" SAID THE SQUIRREL.]

Next came the dormouse. "Sleep is the best defence of all," he said.
"Sleep and being very small indeed, and never coming out except after
sundown, and having great big eyes, so that you can see things like stoats
long before they see you. Offence I know nothing of, unless it's eating
beetles."

After him the wood-mouse. "Give me a good burrow underground," said he.
"Make it among branching roots, with half a dozen entrances and exits, and
I defy the weasel, let alone the stoat. But in the winter, when cover is
scanty, sleep and a store of nuts is best of all. Beans are no good--they
rot away. Earth-stored nuts, tight packed, are the sweetest things I
know."

"What of summer?" said the hedgehog.

"Weight for weight," said the mouse, "I can tackle anything that moves. As
for voles and house-mice, I can fight two at once. When I am giving much
away, I like my burrow handy."

[Illustration: TWO FIELDS AWAY YOU CAN SEE MY FORTRESSES.]

"Who talks of burrows?" said the mole. "Where is there tunnel-builder
like myself? Two fields away you can see my fortresses. You can see them
plainly, tunnelled maze and rounded nest and all. Some prying human has
turned his vacant mind to nature-study, and made a clumsy section of a
pair. Look at each in turn. Mark the one tunnel that leads upward to the
nest, mark the two galleries that surround it, mark that they wind in a
spiral, and are not joined by shafts at intervals. That would so weaken
the surroundings as to leave the nest an easy prey to scratching weasel.
Why is the spiral made? To cheat inquiry; a dozen tunnels join it from
the run; from it are a dozen exits to the surrounding field. _One tunnel
only leads into the nest._ Only the moles know that one. Alone I did it,
save for my wife, who hindered me. Alone I moved two hundredweight of
earth. Nor do my qualities end here. Were I fifty times as big, I would be
lord of creation. Where can you find fiercer courage than mine; where,
bulk for bulk, more mighty strength? What monster, think you, would an
elephant, built for burrowing, be? For my weight, I am the strongest thing
that lives. One creature, and one only, approaches me; that is the
mole-cricket. Let him speak for himself."

[Illustration: "WHO TALKS OF BURROWS," SAID THE MOLE.]

[Illustration: THE MOLE-CRICKET TURNED UP FROM NOWHERE IN PARTICULAR.]

The mole-cricket turned up from nowhere in particular, and his voice was
the tinkling of a