe'sexultation was that Uncle Andy was not on hand to see his triumph. Tobe sure, the proof would be in the pan that night, browned in savorycornmeal after the fashion of the New Brunswick backwoods. But theBabe had in him the makings of a true sportsman, and for him a trouthad just one brief moment of unmatchable perfection--the moment when itwas taken off the hook and held up to be gloated over or coveted. 

The raft had been anchored, carelessly enough, by running an innercorner lightly aground. The Babe's weight, slight as it was, on theouter end, together with his occasional ecstatic, though silent, hoppings up and down, had little by little sufficed to slip thehaphazard mooring. This the Babe was far too absorbed to notice. 

All at once, having just slipped a nice half-pounder onto the forkedstick which served him instead of a fishing basket, he noticed that thewooded point which had been shutting off his view on the right seemedto have politely drawn back. His heart jumped into his throat. Heturned--and there were twenty yards or so of clear water between theraft and the shore. The raft was gently but none too slowly glidingout toward the tumbling whitecaps. 

Always methodical, the Babe laid his rod and his string of fishcarefully down on the logs, and then stood for a second or two quiterigid. This was one of those dreadful things which, as he knew, _did_happen, sometimes, to other people, so that he might read about it. But that it should actually happen to _him_! Why, it was as if he hadbeen reading some terrible adventure and suddenly found himself thrusttrembling into the midst of it. All at once those whitecaps out in thelake seemed to be turning dreadful eyes his way and clamoring for_him_! He opened his mouth and gave two piercing shrieks which cut theair like saws. 

"What's the matter?" shouted a very anxious voice from among the trees. 

It was the voice of Uncle Andy. He had returned sooner than he wasexpected. And instantly the Babe's terror vanished. He knew thateverything would be all right in just no time. 

"I'm afloat. Bill's raft's carrying me away!" he replied in an injuredvoice. 

"Oh!" said Uncle Andy, emerging from the trees and taking in thesituation. "You _are_ afloat, are you! I was afraid from the noiseyou made that you were sinking. Keep your hair on, and I'll be withyou in five seconds. And we'll see what Bill's raft has to say foritself after such extraordinary behavior. "

Putting the canoe into the water, he thrust out, overtook the raft in adozen strokes of his paddle, and proceeded to tow it back to the shorein disgrace. 

"What on earth did you make those dreadful noises for?" demanded UncleAndy, "instead of simply calling for me, or Bill, to come and get you?"

"You see, Uncle Andy, " answered the Babe, after some consideration, "Iwas in a hurry, rather, and I thought you or Bill might be in a hurry, too, if I made a noise like that, instead of just calling. "

"Well, I believe, " said Uncle Andy, seating himself on the bank andgetting out his pipe, "that at last the unexpected has happened. Ibelieve, in other words, that you are right. I once knew of a coupleof youngsters who might have saved themselves and their parents a lotof trouble if they could have made some such sound as you did, at theright time. But they couldn't, or, at least, they didn't; and, therefore, things happened, which I'll tell you about if you like. "

The Babe carefully laid his string of fish in a cool place under someleaves, and then came and sat on the grass at his uncle's feet tolisten. 

"They were an odd pair of youngsters, " began Uncle Andy--and paused toget his pipe going. 

"They were a curious pair, and they eyed each other curiously. One wasabout five years old and the other about five months. One was all pinkand white, and ruddy tan, and fluffy gold, and the other all glossyblack. One, in fact, was a baby, and the other was a bear. 

"Neither had come voluntarily into this strange fellowship; and itwould have been hard to say which of the pair regarded the other withmost suspicion. The bear, to be sure, at five months old, was moregrown up, more self-sufficing and efficient than the baby at fiveyears; but he had the disadvantage of feeling himself an interloper. He had come to the raft quite uninvited, and found the baby inpossession! On that account, of course, he rather expected the baby toshow her white little teeth, and snarl at him, and try to drive him offinto the water. In that case he would have resisted desperately, because he was in mortal fear of the boiling, seething flood. But hewas very uneasy, and kept up a whimpering that was intended to beconciliatory; for though the baby was small, and by no means ferocious, he regarded her as the possessor of the raft, and it was an axiom ofthe wilds that very small and harmless-looking creatures might becomedangerous when resisting an invasion of their rights. 

"The baby, on the other hand, was momentarily expecting that the bearwould come over and bite her. Why else, if not from some such sinistermotive, had he come aboard her raft, when he had been traveling on aperfectly good tree? The tree looked so much more interesting than herbare raft, on which she had been voyaging for over an hour, and ofwhich she was now heartily tired. To be sure, the bear was not muchbigger than her own Teddy Bear at home, which she was wont to carryaround by one leg, or to spank without ceremony whenever she thought itneeded discipline. But the glossy black of the stranger was quiteunlike the wild and grubby whiteness of her Teddy, and his shrewdlittle twinkling eyes were quite unlike the bland shoe buttons whichadorned the face of her uncomplaining pet. She wondered when hermother would come and relieve the strain of the situation. 

"All at once the raft, which had hitherto voyaged with a discreetdeliberation, seemed to become agitated. Boiling upthrusts of thecurrent, caused by some hidden unevenness on the bottom, shouldered ithorridly from beneath, threatening to tear it apart, and unbridlededdies twisted it this way and that with sickening lurches. The treewas torn from it and snatched off reluctant all by itself, rolling overand over in a fashion that must have made the cub rejoice to think thathe had quitted a refuge so eccentric in its behavior. As a matter offact, the flood was now sweeping the raft over what was, at ordinarytimes, a series of low falls, a succession of saw-toothed ledges whichwould have ripped the raft to bits. Now the ledges were buried deepunder the immense volume of the freshet. But they were not to beignored, for all that. And they made their submerged presence felt ina turmoil that became more and more terrifying to the two littlepassengers on the raft. 

"There was just one point in the raft, one only, that was farther awaythan any other part from those dreadful, seething-crested blacksurges--and that was the very center. The little bear backed towardit, whimpering and shivering, from his corner. 

"From her corner, directly opposite, the baby too backed toward it, hitching herself along and eyeing the waves in the silence of theterror. She arrived at the same instant. Each was conscious ofsomething alive, and warm, and soft, and comfortable--with motherlysuggestion in the contact. The baby turned with a sob and flung herarms about the bear. The bear, snuggling his narrow black snout underher arm as if to shut out the fearful sight of the waves, made futileefforts to crawl into a lap that was many sizes too small toaccommodate him. 

"In some ten minutes more the wild ledges were past. The surges sankto foaming swirls, and the raft once more journeyed smoothly. The twolittle voyagers, recovering from their ecstasy of fear, looked at eachother in surprise--and the bear, slipping off the baby's lap, squattedon his furry haunches and eyed her with a sort of guilty apprehension. 

"Here it was that the baby showed herself of the dominant breed. Thebear was still uneasy and afraid of her. But she, for her part, had nomore dread of him whatever. Through all her panic she had been dimlyconscious that he had been in the attitude of seeking her protection. Now she was quite ready to give it--quite ready to take possession ofhim, in fact, as really a sort of glorified Teddy Bear come to life;and she felt her authority complete. Half-coaxingly, but quite firmly, and with a note of command in her little voice which the animalinstinctively understood, she said: 'Turn here, Teddy!' and pulled himback unceremoniously to her lap. The bear, with the influence of hercomforting warmth still strong upon him, yielded. It was nice, whenone was frightened and had lost one's mother, to be cuddled so softlyby a creature that was evidently friendly, in spite of the dreaded mansmell that hung about her. His mother had tried to teach him that thatsmell was the most dangerous of all the warning smells his nostrilscould encounter. But the lesson had been most imperfectly learned, andnow was easily forgotten. He was tired, moreover, and wanted to go tosleep. So he snuggled his glossy, roguish face down into the baby'slap and shut his eyes. And the baby, filled with delight over such anovel and interesting plaything, shook her yellow hair down over hisblack fur and crooned to him a soft, half-articulate babble ofendearment. 

"The swollen flood was comparatively quiet now, rolling full and turbidover the drowned lands, and gleaming sullenly under a blaze of sun. The bear having gone to sleep, the baby presently followed his example, her rosy face falling forward into his woodsy-smelling black fur. Atlast the raft, catching in the trees of a submerged islet, came softlyto a stop, so softly as not to awaken the little pair of sleepers. 

"In the meantime two distraught mothers, quite beside themselves withfear and grief, were hurrying downstream in search of the runaway raftand its burden. 

"The mother of the baby, when she saw the flood sweeping the raft away, was for some moments perilously near to flinging herself in after it. Then her backwoods common sense came to the rescue. She reflected, intime, that she could not swim--while the raft, on the other hand, couldand did, and would carry her treasure safely enough for a while. Wading waist deep through the drowned fields behind the house, shegained the uplands, and rushed dripping along the ridge to the nextfarm, where, as she knew, a boat was kept. This farmhouse, perched ona bluff, was safe from all floods; and the farmer was at home, congratulating himself. Before he quite knew what was happening, hefound himself being dragged to the boat--for his neighbor was astrenuous woman, whom few in the settlement presumed to argue with, andit was plain to him now that she was laboring under an unwontedexcitement. It was not until he was in the boat, with the oars in hishands, that he gathered clearly what had happened. Then, however, hebent to the oars with a will which convinced even that frantic andvehement mother that nothing better could be demanded of him. Dodginglogs and wrecks and uprooted trees, the boat went surging down theflood, while the woman sat stiffly erect in the stern, her face whiteas death, her eyes staring far ahead, while from time to time shemuttered angry phrases which sounded as if the baby had gone off on apleasure trip without leave and was going to be called to sharp accountfor it. 

"The other mother had the deeper and more immediate cause for anguish. Coming to the bank where she had left her cub in the tree, she foundthe bank caved in and the tree and cub together vanished. Unlike thebaby's mother, she _could_ swim; but she knew that she could run fasterand farther. In stoic silence, but with a look of piteous anxiety inher eyes, she started on a gallop down the half-drowned shores, clambering the heaps of debris, and swimming the deep, still estuarieswhere the flood had backed up into the valleys of the tributary brooks. 

"At last, with laboring lungs and pounding heart, she came out upon alow, bare bluff overlooking the flood, and saw, not a hundred yardsout, the raft with its two little passengers asleep. She saw her cublying curled up with his head in the baby's arms, his black fur mixedwith the baby's yellow locks. Her first thought was that he wasdead--that the baby had killed him and was carrying him off. With aroar of pain and vengeful fury, she rushed down the bluff and hurledherself into the water. 

"Not till then did she notice that a boat was approaching the raft--aboat with two human beings in it. It was very much nearer the raftthan she was--and traveling very much faster than she could swim. Hersavage heart went near to bursting with rage and fear. She knew thosebeings in the boat could have but one object--the slaughter, or atleast the theft, of her little one. She swam frantically, her greatmuscles heaving as she shouldered the waves apart. But in that raceshe was hopelessly beaten from the first. 

"The boat reached the raft, bumped hard upon it--and the baby's motherleaped out while the man, with his boathook, held the two craft closetogether. The woman, thrusting the cub angrily aside, clutched thebaby hysterically to her breast, sobbing over her and muttering strangethreats of what she would do to her when she got her home to punish herfor giving so much trouble. The baby did not seem in the leastdisturbed by these threats--to which the man in the boat was listeningwith a grin--but when her mother started to carry her to the boat shereached out her arms rebelliously for the cub. 

"'Won't go wivout my Teddy Bear, ' she announced with tearful decision. 

"'Ye'd better git a move on, Mrs. Murdoch, ' admonished the man in theboat, 'Here's the old b'ar comin' after her young un, an' I've a notionshe ain't exactly ca'm. '

"The woman hesitated. She was willing enough to indulge the baby'swhim, the more so as she felt in her heart that it was in some respectsher fault that the raft had got away. She measured the distance tothat formidable black head cleaving the waters some thirty yards away. 

"'Well, ' said she, 'we may's well take the little varmint along, ifbaby wants him. ' And she stepped over to pick up the now shrinking andanxious cub. 

"'You quit that an' get into the boat quick!" ordered the man in avoice of curt authority. The woman whipped round and stared at him inamazement. She was accustomed to having people defer to her; and JimSimmons, in particular, she had always considered such a mild-manneredman, "'Get in!' reiterated the man in a voice that she found herself obeyingin spite of herself. 

"'D'ye want to see baby et up afore yer eyes?" he continued sternly, hiding a grin beneath the sandy droop of his big mustache. And withthe baby kicking and wailing and stretching out her arms to theall-unheeding cub, he rowed rapidly away just as the old bear draggedherself up upon the raft. 

"Then Mrs. Murdoch's wrath found words, and she let it flow forth whilethe man listened as indifferently as if it had been the whistling ofthe wind. At last she stopped. 

"'Anything more to say, ma'am?' he asked politely. 

"Mrs. Murdoch snorted a negative. 

"'Then all _I_ hev to say, ' he went on, 'is that to _my_ mind _mothers_has _rights_. That there b'ar's a mother, an' she's got feelin's, likeyou, an' she's come after her young un, like you--an' I wasn't a-goin'to see her robbed of him. '"

CHAPTER XIII

THE LITTLE SLY ONE

From away up near the top of the rocky hill that rose abruptly acrossthe inlet came a terrible screech, piercing and startling. 

"Gee!" said the Babe, slipping closer to Uncle Andy, where they sattogether on a log by the water. "I'm glad that's away over there!What is it, Uncle Andy?"

"Lynx!" replied Uncle Andy, puffing at his pipe. 

"What did he go and do _that_ for?"

"Well, " said Uncle Andy presently, "if you'll try your level best tolisten without interrupting, I'll tell you. "

"I'm _not_ interrupting!" protested the Babe. 

"_Of_ course not!" agreed Uncle Andy. "Well, you see, the lynx is theslyest thing that goes on four legs. You think, maybe, a fox is sly. That fool guide Bill's told you that. Now, a fox is sly when hechooses to be, and when he wants to be impudent he'd sass King Solomonto his face. But a lynx is just born sly, and can't even think ofoutgrowing it. "

"I don't see anything sly about that noise he made just now!" said theBabe. 

"There you go!" exclaimed Uncle Andy. Then he stopped and thought forquite a while. But as the Babe never spoke a word he soon went onagain. 

"You see, I was just coming to that. That awful screech is one of theslyest things he does. That fellow has been hunting a while withoutcatching anything. Creeping, creeping on his great furry feet, makingno more sound than the shadow of the leaf on the moss; for all hisquietness he hasn't had any luck. So at last, hiding behind a bush, helet out that screech just to start things moving. Did you notice howquick it stopped? Well, he knew if there was any rabbit or partridgeasleep near by it would be so startled it would jump and make a noise;and then he'd be on it before it could more than get its eyes open. Don't you call that sly?"

The Babe merely nodded, being resolved not to interrupt. 

"Good, " said Uncle Andy. "You're improving a lot. Now, let me tellyou, the slyest thing of all is the Little Sly One, which those whoknow everything call the lynx kitten. The Little Sly One is goodenough for us to call her, for she is even slyer when she is a she thanwhen he is a he. Is that quite clear?"

"Of _course_!" exclaimed the Babe. 

"Well, the Little Sly One was a lonely orphan. She had had a motherand a sister and two brothers; but a man with a dog and a gun hadhappened on the mouth of the cave in which they lived. The dog hadhastily gone in. There was a terrible noise in the cave all of asudden, and the dog would have hastily come out again, but for the factthat he was no longer able to come or go anywhere. When the noise hadstopped so that he could see in, the man had shot the mother lynx. Then he had shot the dog, because that was the only thing to do. Andbecause he was very sorry and angry about the dog, he also shot thelynx kittens, where they crowded, spitting savagely, at the back of thecave. But there were only three of them at the back of the cave. TheLittle Sly One, instead of bothering to spit when there were otherthings more important to be done, had run up the wall and hidden in acrevice, so still she didn't even let her tail twitch. Of course, likeall her family, she didn't really have a tail, but merely a littleblunt stub, perhaps two inches long. But that stub could havetwitched, and wanted desperately to twitch, only she would not let it. She always seemed to think she had a tail, and, if she had had, itwould have stuck out so the man could have seen it, the crevice beingsuch a very small one. You see how _sly_ she was!

"Of course, the Little Sly One was lonely for the next few days, butshe was kept so busy hunting breakfasts, and lunches, and dinners, andsuppers that she hadn't time to fret much. She was something like athree-quarters-grown kitten now, except for her having no tail to speakof, and curious, fierce-looking tufts to her ears, and pale eyes sosavage and bright that they seemed as if they could look through a logeven if it wasn't hollow. 

"Also, her feet were twice as big as a kitten's would have been, andher hindquarters were high and powerful, like a rabbit's. Her soft, bright fur was striped like a tiger's--though by the time she was grownup it would have changed to a light, shadowy, brownish gray, hard todetect in the dim thickets. 

"The Little Sly One was so sly and so small that she had no difficultyin creeping up on birds and woodmice, to say nothing of grasshoppers, beetles and crickets. But one day she learned, to her great annoyance, that she was not the only thing in the woods that could do thiscreeping up. She had been watching a long time at the door of awoodmouse burrow, under a tree, when suddenly she seemed to feel dangerbehind her. Without waiting to look round, being so sly, she shot intothe air and landed on the trunk of a tree. As she madly clawed up it, the jaws of a leaping fox came together with a snap just about threeinches behind her, just, in fact, where an ordinary tail would havebeen. So, you see, her tail really saved her life, just by her nothaving any!

"Well, when she was safely up the tree, of course she couldn't helpspitting and growling down at the hungry fox for a minute or two, whilehe looked up at her with his mouth watering. Then, however, she curledherself up in a crotch and pretended to go to sleep. And then the foxwent away, because he didn't know when she would wake up, and he didn'twant to wait! You see how sly she was!

"But once it happened she was not so sly as she might have been. Yousee, after all, in spite of her fierce eyes, she was still only a_kitten_ of a lynx; and she _had_ to _play_ once in a while. At suchtimes she would pounce on a leaf as if it were a mouse, or just tumbleall over herself pretending she had a real tail and was trying to catchit. So, of course, when she happened to pass under a low, bushy branchand caught sight of a slim, smooth, black tip of a tail, no bigger thanyour little finger, hanging down from it, she naturally couldn't resistthe temptation. She pranced up on her hind legs and _clawed_ thatblack tip of a tail--clawed it hard!

"The next instant, before she could prance away again, the _other_ endof that slim, black tip swung out of the branch and whipped itselfround and round her body, and a black head, with sharp fangs in it, hither _biff, biff, biff_! on the nose. It was the tail of a black snakeshe had tried to play with. "

"Gee! But she wasn't sly that time!" exclaimed the Babe, shaking hishead wisely. 

"The black snake wasn't poisonous, of course, " continued Uncle Andy, "but his fangs hurt the Little Sly One's nose, I can tell you. But theworst of it was, how he could squeeze! Those black coils tightened, tightened, till the Little Sly One, who in her first fright had set upa terrific spitting and yowling, found she had no breath to waste onnoise. Her ribs felt as if they would crack. But, fortunately forher, her teeth and claws were available for business. She fell tobiting, and ripping, and clawing, till the black snake realized it wasno Teddy Bear he had got hold of. For a minute or two he stood it, squeezing harder and harder. Then he wanted to let go. 

"And this, I think, was where he made a mistake. As he relaxed hisdeadly coils and swung his head round, the Little Sly One struck outwith both forepaws at once, and succeeded in catching the hissing, darting head. She caught it fairly, and her long, knife-sharp clawssank in, holding it like a carpenter's vise. The next minute she hadher teeth in the back of the snake's neck, chewing and tearing. 

"Now, the snake's tail was still around the branch, so he triedfuriously to swing the Little Sly One up and crush her against thebranch. But she was too heavy and too strong. So he came down, instead, and thrashed wildly among the leaves, trying to get a new gripon her. It was no use, however. He had made too big a mistake. Andthe next minute he kind of straightened out. The Little Sly One hadbitten through his backbone, just behind the head. 

"Well, now, you see, she had a good square meal before her. But, beingvery sly, she first looked all round to see if anyone was coming todine with her. There was no one in sight, but she knew how curiouslythings get about sometimes. So she growled, on general principles, grabbed the snake in her teeth, and climbed up the tree so she mighteat in peace. 

"The tail was no good to eat, so she bit it off and scornfully let itdrop. If that black snake hadn't had a tail, he would never have beeneaten by a kitten lynx; so the Little Sly One, as she considered thispoint, and also thought of the fox, said to herself: 'Well, maybe mytail doesn't amount to much, after all. But there doesn't seem to beany luck in tails, anyway. '

"For all that, things in general were keeping her so very, very busythe Little Sly One felt lonely and homesick at times. And especiallyshe felt the need of some kind of a nest which she could call her veryown, where she could curl herself up and go to sleep without fear ofunpleasant interruptions. 

"This sort of thing, as you may imagine, was not to be found every dayof the week. Most such places had owners, and the Little Sly One wasnot yet big enough and strong enough to turn the owners out. If she_had_ been big enough-- Well, you see, she hadn't any moreconscience than just enough to get along with comfortably. 

"One fine day, soon after her adventure with the black snake, hersearch for a home of her own brought her out into the warm sunshine ofa little, deserted clearing. It was an old lumber camp, all grown upwith tall grass and flowering weeds. The weeds and grass crowded uparound the very threshold of the old gray log cabin. 

"The Little Sly One stopped short, blinking in the strong light andsniffing cautiously. There was no smell of danger--none whatever, buta scent came to her nose that she thought was quite the nicest scent inthe world. 

"Where did it come from? Oh, there is was--that bunch of dull-greenweeds! Forgetting prudence, forgetting everything, she ran forward andbegan rolling herself over and over in ecstasy in the bed ofstrong-smelling weeds. "

"Catnip!" suggested the Babe. 

"Of course!" agreed Uncle Andy impatiently. "What else _could_ it be?

"The Little Sly One had never heard tell of catnip, but she knew rightoff it was something good for every kind of cat. When she had had_quite_ enough of it, she felt kind of light and silly, and not afraidof anything. So, as bold as you please, she marched right up to thecabin. 

"The door was shut. She climbed upon the roof. There was an old barkchimney, with a great hole rotted in its base. She looked in. 

"It was pleasantly shadowy inside, with a musty smell and no sign ofdanger. She dropped upon a narrow shelf. From the shelf, sniffing andglancing this way and that, she sprang to a kind of wider shelf closeunder the eaves. 

"That was a bunk, of course, where one of the lumbermen used to sleep, though _she_ didn't know _that_. It was full of old dry hay, verywarmy and cozy. And the hay, as the Little Sly One observed at once, was full of mice. 

"She pounced on one at once and ate it. Decidedly, this was the placefor her. She curled herself up in the warm hay and went to sleepwithout fear of any enemies coming to disturb her. "

"But what would she do when the lumbermen came back?" demanded the Babeanxiously. 

"By _that_ time, " answered Uncle Andy, putting away his pipe and risingto go, "she would no longer be the _Little_ Sly One! She'd be bigenough to take care of herself--and run away as soon as she heard themcoming. "

CHAPTER XIV

THE DARING OF STRIPES TERROR-TAIL

"What would you do if a bear came at you, Uncle Andy?" inquired theBabe. 

"Run, " said Uncle Andy promptly, "unless I had a gun!"

The Babe thought deeply for a moment. 

"And what would you do if a little, teeny, black-and-white stripedskunk came at you?" he asked. 

"Run like sixty!" responded Uncle Andy, still more promptly. 

"But a skunk's so little!" persisted the Babe. "Will he bite?"

"Bite!" retorted Uncle Andy scornfully. "He doesn't have to. Itappears to me you don't know skunks very well!"

"Huh!" said the Babe. "I've smelt 'em. But _smells_ can't hurtanybody. "

"With your notions of skunks, " answered Uncle Andy, "you're going toget yourself into a heap of trouble one of these days. I'd better tellyou about what happened once when a small young skunk, out walking allby himself in the dewy twilight, happened to meet a large young bear. "

Now, the Babe had a great respect for bears. 

"Huh!" said he scornfully. "What could _he_ do to a bear?"

"The little skunk's name, " said Uncle Andy, paying no heed to theinterruption, "was Stripes Terror-Tail. He was a pretty fellow, blackand glossy, with two clear white stripes down his back on each side ofhis backbone. His tail was long and bushy, and carried high in agraceful curve; and he was about the size of a half-grown kitten. 

"Generally he went hunting with the rest of his family, for theTerror-Tails are affectionate and fond of each other's companionship. But each one does just as he likes, in his easy way; so on thisparticular evening little Stripes had strolled off by himself over thedewy hillocks, catching fat crickets in the dim twilight, and hopingevery minute that he might find a ground sparrow's nest under somebush. "

"Did he rob birds' nests?" asked the Babe, remembering that this, forboys, was one of the deadly sins. 

"He certainly did!" said Uncle Andy, who didn't like to be interrupted. "That is, when he had a chance. Well, as luck would have it, a youngbear was out nosing around the hillocks that evening, amusing himselfwith the fat crickets. He wasn't very hungry, being chock full of thefirst blueberries. 

"He would sit back on his haunches, like a tremendous, overgrown blackpuppy, with his head tilted to one side, his ears cocked shrewdly, anda twinkle in his little dark eyes; and with one furry forepaw he wouldpat a thick bunch of grass till the frightened crickets came scurryingout to see what was the matter. Then he would almost fall over himselftrying to scoop them all up at once--and while he was chewing thosehe'd caught he'd look as disappointed as anything over those that gotaway. 

"Well, when he got tired of crickets he thought he'd look for a bird'snest. He came to a wide, flat, spreading juniper bush, just the kindthat might have a bird's nest under it; and as he nosed around it hecame face to face with little Stripes. You see, they were both afterthe same thing, and both had the same idea about the best place to lookfor it. 

"Now, that young bear's education had been terribly neglected. Hedidn't know any more about skunks than you do. So he thought, maybethe soft little black-and-white thing with the fluffy tail carried soairily might be just as good to eat as birds' eggs--besides being morefilling, of course. 

"He would have grabbed little Stripes right off, had the latter triedto run away. But as Stripes showed no sign of any such intention, thebear hesitated. After all, there didn't seem to be any great hurry!He put out a big paw to slap the stranger, but changed his mind anddrew it back again, the stranger seemed so unconcerned. It wasdecidedly queer, he thought to himself, that a little scrap of acreature like that should be taking things so easy when he was around. He began to feel insulted. 

"As for Stripes, nothing was farther from his mind than running awayfrom the big black creature that had suddenly appeared in front of him. It was not for a plump, leisurely little skunk to be taking violentexercise on a hot night. Yet he didn't want to walk right over thebear--not at all. And he had no intention of making thingsdisagreeable for the clumsy-looking stranger. "

"Huh, what could _he_ do to _him_?" interrupted the Babe again. He hadthe greatest faith in bears. 

"_Will_ you wait!" groaned Uncle Andy. "But first let me explain toyou the peculiar weapon with which Stripes, and all the Terror-Tailfamily, do their fighting when they have to fight--which they are quitetoo polite to do unnecessarily. Some distance below his bushy, graceful tail, sunken between the strong muscles of his thighs, Stripeshad a shallow pit, or sac, of extraordinarily tough skin containing acurious gland which secreted an oil of terrible power. 

"The strong muscles surrounding this sac kept the mouth of it always sotightly closed that not an atom could get out to soil the littleowner's clean, dainty fur, or cause the slightest smell. In fact, Stripes was altogether one of the cleanest and daintiest and mostgentlemanly of all the wild creatures. But when he _had_ to, he couldcontract those muscles around the oil sac with such violence that thedeadly oil--blinding and suffocating--would be shot forth to a distanceof several feet, right into the face of the enemy. And _that_, let metell you, was never good for the enemy!"

"Why?" demanded the Babe. 

But Uncle Andy only eyed him scornfully. "When Stripes, quite civilly, looked at the bear, and then proceeded to smell around under thejuniper bush for that bird's nest, which didn't seem to be there, thebear was much puzzled. He put out his paw again--and again drew itback. 

"Then he said 'Wah!' quite loud and sharp, to see if that wouldfrighten the imperturbable stranger. But Stripes didn't seem to mindnoises like that. His bright, intelligent eyes were on the bear allthe time, you know, though he seemed to be so busy hunting for thatbird's nest. 

"'Pooh!' said the bear to himself, 'he's just plain idiot, that'swhat's the matter with him. I'll eat him, anyway!' and he bouncedforward, with paw uplifted, intending to gather Stripes as he would afat cricket. "

Here Uncle Andy was so inconsiderate as to pause and relight his pipe. The Babe clutched his arm. 

"Well, " he went on presently, "just at this moment Stripes made as ifhe was going to run away, after all. He whisked round and jumped abouttwo feet, and his fine tail flew up over his back, and in that veryinstant the bear thought the whole side of the hill had struck him inthe face. 

"He stopped with a bump, his nose went straight up in the air, and hesqualled: 'Wah-ah! Wah--' But in the middle of these remarks hechoked and strangled and started pawing wildly at his nose, trying toget his breath. 

"His eyes were shut tight, and that deadly oil clung like glue. Hispaws couldn't begin to get it off, and so he fell to rooting his nosein the turf like a pig, and plowing the grass with his whole face, fairly standing on his head in his efforts, all the time coughing andgurgling as if he was having a fit. 

"His behavior, in fact, was perfectly ridiculous; but there was no onethere to laugh at it but Stripes, and he was too polite. He juststrolled on quietly to another bush, and kept looking for that bird'snest. 

"At last the bear, what with pawing and rooting, managed to get hisbreath and open his eyes. He wallowed a bit more, and then sat up, hisnose full of dirt, and moss and grass hanging all over his face. Hewas a sight, I tell you! And how he did dislike himself!

"As he sat there, thinking how he'd ever get away from himself, hecaught sight of Stripes, strolling off quietly over the brown hillocks. Sitting back on his haunches, he blinked at the little, leisurelyblack-and-white figure. 

"'And to think I was going to eat _that_!' he said to himself sadly. "

CHAPTER XV

DAGGER BILL AND THE WATER BABIES

"What's that?" demanded the Babe nervously, as a peal of wild, crazylaughter rang out over the surface of the lake. 

"Why, don't you know what _that_ is yet?" Said Uncle Andy with asuperior air. "That's old Dagger Bill, the big black-and-white loon. Sounds as if he was terribly amused, doesn't he? But he's only callingto his big black-and-white mate, or the two little Dagger Bills theyhatched out in the spring. "

"What does _he_ do?" asked the Babe. 

"I don't _know_ much about that fellow, " answered Uncle Andy. "Now yousee him, and now you don't. Mostly you don't; and, when you do, aslikely as not it's only his snaky black head, with its sharp dagger ofa bill, stuck up out of the water to keep track of you. He's _most_unsociable. If anyone tells you he knows all about a loon, you wink toyourself and pretend you are not listening. But I'll tell you who _do_know something about old Dagger Bill--the Water Babies. 

"Who're the Water Babies?" demanded the Babe. 

"Why don't you know _that_? The little muskrats, of course, that livein the warm, dry, dark nest under the dome of their mud house, out inthe water--the house with its doors so far under water that no one canget into it without diving and swimming. "

"It must be cozy and awfully safe, " said the Babe, who began to want aplace like that himself. 

"Yes, _fine_!" agreed Uncle Andy. "And safe from everything but themink; and if _he_ came in by one door, there was always another dooropen for them to get out by, so quick that the mink could never seetheir tails. 

"Old Dagger Bill, of course, could never get into the house of theWater Babies, for all his wonderful swimming and diving, because he wasso big--as big as a goose. But, as a rule, he wouldn't want to botherthe Water Babies. Fish were much more to Dagger Bill's taste thanyoung muskrat; and he could swim so fast under water that few fish everescaped him, once he got after them. 

"This summer, however, things were different at Long Pond. Hitherto ithad fairly swarmed with fish--lake trout, suckers, chub, red fins, andso on. But that spring some scoundrel had dynamited the waters for thesake of the big lake trout. Few fish had survived the outrage. Andeven so clever a fisherman as Dagger Bill would have gone hungry mostof the time had he not been clever enough to vary his bill of fare. 

"'If we can't have all the bread we want, ' he said to the family, 'wemust try to get along on cake!'"

"Dagger Bill _might_ get _bread_ from some camp, " interrupted the Babethoughtfully, being a matter-of-fact child. "But _what_ could he knowabout _cake_, Uncle Andy?"

"Oh, come on! You know what I mean!" protested Uncle Andy, aggrievedat the Babe's lack of a sense of humor. "You're too particular, youare! _You_ know bread meant fish with Dagger Bill--and cake meantthings like winkles and frogs, and watermice, and--Water Babies, ofcourse!

"Well, you know, it was no joke hunting the Water Babies, for the oldmuskrats could fight, and would, and did! And after Dagger Bill andhis family had breakfasted on two or three Water Babies, there wasgreat excitement in all the muskrat homes. 

"Dagger Bill was a new enemy, and they were not quite sure how tomanage him. The mink they knew, the fox they knew, and the noiseless, terrible eagle owl, and the swooping hawk. All these they had theirtricks for evading. And the savage pike they would sometimes fight inhis own element. 

"But Dagger Bill, swimming under water like a fish, and spearing themfrom beneath with the deadly javelin of his beak, this was a new anddreadfully upsetting danger. Furry heads got close together, and therewas a terrible lot of squeaking and squealing before anyone could makeup his mind what to do. And meanwhile Dagger Bill was feeling quitepleased, because he had found out that Water Babies were good--andsafe!--to eat. 

"Now the Water Babies, I must tell you, had two nests--one in thewaterhouse, a few yards out from shore, and one at the end of theburrow leading up into the dry bank. Their favorite amusement, as arule, was playing tag in the quiet water around the house, sometimes onthe surface, sometimes beneath it. They would catch and nip each otherby the tails or the hind legs, and sometimes grapple and drag eachother down, for all the world like a lot of boys in swimming--but howthey could swim! You'd give your eye teeth to swim like they could. "

"Bet your boots, Uncle Andy, " agreed the Babe enthusiastically. "Specially _these_ teeth, 'cause they're my first, and I'll lose 'emsoon, anyway. "

"Huh!" grunted Uncle Andy, looking at him suspiciously. "But, as I wassaying, the Water Babies _could swim_. They were no match for DaggerBill, however, who was quicker than a fish. And when Dagger Bill tookto hunting Water Babies, it was no longer safe for them to play farfrom home. They would get themselves well nipped by their relations, Ican tell you, whenever they went outside the little patch of shallowwater between the house and the bank. 

"Now the sharpness of Dagger Bill's eyes was something terrible. Fromaway across the lake, where no muskrat could see him at all, _he_ couldsee the ripple made by the brown nose of the littlest muskrat swimming. So one day, when the Water Babies were playing tag in what was really, you know, nothing more nor less than their own back yard, he saw theswift ripples and splashes crossing and recrossing--and he laughed!_You_ know how he laughed. 

"And when the muskrats heard that wild laughter, they bobbed up theirfurry heads, those in the water; and those on land sat up likesquirrels to listen, and all were as delighted as possible because thesound was so very far away! Then the Water Babies all began to playabout as boldly as you please, because they knew Dagger Bill was awayover at the other side of the lake. 

"But do you suppose he really was?

"Not much! The moment he was done laughing he dived, and swam as hardas he could straight across the lake, under water. He swam and heswam, a sharp, black-and-white wedge rushing through the golden deep, as long as he could hold his breath. When he could not hold it amoment longer he came up, stuck his bill just above water, took a longbreath, and dived again. He was halfway across the lake when he cameup that time. Next time he was _all_ the way across; but, being verycunning indeed, he came up under a grassy bank, where his black billwas hidden among the stems. 

"He was not more than twenty paces now from the place where the WaterBabies were splashing and racing and squeaking, and having such a goodtime on the smooth, sunny water, under the blue, blue sky. They werevery happy. Dagger Bill sank back into the deep water so noiselessly, you would have said it was a shadow sinking. Then he rushed forwardlike a swordfish, down there in the brown glow, and darted up rightinto the game of tag. 

"He had aimed his cruel thrust at the Water Baby who, at thatparticular moment, was IT. But, in that same second, as luck wouldhave it, IT caught the one he was pursuing, nipped his tail, anddoubled back like lightning to escape getting nipped in return. So, you see, Dagger Bill missed his aim. That javelin of his beak justgrazed the brown tip of IT'S nose, scaring him to death, but nothingmore. "

"Ah-h!' breathed the Babe, relieved in his feelings. 

"In a wink, of course, " went on Uncle Andy, "all the Water Babies, witha wild slapping of tails on the water to warn each other, werescurrying desperately for the nest. Some dived as deep as possible;but others lost their wits and swam on the surface. A moment more, andDagger Bill, who had sunk at once, darted up again, and this time histerrible beak pierced right through a little swimmer's body, severingthe backbone. "

"Oh-h-h!" murmured the Babe, drawing in his breath sharply. 

"I can't help it, " said Uncle Andy. "But that's the way things go. Well, now, Dagger Bill rose right out on top of the water, as a birdshould, and swam toward shore with the victim hanging limply from hisbeak. But every old muskrat, along the bank or around the waterhouse, had seen and had understood. Those folks that think muskrats and otherwild creatures have sense, would have said it was all planned outahead--it happened so quick. Every muskrat dived like a flash into thewater and disappeared. 

"Dagger Bill was coolly making for shore, not dreaming that anybodywould dare interfere with him, when suddenly his black head went up inthe air, his great beak opened with a hoarse squawk, and he dropped thedead Water Baby. His dark wings flopped, and his tail was drawn underso violently that he nearly turned over backward. It seemed to himthat nothing less than the Great Sturgeon, which lived far down theriver, must have grabbed him by the feet. "

"Wish it had been!" said the Babe. 

"Just you wait!" said Uncle Andy. "Well, the next minute he lookeddown, and, lo and behold! all the water underneath him was alive withswimming muskrats, darting up and closing in upon him. Three or fouralready had their sharp teeth in his feet. He was mad and frightened, I can tell you. 

"He struggled and flopped, but his short wings could not raise him fromthe water with those weights fastened upon his feet. Then his blackhead shot under, and he jabbed savagely this way and that, makingdreadful wounds in those soft, furry bodies. But the muskrats neverheeded a wound. They swarmed upon their enemy with a splendid, reckless rage. _They'd_ teach him to stab Water Babies!

"And they did, too! In a minute or so they had pulled the old robberclean under, where they could all get at him; and, my! you should haveseen how the water boiled! But it was only for a minute or two. Thentwo muskrats came up, bleeding, but proud as you please, and then twoor three more; and they all went ashore to lick their wounds and maketheir toilets, for, as you may imagine, their hair was somewhatdisarranged. 

"And then, while they were combing their fur with the claws of theirlittle forepaws, like hands, who should come up but Dagger Bill; buthis feet came up first, and he didn't come up far, anyway, and hedidn't stir. In fact, he was good and dead--so dead that presently ayoung chub, and a red-fin, and two sunfish, came up and swam round himcuriously. 

"You see, they thought they might never have another chance to get sucha _good, comfortable_ look at a loon, and be able to talk about itafterwards. "