Part 4 (2/2)
Then Nimble went away from the clearing, and once more resolved to seek his fortune in the woods. He knew there were plenty b.u.t.ter-nuts, acorns, hickory-nuts, and beech-nuts, to be found, besides many sorts of berries; and he very diligently set to work to lay up stores against the coming winter.
As it was now getting cold at night, Nimble-foot thought it would be wise to make himself a warm house; so he found out a tall hemlock-pine that was very thick and bushy at the top; there was a forked branch in the tree, with a hollow just fit for his nest. He carried twigs of birch and beech, and over these he laid dry green moss, which he collected on the north side of the cedar-trees, and some long grey moss that he found on the swamp maples, and then he stripped the silky threads from the milk-weeds, and the bark of the cedar and birch-trees. These he gnawed fine, and soon made a soft bed; he wove and twisted the sticks, and roots, and mosses together, till the walls of his house were quite thick, and he made a sort of thatch over the top with dry leaves and long moss, with a round hole to creep in and out of.
Making this warm house took him many days' labour; but many strokes will fell great oaks, so at last Nimble-foot's work came to an end, and he had the comfort of a charming house to shelter him from the cold season. He laid up a good store of nuts, acorns, and roots: some he put in a hollow branch of the hemlock-tree close to his nest; some he hid in a stump, and another store he laid under the roots of a mossy cedar. When all this was done, he began to feet very lonely, and often wished no doubt that he had had his sisters Silvy and Velvet-paw with him, to share his nice warm house; but of Silvy he knew nothing, and poor Velvet-paw was dead.
One fine moonlight night, as Nimble was frisking about on the bough of a birch-tree, not very far from his house in the hemlock, he saw a canoe land on the sh.o.r.e of the lake, and some Indians with an axe cut down some bushes, and having cleared a small piece of ground, begin to sharpen, the ends of some long poles. These they stuck into the ground close together in a circle; and having stripped some sheets of birch-bark from the birch-trees close by, they thatched the sides of the hut, and made a fire of sticks inside. They had a dead deer in the canoe, and there were several hares and black squirrels, the sight of which rather alarmed Nimble; for he thought if they killed one sort of squirrel, they might another, and he was very much scared at one of the Indians firing off a gun close by him. The noise made him fall down to the ground, and it was a good thing that it was dark among the leaves and gra.s.s where the trunk of the tree threw its long shadow, so that the Indian did not see him, or perhaps he might have loaded the gun again, and shot our little friend, and made soup of him for his supper.
Nimble ran swiftly up a pine-tree, and was soon out of danger. While he was watching some of the Indian children at play, he saw a girl come out of the hut with a grey squirrel in her arms; it did not seem at all afraid of her, but nestled to her shoulder, and even ate out of her hand; and what was Nimble's surprise to see that this tame grey squirrel was none other than his own pretty sister Silver-nose, whom he had left in the hollow tree when they both ran away from the red squirrel.
You may suppose the sight of his lost companion was a joyful one; he waited for a long, long time, till the fire went out, and all the Indians were fast asleep, and little Silvy came out to play in the moonlight, and frisk about on the dewy gra.s.s as she used to do. Then Nimble, when he saw her, ran down the tree, and came to her and rubbed his nose against her, and licked her soft fur, and told her who he was, and how sorry he was for having left her in so cowardly a manner, to be beaten by the red squirrel.
The good little Silvy told Nimble not to fret about what was past, and then she asked him for her sister Velvet-paw. Nimble had a long sorrowful tale to tell about the death of poor Velvet; and Silvy was much grieved.
Then in her turn she told Nimble all her adventures, and how she had been caught by the Indian, girl, and kept, and fed, and tamed, and had pa.s.sed her time very happily, if it had not been for thinking about her dear lost companions. ”But now,” she said, ”my dear brother, we will never, part again; you shall be quite welcome, to share my cage, and my nice stores of Indian corn, rice, and nuts, which my kind mistress gives me.”
”I would not be shut up in a cage, not even for one day,” said Nimble, ”for all the nice and grain in Canada. I am a free squirrel, and love my liberty. I would not exchange a life of freedom in these fine old woods, for all the dainties in the world. So, Silvy, if you prefer a life of idleness and ease to living with me in the forest, I must say good-bye to you.”
”But there is nothing to hurt us, my dear Nimble--no rac.o.o.ns, nor foxes, nor hawks, nor owls, nor weasels; if I see any hungry-looking birds or beasts, I have a safe place to run to, and never need be hungry!”
”I would not lead a life like that, for the world,” said Nimble. ”I should die of dullness; if there is danger in a life of freedom, there is pleasure too, which you cannot enjoy, shut up in a wooden cage, and fed at the will of a master or mistress.”
”Well, I shall be shot if the Indians awake and see me; so I shall be off.”
Silvy looked very sorrowful; she did not like to part from her newly-found brother, but she was unwilling to forego all the comforts and luxuries her life of captivity afforded her.
”You will not tell the Indians where I live, I hope, Silvy, for they would think it a fine thing to hunt me with their dogs, or shoot me down with their bows and arrows.”
At these words Silvy was overcome with grief, so jumping off from the log on which she was standing, she said, ”Nimble, I will go with you and share all your perils, and we will never part again.” She then ran into the wigwam; and going softly to the little squaw, who was asleep, licked her hands and face, as if she would say, ”Good-bye, my good kind friend; I shall not forget all your love for me, though I am going away from you for ever.”
Silvy then followed Nimble into the forest, and they soon reached his nice comfortable nest in the tall hemlock-tree.
”Nurse, I am glad Silvy went away with Nimble, are not you? Poor Nimble must have been so lonely without her, and then you know it must have seemed so hard to him if Silvy had preferred staying with the Indians, to living with him.”
”Those who have been used to a life of ease do not willingly give it up, my dear lady; thus you see, love for her old companion was stronger even than love of self. But I think you must have tired yourself with reading so long to me.”
”Indeed, nurse, I must read a little more, for I want you to hear how Silvy and Nimble amused themselves in the hemlock-tree.”
Then Lady Mary went on and read as follows.
Silvy was greatly pleased with her new home, which was as soft and as warm as clean dry moss, hay, and fibres of roots could make it. The squirrels built a sort of pent or outer roof of twigs, dry leaves, and roots of withered gra.s.s, which was pitched so high that it threw off the rain and kept the inner house very dry. They worked at this very diligently, and also laid up a store of nuts and berries. They knew that they must not only provide plenty of food for the winter, but also for the spring months, when they could get little to eat beside the buds and bark of some sort of trees, and the chance seeds that might still remain in the pine-cones.
Thus the autumn months pa.s.sed away very quickly and cheerfully with the squirrels while preparing for the coming winter. Half the cold season was spent, too, in sleep; but on mild sunny days the little squirrels, roused by the bright light of the sunbeams on the white and glittering snow, would shake themselves, rub their black eyes, and after licking themselves clean from dust, would whisk out of their house and indulge in merry gambols up and down the trunks of the trees, skipping from bough to bough, and frolicking over the hard crisp snow, which scarcely showed on its surface the delicate print of their tiny feet, and the sweep of their fine light feathery tails. Sometimes they met with some little shrewmice, running on the snow. These very tiny things are so small, they hardly look bigger than a large black beetle; they lived on the seeds of the tall weeds, which they, might be seen climbing and clinging to, yet were hardly heavy enough to weigh down the heads of the dry stalks. It is pretty to see the footprints of these small shrewmice, on the surface of the fresh fallen snow in the deep forest-glades. They are not dormant during the winter like many of the mouse tribe, for they are up and abroad at all seasons; for however stormy and severe the weather may be, they do not seem to heed its inclemency. Surely, children, there is One who cares for the small tender things of earth, and shelters them from the rude blasts.
Nimble-foot and Silver-nose often saw their cousins, the black squirrels, playing in the suns.h.i.+ne, chasing each other merrily up and down the trees, or over the brush-heaps; their jetty coats, and long feathery tails, forming a striking contrast with the whiteness of the snow, above which they were sporting. Sometimes they saw a few red squirrels too, but there was generally war between them and the black ones.
<script>