st be dreadfully anxious about me, for it is now six
days since I left the nest. Hold me up to your face, and let me read my
fate in your beautiful eyes, which I declare are almost as bright and
dark as my mother's. Bring me closer, quite close, for I am rather
near-sighted. That will do. Oh joy! I see by those sweet sparklers,
that my petition is granted, and that I shall sleep to-night by my
mother's side in the downy nest on the thistle.

* * * * *

When this history was finished, Leatherwing said, that the little girl
pressed her captive to her lips, and then, putting on her straw hat,
she immediately walked out into the fields, with Minimus perched upon
her hand.

CHAPTER VII.

It was now the season for collecting nuts, acorns, and beech-mast; and
it was time that the squirrels attended to the important business of
filling their several storehouses with a supply of provisions for the
winter.

Now their own oak would furnish acorns for hundreds of squirrels, and
some beech-trees, laden with mast, were close at hand; but in order to
procure hazle-nuts, their favourite food, it was necessary to go rather
further from home. The nearest spot where the business of nutting could
be carried on with much success, was a large hazel-copse, on the side
of a hill, at the upper end of the valley. But the great difficulty
was, how to obtain these nuts without risking their lives. For since
the appearance of the wild-cat in the neighbourhood the squirrels had
always avoided the thick bushes and underwood, knowing that she could
more easily surprise them there, than among the open branches of large
trees. Even in the trees they were very careful to look well about
them, as they fully believed that the enemy was still in the
neighbourhood, for Leatherwing, who had promised to give them early
information, could hear no account of her having been killed. Indeed,
he had very lately overheard a farmer complaining to a neighbour, that
the night before, he had had three fine lambs killed, and several
others sadly mangled by this destructive wild beast.

But to pass the tedious winter without a supply of nuts appeared as
great a hardship to the squirrels as it would be to us to live for
several months upon bread and water. Therefore, after several
consultations on the subject, it was at length agreed, that _nuts
they would have_, at all hazards; for said Brush, "Better to be eaten
up