Project Gutenberg's The Squirrels and other animals, by George E. Waring

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

Title: The Squirrels and other animals
Illustrations of the habits and instincts of many of the
smaller British quadrupeds

Author: George E. Waring

Release Date: August 14, 2010 [EBook #33434]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SQUIRRELS AND OTHER ANIMALS ***

Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images
generously made available by The Internet Archive/American
Libraries.)

[Illustration: THE FOX AND THE HEDGEHOG. Page 202.]

THE SQUIRRELS AND OTHER ANIMALS;

OR,

ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE HABITS AND INSTINCTS OF MANY OF
THE SMALLER BRITISH QUADRUPEDS.

BY GEORGE WARING.

LONDON:
HARVEY AND DARTON, GRACECHURCH STREET.

THE SQUIRRELS AND OTHER ANIMALS.

CHAPTER I.

"Bless me, I do believe I have been asleep!" said a squirrel, one fine
morning in early spring, when the delicious warmth of the sun had
reached him in his winter retreat, and roused the lazy little fellow
from a two months' nap. The truth is, that he and his family had fallen
asleep at the first setting in of the cold weather, and had passed the
dismal winter in a state of profound repose, except, that, during a
warm day or two in January, they had roused themselves for a short
time, and eaten a few nuts and acorns from their winter store.

"Yes, I have certainly been asleep," said the squirrel, "and I fancy I
have had a pretty long nap too. Well, I declare, my lazy wife and
children are lying there still, curled up like so many dead things!
Hallo, Mrs. Brush! come, get up and eat some breakfast. Here is the sun
shining in most gloriously at the mouth of the hole, and I hear the
blackbird's merry whistle in the grove below. Ah! they wont move, so
I'll have a run this fine morning, and see how the world looks now.
Perhaps when I come back they may be awake."

So Master Brush went to the entrance of his nest, which was situated at
a great height from the ground, in a commodious hollow of a magnificent
oak-tree.

"Oh joy!" he ex