He grew up to early manhood in a land of hunters, but he took no
pleasure in the killing that was such sport to his neighbour's sons, and
to his dying day he could not look on the skin of a Badger without
feelings of love, tenderness, and regret.

This is the story of the Badger as it was told me, and those who wish to
inquire further can do so at Winnipeg, if they seek out Archbishop
Matheson, Dr. R. M. Simpson, or Mrs. George A. Frazer of Kildonan. These
witnesses may differ as to the details, but all have assured me that in
its main outlines this tale is true, and I gladly tell it, for I want
you to realize the kindly disposition that is in that sturdy, harmless,
noble wild animal that sits on the low prairie mounds, for then I know
that you will join with me in loving him, and in seeking to save his
race from extermination.




       *       *       *       *       *

VIII

The Squirrel and His Jerky-tail Brothers

       *       *       *       *       *




VIII

The Squirrel and His Jerky-tail Brothers


You remember that Hiawatha christened the Squirrel
"Adjidaumo"--"Tail-in-air" and this Tail-in-air was chattering overhead
as I sat, some twenty-five years ago, on the shore of the Lake of the
Woods with an Ojibwa Indian, checking up the animals' names in the
native tongue. Of course the Red-squirrel was early in our notice.

"Ad-je-_daw_-mo" I called it, but the Indian corrected me;
"Ah-chit-aw-_mo_" he made it; and when I translated it "Tail-in-air" he
said gravely, "No, it means head downward." Then noting my surprise, he
added, with characteristic courtesy, "Yes, yes, you are right; if his
head is down, his tail must be up." Thoreau talks of the Red-squirrel
flicking his tail like a whip-lash, and the word "Squirrel," from the
Latin "_Sciurus_" and Greek "_Skia-oura_" means "shady tail." Thus all
of its names seem to note the wonderful banner that serves the animal
in turn as sun-shade, signal-flag, coverlet, and parachute.


THE CHEEKY PINE SQUIRREL

[Illustration]

A wonderfully extensive kingdom has fallen to Adjidaumo of the shady
tail; all of Canada and most of the Rockies are his. He is at home
wherever there are pine forests and a cool climate; and he covers so
many ranges of diverse conditions that, responding to the new
environments in lesser matters of makeup, we have a score of different
Squirrel races from this parent stock. In size, in tail, in kind or
depth of coat they differ to the expert eye, but so far as I can see
they are exactly alike in all their ways, their calls and their
dispositions.

The Pine Squirrel is the form found in the Rockies about the Yellowstone
Park. It is a little darker in colour than the Red-squirrel of the East,
but I find no other difference. It has the same aggressive, scolding
propensities, the same love of the pinyons and their product, the same
friends and the same foes, with one possible partial exception in the
list of habits, and that is in its method of storing up mushrooms.

[Illustration]

The pinyons, or nuts of the pinyon pine, are perhaps the most delicious
nuts in all the lap of bountiful dame Nature, from fir belt in the
north to equatorial heat and on to far Fuego. All wild creatures revel
in the pinyons. To the Squirrels they are more than the staff of life;
they are meat and potatoes, bread and honey, pork and beans, bread and
cake, sugar and chocolate, the sum of comfort, and the promise of
continuing joy. But the pinyon does not bear every year; there are off
years, as with other trees, and the Squirrels might be in a bad way if
they had no other supply of food to lay up for the winter.

[Illustration: XXV. Red-squirrel storing mushrooms for winter use
_Sketched from life in the Selkirk Mountains, by E. T. Seton_]

[Illustration: XXVI. Chink stalking the Picket-pin
_Photo by E. T. Seton_]

A season I spent in the Southern Rockies was an off year for pinyons,
and when September came I was shown what the Squirrels do in such an
emergency. All through autumn the slopes of the hills were dotted with
the umbrellas of countless toadstools or mushrooms, representing many
fat and wholesome species. It is well known that while a few of them are
poisonous, a great many are good food. Scientists can find out which is
which only by slow experiment. "Eat them; if you live they are good, if
you die they are poisonous" has been suggested as a certain method. The
Squirrels must have worked this out long ago, for they surely know the
good ones; and all through late summer they are at work gathering them
for winter use in place of the pine-nuts.

[Illustration]

Now if the provident Squirrel stored these up as he does the pinyons, in
holes or underground, they would surely go to mush in a short time and
be lost. He makes no such mistake. He stores them in the forked branches
of trees, where they dry out and remain good until needed; and wisely
puts them high enough up to be out of reach of the Deer and low enough
to avoid being dislodged by the wind.

As you ramble through the Squirrel-frequented woods, you will often come
across a log or stump which is littered over with the scales fresh cut
from a pine cone; sometimes there is a pile of a bushel or more by the
place; you have stumbled on a Squirrel's workshop. Here is where he does
his husking, and the "clear corn" produced is stored away in some
underground granary till It is needed.

The Pine Squirrel loves to nest in a hollow tree, but also builds an
outside nest which at a distance looks like a mass of rubbish. This, on
investigation, turns out to be a convenient warm chamber some six inches
wide and two or three high. It is covered with a waterproof roof of bark
thatch, and entered by a door artfully concealed with layers and fringes
of bark that hide it alike from blood-thirsty foes and piercing winter
blasts.

[Illustration]


CHIPMUNKS AND GROUND-SQUIRRELS

The Red-squirrel is safe and happy only when in the tall trees, but his
kinsmen have sought out any and every different environment. One
enormous group of his great grandfather's second cousins have abandoned
tree life altogether. They have settled down like the Dakota farmers, to
be happy on the prairie, where, never having need to get over anything
higher than their own front doorstep, they have lost the last vestige of
power to climb. These are the Ground-squirrels, that in a variety of
forms are a pest in gardens and on farms in most of the country west of
the Mississippi.

Standing between these and the true Squirrels are the elegant Chipmunks,
the prettiest and most popular of all the family. They frequent the
borderland between woods and prairie; they climb, if anything is to be
gained by it, but they know, like the Ground-squirrels, that Mother
Earth is a safer retreat in time of danger than the tallest tree that
ever grew.


THE GROUND-SQUIRREL THAT PLAYS PICKET-PIN

Conspicuous in its teeming numbers in the Yellowstone Park is the
Picket-Pin Ground-squirrel. On every level, dry prairie along the great
river I found it in swarms.

[Illustration]

It looks much like a common Squirrel, but its coat has become more
mud-coloured, and its tail is reduced by long ages of neglect to a mere
vestige of the ancestral banner. It has developed great powers of
burrowing, but it never climbs anything higher than the little mound
that it makes about the door of its home.

The Picket-pin is an interesting and picturesque creature in some ways,
but it has one habit that I cannot quite condone. In this land of sun
and bright blue air, this world of outdoor charm, it comes forth tardily
in late spring, as late sometimes as the first of May, and promptly
retires in mid-August, when blazing summer is on the face of the earth,
and the land is a land of plenty. Down it goes after three and one half
short months, to sleep for eight and a half long ones; and since during
these three and a half months it is above ground only in broad daylight,
this means that for only two months of the year it is active, and the
other ten, four fifths of its life, it passes in a deathlike sleep.

Of course, the Picket-pin might reply that it has probably as many hours
of active life as any of its kind, only it breaks them up into sections,
with long blanks of rest between. Whether this defense is a good one or
not, we have no facts at present to determine.

[Illustration]

It has a fashion of sitting up straight on the doorway mound when it
wishes to take an observation, and the more it is alarmed by the
approach of an enemy the straighter it sits up, pressing its paws tight
to its ribs, so that at a short distance it looks like a picket-pin of
wood; hence the name.

Oftentimes some tenderfoot going in the evening to stake out his horse
and making toward the selected patch of grassy prairie, exclaims, "Good
Luck! here's a picket-pin already driven in." But on leading up his
horse within ten or twelve feet of the pin, it gives a little "_chirr_"
and dives down out of sight. Then the said tenderfoot realizes why the
creature got the name.

The summer of 1897 I spent in the Park about Yancey's and there had
daily chances of seeing the Picket-pin and learning its ways, for the
species was there in thousands on the little prairie about my cabin. I
think I am safe in saying that there were ten families to the acre of
land on all the level prairie in this valley.


CHINK AND THE PICKET-PINS

As already noted in the Coyote chapter, we had in camp that summer the
little dog called Chink. He was just old enough to think himself a
remarkable dog with a future before him. There was hardly anything that
Chink would not attempt, except perhaps keeping still. He was always
trying to do some absurd and impossible thing, or, if he did attempt the
possible, he usually spoiled his best efforts by his way of going about
it. He once spent a whole morning trying to run up a tall, straight,
pine tree in whose branches was a snickering Pine Squirrel.

The darling ambition of his life for some weeks was to catch one of the
Picket-pin Ground-squirrels that swarmed on the prairie about the camp.

Chink had determined to catch one of these Ground-squirrels the very
first day he came into the valley. Of course, he went about it in his
own original way, doing everything wrong end first, as usual. This, his
master said, was due to a streak of Irish in his makeup. So Chink would
begin a most elaborate stalk a quarter of a mile from the
Ground-squirrel. After crawling on his breast from tussock to tussock
for a hundred yards or so, the nervous strain would become too great,
and Chink, getting too much excited to crawl, would rise on his feet and
walk straight toward the Squirrel, which would now be sitting up by its
hole, fully alive to the situation.

After a minute or two of this very open approach, Chink's excitement
would overpower all caution. He would begin running, and at the last,
just as he should have done his finest stalking, he would go bounding
and barking toward the Ground-squirrel, which would sit like a peg of
wood till the proper moment, then dive below with a derisive chirrup,
throwing with its hind feet a lot of sand right into Chink's eager, open
mouth.

Day after day this went on with level sameness, and still Chink did not
give up, although I feel sure he had bushels of sand thrown in his mouth
that summer by the impudent Picket-pins.

[Illustration]

Perseverance, he seemed to believe, must surely win in the end, as
indeed it did. For, one day, he made an unusually elaborate stalk after
an unusually fine big Picket-pin, carried out all his absurd tactics,
finishing with the grand, boisterous charge, and actually caught his
victim; but this time it happened to be a _wooden_ picket-pin. Any one
who doubts that a dog knows when he has made a fool of himself should
have seen Chink that day as he sheepishly sneaked out of sight behind
the tent.


CHIPMUNKS

Every one recognizes as a Chipmunk the lively little creature that, with
striped coat and with tail aloft, dashes across all the roads and
chirrups on all the log piles that line the roads throughout the
timbered portions of the Park. I am sure I have often seen a thousand of
them in a mile of road between the Mammoth Hot Springs and Norris Geyser
Basin. The traveller who makes the entire round of the Park may see a
hundred thousand if he keeps his eyes open. While every one knows them
at once for Chipmunks, it takes a second and more careful glance to show
they are of three totally distinct kinds.


THE GROUND-SQUIRREL THAT PRETENDS IT'S A CHIPMUNK

First, largest, and least common, is the Big Striped Ground-squirrel,
the Golden Ground-squirrel or Say's Ground-squirrel, called
scientifically _Citellus lateralis cinerascens_. This, in spite of its
livery, is not a Chipmunk at all but a Ground-squirrel that is trying
hard to be a Chipmunk. And it makes a good showing so far as manners,
coat and stripes are concerned, but the incontrovertible evidence of its
inner life, as indicated by skull and makeup, tells us plainly that it
is merely a Ground-squirrel, a first cousin to the ignoble Picket-pin.

I found it especially common in the higher parts of the Park. It is
really a mountain species, at home chiefly among the rocks, yet is very
ready to take up its abode under buildings. At the Lake Hotel I saw a
number of them that lived around the back door, and were almost tamed
through the long protection there given them. Like most of these small
rodents, they are supposed to be grain-eaters but they really are
omnivorous, and quite ready to eat flesh and eggs, as well as seeds and
fruit. Warren in his "Mammals of Colorado," tells of having seen one of
these Ground-squirrels kill some young Bluebirds; and adds another
instance of flesh-eating observed in the Yellowstone Park, where he and
two friends, riding along one of the roads, saw a Say Ground-squirrel
demurely squatting on a log, holding in its arms a tiny young Meadow
Mouse, from which it picked the flesh as one might pick corn from a cob.
Meadow Mice are generally considered a nuisance, and the one devoured
probably was of a cantankerous disposition; but just the same it gives
one an unpleasant sensation to think of this elegant little creature, in
appearance, innocence personified, wearing all the insignia of a
grain-eater, yet ruthlessly indulging in such a bloody and cannibal
feast.


A FOUR-LEGGED BIRD--THE NORTHERN CHIPMUNK

The early naturalists who first made the acquaintance of the Eastern
Ground-squirrel named it Tamias or "The Steward." Later the Northern
Chipmunk was discovered and it was found to be more of a Chipmunk than
its Eastern cousin. The new one had all the specialties of the old kind,
but in a higher degree. So they named this one _Eutamias_, which means
"good" or "extra good" Chipmunk. And extra good this exquisite little
creature surely is in all that goes to make a charming, graceful, birdy,
pert and vivacious four-foot. In everything but colours it is Eutamias
or Tamias of a more intensified type. Its tail is long in proportion and
carried differently, being commonly held straight up, so that the
general impression one gets is of a huge tail with a tiny striped animal
attached to its lower end.

[Illustration]

Its excessive numbers along the roads in the Park are due to two things:
First, the food, for oats are continually spilled from the freighting
wagons. Second, the protection of piles of pine trees cut and cast aside
in clearing the roadway.

There is one habit of the Eastern Chipmunk that I have not noted in the
mountain species, and that is the habit of song. In the early spring and
late autumn when the days are bright and invigorating, the Eastern
Chipmunk will mount some log, stump or other perch and express his
exuberant joy in a song which is a rapid repetition of a bird-like note
suggested by "Chuck," "Chuck," or "Chock," "Chock." This is kept up two
or three minutes without interruption, and is one of those delightful
woodland songs whose charm comes rather from association than from its
inherent music.

If our Western Chipmunk is as far ahead in matters musical as he is in
form and other habits, I shall expect him to render no less than the
song of a nightingale when he gives himself up to express his wild
exuberance in a chant.

I shall never forget the days I spent with a naturalist friend in an old
mill building in western Manitoba. It was in a pine woods which was
peopled with these little Chipmunks. They had hailed the mill and its
wood piles, and especially the stables, with their squandered oats, as
the very gifts of a beneficient Providence for their use and benefit.
They had concentrated on the mill; they were there in hundreds, almost
thousands, and whenever one looked across the yard in sunny hours one
could see a dozen or more together.

The old mill was infested with them as an old brewery with rats. But in
many respects besides beauty they were an improvement on rats: they did
not smell, they were not vicious, and they did not move by night.

[Illustration]

During the daytime they were everywhere and into everything. Our slender
stock of provisions was badly reduced when, by mischance, the tin box
was left open a few hours, but we loved to see so much beautiful life
about and so forgave them. One of our regular pleasures was to sit back
after a meal and watch these pert-eyed, four-legged birds scramble onto
the table, eat the scraps and lick all the plates and platters clean.

Like all the Chipmunks and Ground-squirrels, this animal has
well-developed cheek-pouches which it uses for carrying home seeds and
roots which serve for food in the winter. Or perhaps we should say in
the early spring, for the Chipmunk, like the Ground-squirrel, goes into
the ground for a long repose as soon as winter comes down hard and
white.

Yet it does not go so early or stay so late as its big cousin. October
still sees it active, even running about in the snow. As late as October
31st at Breckenridge, Col., I saw one sitting up on a log and eating
some grass or seeds during a driving snowstorm. High up in the
Shoshonees, after winter had settled down, on October 8, 1898, I saw one
of these bright creatures bounding through the snow. On a stone he
paused to watch me and I made a hasty sketch of his attitude.

[Illustration]

Then, again, it is out in the spring, early in April, so that it is
above ground for at least seven months of the year. Its nest is in a
chamber at the end of a long tunnel that it digs under ground, usually
among roots that make hard digging for the creatures that would rout
them out. Very little is known as yet, however, about the growth or
development of the young, so here is an opportunity for the young
naturalist who would contribute something to our knowledge of this
interesting creature.


A STRIPED PIGMY--THE LEAST CHIPMUNK

Closely akin to this one and commonly mistaken for its young, is the
Least Chipmunk (_Eutamias minimus_), which is widely diffused in the
great dry central region of the Continent. Although so generally found
and so visible when found, its history is practically unknown. It
probably lives much like its relatives, raising a brood of four to six
young in a warm chamber far underground, and brings them up to eat all
manner of seeds, grains, fruits, herbs, berries, insects, birds, eggs,
and even mice, just as do most of its kinsmen, but no one has proved any
of these things. Any exact observations you may make are sure to be
acceptable contributions to science.




       *       *       *       *       *

IX

The Rabbits and their Habits

       *       *       *       *       *

[Illustration: XXVII. The Snowshoe Hare is a cross between a Rabbit and
a Snowdrift
_Captives; photo by E. T. Seton_]

[Illustration: XXVIII. The Cottontail freezing
_Photos after sunset, by E. T. Seton_]




IX

The Rabbits and their Habits

[Illustration]


If the Wolf may be justly proud of his jaws and the Antelope of his
legs, I am sure that the Rabbit should very properly glory in his
matchless fecundity. To perfect this power he has consecrated all the
splendid energies of his vigorous frame, and he has magnified his
specialty into a success that is worth more to his race than could be
any other single gift.

[Illustration]

Rabbits are without weapons of defense, and are simple-minded to the
last degree. Most are incapable of long-distance speed, but all have an
exuberance of multiplication that fills their ranks as fast as foe can
thin the line. If, indeed, they did not have several families, several
times a year, they would have died out several epochs back.

[Illustration]

There are three marked types of Rabbits in the Rockies--the Cottontail,
the Snowshoe, and the Jackrabbit. All of them are represented on the
Yellowstone, besides the little Coney of the rocks which is a remote
second cousin of the family.


MOLLY COTTONTAIL, THE CLEVER FREEZER

[Illustration: Molly Freezing]

I have often had occasion to comment on the "freezing" of animals. When
they are suddenly aware of a near enemy or confronted by unexpected
situations, their habit is to _freeze_--that is, become perfectly rigid,
and remain so until the danger is past or at least comprehended.

Molly Cottontail is one of the best "freezers." Whenever she does not
know what to do, she does nothing, obeying the old Western rule, "Never
rush when you are rattled." Now Molly is a very nervous creature. Any
loud, sharp noise is liable to upset her, and feeling herself unnerved
she is very apt to stop and simply "freeze." Keep this in mind when next
you meet a Cottontail, and get a photograph.

In July, 1902, I tried it myself. I was camped with a lot of Sioux
Indians on the banks of the Cheyenne River in Dakota. They had their
families with them, and about sundown one of the boys ran into the tepee
for a gun, and then fired into the grass. His little brother gave a
war-whoop that their "pa" might well have been proud of, then rushed
forward and held up a fat Cottontail, kicking her last kick. Another, a
smaller Cottontail, was found not far away, and half a dozen young
redskins armed with sticks crawled up, then suddenly let them fly. Bunny
was hit, knocked over, and before he could recover, a dog had him.

[Illustration]

I had been some distance away. On hearing the uproar I came back toward
my own campfire, and as I did so, my Indian guide pointed to a
Cottontail twenty feet away gazing toward the boys. The guide picked up
a stick of firewood.

The boys saw him, and knowing that another Rabbit was there they came
running. Now I thought they had enough game for supper and did not wish
them to kill poor Molly. But I knew I could not stop them by saying
that, so I said: "Hold on till I make a photo." Some of them understood;
at any rate, my guide did, and all held back as I crawled toward the
Rabbit. She took alarm and was bounding away when I gave a shrill
whistle which turned her into a "frozen" statue. Then I came near and
snapped the camera. The Indian boys now closed in and were going to
throw, but I cried out: "Hold on! not yet; I want another." So I chased
Bunny twenty or thirty yards, then gave another shrill whistle, and got
a fourth snap. Again I had to hold the boys back by "wanting another
picture." Five times I did this, taking five pictures, and all the while
steering Molly toward a great pile of drift logs by the river. I had now
used up all my films.

The boys were getting impatient. So I addressed the Cottontail solemnly
and gently: "Bunny, I have done my best for you. I cannot hold these
little savages any longer. You see that pile of logs over there? Well,
Bunny, you have just five seconds to get into that wood-pile. Now git!"
and I shooed and clapped my hands, and all the young Indians yelled and
hurled their clubs, the dogs came bounding and Molly fairly dusted the
earth.

"Go it, Molly!"

"Go it, dogs!"

"Ki-yi, Injuns!"

The clubs flew and rattled around her, but Molly put in ten feet to the
hop and ten hops to the second (almost), and before the chase was well
begun it was over; her cotton tuft disappeared under a log; she was safe
in the pile of wood, where so far as I know she lived happy ever after.

[Illustration]


THE RABBIT THAT WEARS SNOWSHOES

The Snowshoe Rabbit is found in all parts of the Park, though not in
very great numbers. It is called "Snowshoe" on account of the size of
its feet, which, already large, are in snow time made larger by fringes
of stiff bristles that give the creature such a broad area of support
that it can skip on the surface of soft snow while all its kinsmen sink
in helplessness.

[Illustration]

Here is the hind foot of a Snowshoe in winter, contrasted with the hind
foot of a Jackrabbit that was nearly three times its weight.

Rabbits are low in the scale of intelligence, but they are high enough
to have some joy in social life. It always gives one a special thrill of
satisfaction when favoured with a little glimpse into the home ways, the
games, or social life of an animal; and the peep I had into the Rabbit
world one night, though but a small affair, I have always remembered
with pleasure, and hope for a second similar chance.

This took place in the Bitterroot Mountains in Idaho, in 1902. My wife
and I were out on a pack-train trip with two New York friends. We had
seen some rough country in Colorado and Wyoming, but we soon agreed that
the Bitterroots were the roughest of all the mountains. It took
twenty-eight horses to carry the stuff, for which eighteen were enough
in the more southern Rockies.

[Illustration]

The trails were so crooked and hidden in thick woods, that sometimes
the man at the rear might ride the whole day, and never see all the
horses until we stopped again for the night.


THE TERROR OF THE MOUNTAIN TRAILS

[Illustration]

There were other annoyances, and among them a particularly dangerous
animal. The country was fairly stocked with Moose, Elk, Blacktail,
Sheep, Goats, Badgers, Skunks, Wolverines, Foxes, Coyotes, Mountain
Lions, Lynx, Wolves, Black Bears and Grizzly Bears, but it was none of
these that inspired us with fear. The deadly, dangerous creature, the
worst of all, was the common Yellow-Jacket-Wasp. These Wasps abounded in
the region. Their nests were so plentiful that many were on, or by, the
narrow crooked trails that we must follow. Generally these trails were
along the mountain shoulder with a steep bank on the upside, and a sheer
drop on the other. It was at just such dangerous places that we seemed
most often to find the Yellow-Jackets at home. Roused by the noise and
trampling, they would assail the horses in swarms, and then there would
be a stampede of bucking, squealing, tortured animals. Some would be
forced off the trail, and, as has often happened elsewhere, dashed to
their death below. This was the daily danger.

[Illustration]

One morning late in September we left camp about eight, and set off in
the usual line, the chief guide leading and the rest of us distributed
at intervals among the pack-horses, as a control. Near the rear was the
cook, after him a pack-horse with tins and dishes, and last of all
myself.

At first we saw no wasps, as the morning was frosty, but about ten the
sun had become strong, the air was quite mild, and the wasps became
lively. For all at once I heard the dreaded cry, "_Yellow-Jackets_!"
Then in a moment it was taken up by the cook just ahead of me.
"Yellow-Jackets! look out!" with a note almost of terror in his voice.

At once his horse began to plunge and buck. I saw the man of pots
clinging to the saddle and protecting his face as best he could, while
his mount charged into the bushes and disappeared.

Then "_bzz-z-z-z_" they went at the pot-horse and again the bucking and
squealing, with pots going clank, clink, rattle and away.

"_Bzz-z-z-z-z_" and in a moment the dark and raging little terrors came
at me in a cloud. I had no time to stop, or get off, or seek another
way. So I jerked up a coat collar to save my face, held my head low, and
tried to hold on, while the little pony went insane with the fiery
baptism now upon him. Plunging, kicking, and squealing he went, and I
stuck, to him for one--two--three jumps, but at number four, as I
remember it, I went flying over his head, fortunately up hill, and
landed in the bushes unhurt, but ready for peace at any price.

It is good old wisdom to "lay low in case of doubt," and very low I lay
there, waiting for the war to cease. It was over in a few seconds, for
my horse dashed after his fellows and passed through the bushes, so that
the winged scorpions were left behind. Presently I lifted my head and
looked cautiously toward the wasp's-nest. It was in a bank twenty feet
away, and the angry swarm was hovering over it, like smoke from a vent
hole. They were too angry, and I was too near, to run any risks, so I
sank down again and waited. In one or two minutes I peered once more,
getting a sight under a small log lying eight or ten feet away. And as I
gazed waspward my eye also took in a brown furry creature calmly sitting
under the log, wabbling his nose at me and the world about him. It was a
young Snowshoe Rabbit.

[Illustration]


BUNNY'S RIDE

There is a certain wild hunter instinct in us all, a wish to capture
every wood creature we meet. That impulse came on me in power. There was
no more danger from wasps, so I got cautiously above this log, put a
hand down at each side, grabbed underneath, and the Rabbit was my
prisoner. Now I had him, what was I going to do with him--kill him?
Certainly not. I began to talk to him. "Now what _did_ I catch you for?"
His only reply was a wobble of his nose, so I continued: "I didn't know
when I began, but I know now. I want to get your picture." And again the
nose wobbled.

I could not take it then as my camera had gone on with my horse. I had
nothing to put the Rabbit in. I could not put it in my pocket as that
would mean crushing it in some early tumble; I needed both my hands to
climb with and catch my horse, so for lack of a better place I took off
my hat and said, "Bunny, how would you like to ride in that?" He wobbled
his nose, which I understood to mean that he didn't care. So I put the
Rabbit on my head, and put the hat on again.

[Illustration]

Then I went forward and found that the cook had recovered his pots and
pans; all was well now and my horse was awaiting me.

I rode all the rest of that day with the Rabbit quietly nestling in my
hair. It was a long, hard day, for we continued till nightfall and then
made a dark camp in a thick pine woods. It was impossible to make
pictures then, so I put the little Rabbit under a leatheroid telescope
lid, on a hard level place, gave him food and water, and left him for
use in the morning.


THE RABBIT DANCE

About nine o'clock that night we were sitting about the fire, when from
the near woods was heard a tremendous "_tap-tap-taptrrr_," so loud and
so near that we all jumped and stared into the darkness. Again it came,
"_tap-tap-tap trrrrr_," a regular drum tattoo.

"What is that?" we all exclaimed, and at that moment a large Rabbit
darted across the open space lighted by the fire.

Again the tattoo and another Rabbit dashed across. Then it dawned on me
that that was the young Rabbit signalling to his friends. He was using
the side of his box for a drum.

Again the little prisoner rolled his signal call, and then a third
Snowshoe Rabbit appeared.

"Look at all the Rabbits!" exclaimed my friend. "Where is my gun?"

"No," I said, "you don't need your gun. Wait and see. There is something
up. That little chap is ringing up central."

"I never saw so many together in all my life," said he. Then added:
"I've got an acetylene lantern; perhaps we can get a picture."

[Illustration]

As soon as he had his camera and lantern, we went cautiously to the
rabbity side of the woods; several ran past us. Then we sat down on a
smooth place. My friend held the camera, I held the light, but we rested
both on the ground. Very soon a Rabbit darted from the darkness into the
great cone of light from the lantern, gazed at that wonder for a moment,
gave a "thump" and disappeared. Then another came; then two or three.
They gazed into this unspeakably dazzling thing, then one gave the alarm
by thumping, and all were lost to sight.

But they came again and in ever-increasing numbers, 4, 5, 7, 8, 10 at
last, now in plain view, gazing wildly at the bright light, pushing
forward as though fascinated. Some two or three so close together that
they were touching each other. Then one gave the thumping alarm, and all
scattered like leaves, to vanish like ghosts. But they came back again,
to push and crawl up nearer to that blazing wonder. Some of the back
ones were skipping about but the front ones edged up in a sort of
wild-eyed fascination. Closer and closer they got, then the first one
was so near that reaching out to smell the lantern he burnt his nose,
and at his alarm thump, all disappeared in the woods. But they soon
returned to disport again in that amazing brightness; and, stimulated
by the light, they danced about, chasing each other, dodging around in
large circles till one of the outermost leaped over the camera box and
another following him, leaped up and sat on it. My friend was just
behind, hidden by the light in front, and he had no trouble in clutching
the impudent Rabbit with both hands. Instantly it set up a loud
squealing. The other Rabbits gave a stamping signal, and in a moment all
were lost in the woods, but the one we held. Quickly we transported it
to another leatheroid box, intending to take its picture in the morning,
but the prisoner had a means of attack that I had not counted on. Just
as we were going to sleep he began with his front feet on the resounding
box and beat a veritable drum tattoo of alarm. Every one in camp was
awakened, and again, as we were dropping off, the camp was roused by
another loud "tattoo." For nearly two hours this went on; then, about
midnight, utterly unable to sleep, I arose and let the drummer go about
his business, do anything or go anywhere, so only he would be quiet and
let us attend to ours.

[Illustration: XXIX. The Baby Cottontail that rode twenty miles in my
hat
_Photo by E. T. Seton_]

[Illustration: XXX. Snowshoe Rabbits dancing in the light of the lantern
_Sketch by E. T. Seton_]

Next morning I photographed the little Bunny, and set him free to join
his kin. It is a surprising fact that though we spent two weeks in this
valley, and a month in those mountains, we did not see another wild
Rabbit.

This incident is unique in my experience. It is the only time when I
found the Snowshoe Hares gathered for a social purpose, and is the only
approach to a game that I ever heard of among them.


THE GHOST RABBIT

An entirely different side of Rabbit life is seen in another mysterious
incident that I have never been able to explain.

At one time when I lived in Ontario, I had a very good hound that was
trained to follow all kinds of trails. I used to take him out in the
woods at night, give him general instructions "to go ahead, and report
everything afoot"; then sit down on a log to listen to his reports. And
he made them with remarkable promptness. Slight differences in his bark,
and the course taken, enabled me to tell at once whether it was Fox,
Coon, Rabbit, Skunk, or other local game. And his peculiar falsetto yelp
when the creature treed, was a joyful invitation to "come and see for
yourself."

[Illustration]

The hound's bark for a Fox was deep, strong, and at regular intervals as
befitted the strong trail, and the straightaway run. But for a Rabbit
it was broken, uncertain, irregular and rarely a good deep bay.

[Illustration]

One night the dog bawled in his usual way, "Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit," and
soon leaving the woods he crossed an open field where the moon shone
brightly, and I could easily see to follow. Still yelping "Rabbit,
Rabbit, Rabbit," he dashed into a bramble thicket in the middle of the
field. But at once he dashed out again shrieking, "Police! Help!
Murder!" and took refuge behind me, cowering up against my legs. At the
same moment from the side of that bramble thicket there went out--_a
Rabbit_. Yes, a common Rabbit all right, but it was a _snow-white_ one.
The first albino Cottontail I had ever seen, and apparently the first
albino Cottontail that[C] Ranger had ever seen. Dogs are not supposed to
be superstitious, but on that occasion Ranger behaved exactly as though
he thought that he had seen a ghost.


A NARROW-GAUGE MULE--THE PRAIRIE HARE

[Illustration]

One has to see this creature with its great flopping ears, and its
stiff-legged jumping like a bucking mule, to realize the aptness of its
Western nickname.

As it bounds away from your pathway its bushy snow-white tail and the
white behind the black-tipped ears will point out plainly that it is
neither the Texas Jackrabbit nor the Rocky Mountain Cottontail, but the
White-tailed Jackrabbit, the finest of all our Hares.

I have met it in woods, mountains, and prairies, from California to
Manitoba and found it the wildest of its race and almost impossible of
approach; _except_ in the great exceptional spot, the Yellowstone Park.
Here in the August of 1912 I met with two, close to the Mammoth Hot
Springs Hotel. At a distance of thirty feet they gave me good chances to
take pictures, and though the light was very bad I made a couple of
snaps. Fifteen years ago, when first I roamed in the Park, the Prairie
Hare was exceedingly rare, but now, like so many of the wild folk, it
has become quite common. Another evidence of the efficacy of protection.

This silvery-gray creature turns pure white in the winter, when the snow
mantle of his range might otherwise make it too conspicuous.


THE BUMP OF MOSS THAT SQUEAKS

No matter how horrible a certain climate or surroundings may seem to us,
they are sure to be the ideal of some wild creature, its very dream of
bliss. I suppose that slide rock, away up in cold, bleak, windy country
above the timber-line, is absolutely the unloveliest landscape and most
repulsive home ground that a man could find in the mountains and yet it
is the paradise, the perfect place of a wonderful little creature that
is found on the high peaks of the Rockies from California to Alaska.

It is not especially abundant in the Yellowstone Park, but it was there
that first I made its acquaintance, and Easterners will meet with it in
the great Reserve more often than in all other parts of its range put
together.

[Illustration]

As one reaches the Golden Gate, near Mammoth Hot Springs, many little
animals of the Ground-squirrel group are seen running about, and from
the distance comes a peculiar cry, a short squeak uttered every ten or
fifteen seconds. You stop, perhaps search with your eye the remote
hillside, but you are looking too far afield. Glance toward the tumbled
rock piles, look at every high point. There on top of one you note a
little gray lump, like a bump of moss, the size of your fist, clinging
to the point of the rock. Fix your glasses on it, and you will see
plainly that the squeak is made by this tiny creature, like a
quarter-grown Rabbit with short, round, white-rimmed ears and no
visible tail. This is the curious little animal that cannot be happy
anywhere but in the slide rock; this is the Calling Hare. "Little Chief
Hare" is its Indian name, but it has many others of much currency, such
as "Pika," and "Starved Rat," the latter because it is never fat. The
driver calls it a "Coney," or "Rock Rabbit." In its colour, size, shape,
and habits it differs from all other creatures in the region; it is
impossible to mistake it. Though a distant kinsman of the Rabbits, it is
unlike them in looks and ways. Thus it has, as noted, the very
un-rabbit-like habit of squeaking from some high lookout. This is
doubtless a call of alarm to let the rest of the company know that there
is danger about, for the Coney is a gregarious creature; there may be a
hundred of them in the rock-slide.

Some years ago, in Colorado, I sketched one of the Coneys by help of a
field glass. He was putting all the force of his energetic little soul
into the utterance of an alarm cry for the benefit of his people.

But the most interesting habit of this un-rabbity Rabbit is its way of
preparing for winter.

[Illustration]

When the grass, the mountain dandelions, and the peavines are at their
best growth for making hay, the Coney, with his kind, goes warily from
his stronghold in the rocks to the nearest stretch of herbage, and there
cuts as much as he can carry of the richest growths; then laden with a
bundle as big as himself, and very much longer, he makes for the rocks,
and on some flat open place spreads the herbage out to be cured for his
winter hay. Out in full blaze of the sun he leave it, and if some
inconsiderate rock comes in between, to cast a shadow on his hay
a-curing, he moves the one that is easiest to move; he never neglects
his hay. When dry enough to be safe, he packs it away into his barn, the
barn being a sheltered crevice in the rocks where the weather cannot
harm it, and where it will continue good until the winter time, when
otherwise there would be a sad pinch of famine in the Coney world. The
trappers say that they can tell whether the winter will be hard or open
by the amount of food stored up in the Coney barns.

[Illustration]

Many a one of these I have examined in the mountains of British Columbia
and Colorado, as well as in the Park. The quantity of hay in them varies
from what might fill a peck measure to what would make a huge armful.
Among the food plants used, I found many species of grass, thistle,
meadow-rue, peavine, heath, and the leaves of several composite plants.
I suspect that fuller observations will show that they use every herb
not actually poisonous, that grows in the vicinity of their citadel.
More than one of these wads of hay had in the middle of it a nest or
hollow; not, I suspect, the home nest where the young are raised, but a
sort of winter restaurant where they could go while the ground was
covered with snow, and sitting in the midst of their provisions, eat to
their heart's content.

It is not unlikely that in this we see the growth of the storage habit,
beginning first with a warm nest of hay, which it was found could be
utilized for food when none other was available. The fact that these
barns are used year after year is shown by the abundance of pellets in
several layers which were found in and about them.


THE WEATHERWISE CONEY

[Illustration]

A very wise little people is this little people of the Rocks. Not only
do they realize that in summer they must prepare for winter, but they
know how to face a present crisis, however unexpected. To appreciate the
following instance, we must remember that the central thought in the
Coney's life is his "grub pile" for winter use, and next that he is a
strictly daytime animal. I have often slept near a Coney settlement and
never heard a sound or seen a sign of their being about after dark.
Nevertheless, Merriam tells us that he and Vernon Bailey once carried
their blankets up to a Coney colony above timber-line in the Salmon
River Mountains of Idaho, intending to spend the night there and to
study the Coneys whose piles of hay were visible in all directions on
their rocks. As this was about the first of September, it was natural to
expect fair weather and a complete curing of the hay in a week or so.
But a fierce storm set in with the descending night. The rain changed to
hail and then to snow, and much to the surprise of the naturalists, they
heard the squeak of the Coneys all night long.

These animals love the sunshine, the warmth and the daylight, and dread
cold and darkness as much as we do. It must have been a bitter
experience when at the call of the older ones every little Coney had to
tumble out of his warm bed in the chill black hours and face the driving
sleet to save the winter's supplies. But tumble out they did, and
overtime they worked, hard and well, for when the morning dawned the
slide-rock and the whole world was covered deep in snow, but every
haycock had been removed to a safer place under the rocks, and the
wisdom of the Coney once more exemplified, with adequate energy to make
it effective.

[Illustration]

[Illustration: XXXI. Snowshoe Rabbits fascinated by the lantern
_Sketched in the Bitterroot Mts. by E. T. Seton_]

[Illustration: XXXII. The Ghost Rabbit
_Sketch by E. T. Seton_]


HIS SAFETY IS IN THE ROCKS

No one has ever yet found the home nest of the Calling Hare. It is so
securely hidden under rocks, and in galleries below rocks, that all
attempts to dig it out have thus far failed. I know of several men, not
to mention Bears, Badgers, Wolverines, and Grizzlies, who have essayed
to unearth the secret of the Coney's inner life. Following on the trail
of a Coney that bleated derisively at me near Pagoda Peak, Col., I began
at once to roll rocks aside in an effort to follow him home to his den.
The farther I went the less satisfaction I found. The uncertain trail
ramified more and more as I laboured. Once or twice from far below me I
heard a mocking squeak that spurred me on, but that too, ceased. When
about ten tons of rock had been removed I was baffled. There were half a
dozen possible lines of continuation, and while I paused to wipe the
"honest sweat" from my well-meaning brow, I heard behind me the "weak,"
"weak," of my friend as though giving his estimate of my resolution, and
I descried him--I suppose the same--on a rock point like a moss-bump
against the sky-line away to the left. Only, one end of the moss-bump
moved a little each time a squeak was cast upon the air. I had not time
to tear down the whole mountain, so I did as my betters, the Bears and
Badgers have done before me, I gave it up. I had at least found out why
the Coney avoids the pleasant prairie and the fertile banks, and I
finished with a new and profounder understanding of the Scripture text
which says in effect, "As for the Coney, his safe refuge is in the
rocks."


FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote C: It proved later to be an albino domestic Rabbit run wild.]




       *       *       *       *       *

X

Ghosts of the Campfire

       *       *       *       *       *

[Illustration]




X

Ghosts of the Campfire


It is always worth while to cultivate the old guides. Young guides are
often fresh and shallow, but the quiet old fellows, that have spent
their lives in the mountains, must be good or they could not stay in the
business; and they have seen so much and been so far that they are like
rare old manuscript volumes, difficult to read, but unique and full of
value. It is not easy to get them to talk, but there is a combination
that often does it. First, show yourself worthy of their respect by
holding up your end, be it in an all-day climb or breakneck ride; then
at night, after the others have gone to bed, you sit while the old guide
smokes, and by a few brief questions and full attention, show that you
value any observations he may choose to make. Many happy hours and much
important information have been my reward for just such cautious play,
and often as we sat, there flitted past, in the dim light, the silent
shadowy forms of the campfire ghosts. Swift, not twinkling, but looming
light and fading, absolutely silent. Sometimes approaching so near that
the still watcher can get the glint of beady eyes or even of a snowy
breast, for these ghosts are merely the common Mice of the mountains,
abounding in every part of the West.

[Illustration]

There are half a dozen different kinds, yet most travellers will be
inclined to bunch them all, and pass them by as mere Mice. But they are
worthy of better treatment. Three, at least, are so different in form
and ways that you should remember them by their names.

First is the _Whitefooted or Deer-mouse_. This is the one that you find
in the coffee pot or the water bucket in the morning; this is the one
that skips out of the "grub box" when the cook begins breakfast; and
this is the one that runs over your face with its cold feet as you sleep
nights. It is one of the most widely diffused mammals in North America
to-day, and probably the most numerous.

It is an elegant little creature, with large, lustrous black eyes like
those of a Deer, a fact which, combined with its large ears, the
fawn-coloured back, and the pure white breast, has given it the name of
"Deer-mouse." It is noted for drumming with one foot as a call to its
mate, and for uttering a succession of squeaks and trills that serve it
as a song.

Sometimes its nest is underground; and sometimes in a tree, whence the
name Tree-mouse. It breeds several times in a year and does not
hibernate, so is compelled to lay up stores of food for winter use. To
help it in doing this it has a very convenient pair of capacious
pockets, one in each cheek, opening into the mouth.


THE JUMPING MOUSE

He glides around the fire much as the others do, but at the approach of
danger, he simply fires himself out of a catapult, afar into the night.
Eight or ten feet he can cover in one of these bounds and he can, and
does, repeat them as often as necessary. How he avoids knocking out his
own brains in his travels I have not been able to understand.

This is the New World counterpart of the Jerboa, so familiar in our
school books as a sort of diminutive but glorified kangaroo that
frequents the great Pyramids. It is so like a Jerboa in build and
behaviour that I was greatly surprised and gratified to find my
scientist friends quite willing that I should style it the American
representative of the African group.

[Illustration]

The country folk in the East will tell you that there are "seven
sleepers" in our woods, and enumerate them thus: the Bear, the Coon, the
Skunk, the Woodchuck, the Chipmunk, the Bat, and the Jumping Mouse. All
are good examples, but the longest, soundest sleeper of the whole
somnolent brotherhood is the Jumping Mouse. Weeks before summer is ended
it has prepared a warm nest deep underground, beyond the reach of cold
or rain, and before the early frost has nipped the aster, the Jumping
Mouse and his wife curl up with their long tails around themselves like
cords on a spool, and sleep the deadest kind of a dead sleep, unbroken
by even a snore, until summer is again in the land, and frost and snow
unknown. This means at least seven months on the Yellowstone.