and more efficient, even as a flyer. As the pricked-up ears of the bat
caught the swish of the falcon's wings, the beats of its own
skin-covered pair increased, and the bird suddenly ceased to gain.
Disdaining to double or zigzag, the great bat flew the straightaway
race which the falcon loves, and which would have meant quick death to
any bird who tried it. Skin, however, makes a better flying surface
than feathers, and slowly but unmistakably the bat began to draw away
from its pursuer. The gyrfalcon is the speed-king among birds, but the
hoary bat is faster still. Five, ten, fifteen minutes passed before
the hawk realized that he was being outflown. Increase his speed as he
would, the bat, in an effortless nonchalant manner, moved farther
away. When only a streak of silver sky, with a shoal of little violet
clouds, was left of the daylight the gyrfalcon gave up the chase. As
he swooped down to earth like a white meteor, the brown figure of the
bat disappeared in the violet twilight, beating, beating his way
south.
As the sky darkened to a peacock-blue, and a faint amber band in the
west tried to bar the dark, suddenly the star-shine was full of soft
pipings and chirpings. The night-flyers had begun their journey, and
were calling back and forth heartening each other as they flew through
the long dark hours. Against the golden disc of the rising moon a
continuous procession of tiny black figures showed the whole sky to be
full of these pilgrims from the north. The "chink, chink" of the
bobolinks dropped through the stillness like silver coins; and from
higher up came the "tsip, tsip, tsip" of the black-poll warblers, all
the way from the Magdalen Islands. With them were a score or so of
others of the great warbler family. Black-throated blues, Cape Mays,
redstarts, golden-wings, yellow warblers, black-throated greens,
magnolias, myrtles, and tiny parulas--myriads of this many-colored
family were traveling together through the sky. With them went the
vireos, the orioles, the tanagers, and four different kinds of
thrushes, with a dozen or so other varieties of birds following.
Most of them had put on their traveling clothes for the long journey.
The tanagers had laid aside their crimson and black, and wore
yellowish-green suits. The indigo bird had lost his vivid blue, the
rose stain of the rose-breasted grosbeak was gone, along with the
white cheeks of the black-poll warbler and the black throat of the
black-throated green, while the bobolinks wore sober coats of
olive-buff streaked with black, in place of their cream-white and
velvet black.
Once during the night, as the army crossed an Atlantic cape, a
lighthouse flashed its fatal eye at them. Immediately the ranks of the
flyers broke, and in confused groups they circled around and around
the witch-fire which no bird may pass. For hours they flew in dizzying
circles, until, weary and bewildered, some of the weaker ones began to
sink toward the dark water. Fortunately for them, at midnight the
color of the light changed from white to red. Instantly the prisoners
were freed from the spell which only the white light lays upon them,
and in a minute the air was filled with glad flight-calls, as the
released ranks hurried on and away through the dark.
All night long they flew steadily, and turned earthward only at
sunrise. As the weary flyers sought the trees and fields for rest and
food, overhead, against a crimson and gold dawn, passed the
long-distance champion of the skies--the Arctic tern, with its
snow-white breast, black head, curved wings, and forked tail. Nesting
as far north as it can find land, only seven and a half degrees from
the Pole, it flies eleven thousand miles to the Antarctic, and,
ranging from pole to pole, sees more daylight than any other creature.
For eight months of its year it never knows night, and during the
other four has more daylight than dark. Scorner of all lands,
tireless, unresting, this dweller in the loneliest places of earth
flashed white across the dawn-sky--and was gone.
V
THE LITTLE PEOPLE
The swamp-maples showed rose-red and gold-green in the warm sunlight,
and the woods were etched lavender-brown against a heliotrope sky. The
bluebird, with the sky-color on his back and the red-brown of earth at
his breast, called, "Far-away! far-away! far-away!" in his soft sweet
contralto. From a wet meadow a company of rusty blackbirds, with short
tails and white eyes, sang together like a flock of creaking
wheelbarrows, with single split notes sounding constantly above the
squealing chorus. Beyond the meadow was a little pool, where the air
was vibrant with the music of the frogs. The hylas sang like a chest
of whistles so shrill that the air quivered with their song. At
intervals, a single clear flute-note rose above the chorus, the
love-call of the little red salamander; while the drawling mutter of
cricket-frogs, the trilled call of the wood-frogs, and the soft croon
of the toad added delicate harmonies. Near-by a song-sparrow sang
wheezingly from a greening willow tree, but its note sounded flat
compared with the shrill, high sweetness of the batrachian chorus.
Near the top of Prindle Hill was a dry warm slope, with stretches of
underbrush, pasture, and ledges of rock rising to the patch of woods
which crowned the crest of the hill. Beyond was a tiny lake.
Everywhere along the sunny slope were small round holes bored through
the tough turf. As the sun rose higher and higher, little waves of
heat penetrated deep below the grass-roots.
Suddenly, from out of one of the holes, a little pointed nose was
thrust, and a second later the first chipmunk of the year darted above
ground from the burrow where he had slept out the long winter. His
dark pepper-and-salt colored back had a black-brown stripe down the
centre and four others in pairs along either side, separated by strips
of cream-white. His cheeks, flanks, feet, and the underside of his
black fringed tail were of a light fawn-color, and he wore a silky
white waistcoat. Erecting his white-tipped tail, he sat up on his
haunches and tipping back his head, began to sing the spring song
which every chipmunk must sing when he first comes above ground at the
dawn of the year. "Chuck-a-chuck-a-chuck-a-chuck-a-chuck," he chirped
loudly, at the rate of two chirps per second.
At the very first note sharp noses and bright black eyes appeared at
every hole, and in a second a score or more other singers had whisked
out and joined in the spring chorus, each one bent on proving that his
notes were the loudest and clearest of any on the hill. One of the
last to begin was a half-grown chipmunk, who had been crowded out of
the family burrow by new arrivals the autumn before. Fortunately for
him, however, the next burrow was occupied by a chipmunk of an
inquiring disposition. Said disposition caused him to wait to
investigate the habits of a passing red fox. Thereafter his burrow was
to let, and was immediately taken possession of by the young chipmunk
aforesaid.
This new tenant came out timidly, even when he felt the thrill of
spring. Once above ground, however, he simply had to sing. At his very
first note, he sensed a difference between his voice and those of all
the others. Whereas they sang "Chuck-a-chuck-a-chuck," he sang
"Chippy, chippy, chippy." To his delighted ear his own higher notes
were far superior to those of his companions, and he shrilled away,
ecstatically, with half-closed eyes. Ten minutes went happily by. Then
a singer on the outskirts caught sight of a marsh-hawk quartering the
hillside, and gave the alarm-squeal as he dove into his hole. The song
broke in the middle, as every singer whisked underground and the
annual spring song was over. Thereafter the customary caution of a
chipmunk-colony was resumed.
At first, Chippy ventured but seldom outside of his new burrow. Far in
under the turf was the storehouse, filled by its first owner full of
hazel-nuts, cherry-pits, wild buckwheat, buttercup seeds, maple-keys,
and other chipmunk staples, all carefully cleaned, dried, and stored.
On these he lived largely during the first few weeks of spring. Then
came a day when he entered his front door with a flying leap, only to
find a burly and determined stranger blocking his way. A bustling and
lusty bachelor from another colony had spied the burrow from the
stone wall, the broad highway of all chipmunks, and had decided to
make it his own by right of conquest.
In vain Chippy fought for his home, at first desperately and then
despairingly. The other chipmunk had the advantage of weight,
experience, and position, and Chippy was forced slowly out into the
wide world. Squealing and chirping with rage, with his soft fur
fluffed up all over his sleek body, he came out into the sunlight. He
saw nothing, heard nothing, scented nothing, hostile. Yet, obeying the
little alarm-bell that rings in every chipmunk's brain, he dashed
desperately for the shelter of the stone wall. It was well for him
that he did. As he crossed the wide stretch of turf like a tawny
streak, there was a whirl of wing-beats, the flash of a gray-brown
body balanced by a narrow black-barred tail, and the shadow of death
fell upon him even as he neared his refuge. With a frightened squeal,
Chippy put every atom of the force which pulsed through his little
vibrant body into one last spring. Even as he disappeared headlong
into a chink between two large stones, a set of keen claws clamped
vainly through the long hairs of his vanishing tail, as a
sharp-shinned hawk somersaulted with a backward sweep of its wings, to
avoid dashing itself against the wall. For a moment it vibrated in the
air with cruel, crooked beak half-open, searching the wall with
unflinching golden eyes, and then skimmed sullenly away.
In a minute a pointed nose was poked out from the stones and carefully
winnowed the air. Satisfied that the coast was clear, Chippy at last
scurried up to the top of the wall, where he could see on all sides,
with a wide cranny conveniently near; for a chipmunk who desires to
live out all his days must never be more than two jumps from a hole.
Sitting up on the stone, he produced from one of the pockets which he
wore in either cheek a large hickory nut, which had been pouched there
all through his fight and flight. Holding it firmly in both his little
three-fingered, double-thumbed forepaws, he nibbled an alternate hole
in either side, through which he extracted every last fragment of the
rich, brown kernel within. While he ate, there was never a second
during which his sharp black eyes were not scanning every inch of the
circumference of which his stone was the centre. There was not an
instant that his sharp ears were not pricked up to catch the slightest
sound, and his keen nostrils to sniff the faintest scent, that would
indicate the approach of death in any of the many forms in which it
comes to chipmunks.
His meal finished, Chippy turned his instantaneous mind to the next
most important item of life. On his list of necessities, _Home_ stared
at him in capitals just under the item _Food_. A stone wall makes a
good lodging-house but a poor home, for it has too many doors.
Wherefore Chippy scampered along the top of the wall, his tail erect
like a plume, scanning the hillside as he ran for a good
building-site. At last, he came to a dry bank covered with short
twisted ringlets of tough grass, which sloped up from the stone wall
and ended in a clump of sweet fern. With a flying leap, he struck the
middle of the bank, and with another bound was safe in the depths of
the sweet fern.
From there he commenced to dig. No one has ever yet found a fleck or
flake of loose earth near the entrance to a chipmunk home. This is
because he always starts digging at the other end. Working like a
little steam-shovel, within a few days Chippy had dug a series of
intersecting tunnels, of which the main one ended between two stones
at the base of the wall. Far down among the roots of a rotting stump,
he made a warm nest of leaves and grass. From this sleeping-room a
twisted passage led to a rounded storeroom on the other side of the
stump. No less than three emergency entrances and exits were made
within a ten-foot circle; and beside the bedroom and storeroom he dug
a kitchen midden, where all refuse and garbage could be deposited and
covered with earth, in accordance with the custom of all properly
brought-up chipmunks. When at last every grain of earth had been
carried out through the first hole among the overshadowing ferns, he
sealed it up from the outside, and covered the packed earth with
leaves. Then he took a day off. Climbing to the top of the wall, he
perched himself where a single bound would take him to the main
entrance of his new home, and with his little nose pointed skyward
told the world, at the rate of one hundred and thirty chirps per
minute, what a wonderful home was his. Thereafter began an unending
search for food. On the far side of the slope he found a thicket of
hazel bushes, which had been overlooked by the rest of the colony.
Thence he would return to his burrow, looking as if he had a bad
attack of mumps. Really it was only nuts. Twelve hazel-nuts, or four
acorns, were Chippy's tonnage.
By the time the flood-tide of summer had set in, Chippy had reached
the high watermark of his youth. Larger, stronger, and swifter than
any of the younger members of the colony, he soon began to rival the
elders of the community in wisdom. Then suddenly there came to the
Little People of the Woods, a wandering demon of blood and carnage.
One sunny afternoon, while every chipmunk on that hillside was abroad,
playing, feasting, hoarding, singing, there flashed in among them a
reddish animal, with a long black-tipped tail, white chin and cheeks,
and a fierce pointed head. Sniffing here and there like a trailing
hound, it darted down upon the little colony.
It was the long-tailed, or great, weasel, whose movements are so swift
as to baffle even the quickest eye. Caught too far from their burrows,
the lives of four chipmunks went out like the puff of a candle. Then
the high alarm-squeal ran up and down the hillside, and every chipmunk
within hearing dived underground where they were all safe; for the
great weasel is just one size too large to enter a chipmunk's burrow.
Hither and there the weasel wound its way, like some fierce swift
snake. With its flaming eyes, white cheeks dabbled red with blood, and
flat triangular head swaying from side to side on a long neck, it
looked the very personification of sudden death.
Farthest from home of all the others, Chippy, the swift and wise,
faced the death which had overtaken the slow and foolish. For the
first time in his life he had climbed to the tiptop of an elm tree.
There among the topmost slender sprays he was feasting on elm-seeds,
and came hurrying down at the first alarm-note. Just as he had nearly
reached the ground, around the foot of the tree trunk was thrust the
bloody face of the killer. There is something so devilish and
implacable in the appearance of a hunting weasel, that it cows even
the bravest of the smaller animals. A gray old rat, ordinarily a grim
cynical fighter with no nerves to speak of, will run squealing in
terror from before a weasel; while a rabbit, when it sees the red
death on his trail, forgets his swiftness and cowers on the ground.
Something of the same spell came over Chippy as, for the first time,
he faced the demon of his tribe. Yet he kept his head enough to
realize that his only hope was aloft, and instantly whisked back up
the great trunk. Unfortunately for him the versatile weasel is at home
on, under, and above ground. The chipmunk had hardly reached the
topmost branch, when he felt it sway under the quick, darting motions
of his pursuer. Up and up he went, until he clung to the tiny swaying
twigs at the very spire and summit of the elm, seventy-five feet from
the ground.
In a moment, the bloody muzzle of his pursuer was sniffing along his
trail. Hunting by scent, like all of its kind, the weasel wound his
way up through the twigs, nearer and nearer to the trembling chipmunk.
Twelve inches away, the weasel stopped and, thrusting out its long
neck, seemed for the first time to see the little animal just above. A
green gleam showed in the depths of the malignant eyes.
As it shifted its weight on the swaying twigs preparatory to the
lightning-like pounce which would end the chase, the chipmunk, with a
little wailing cry, let go his hold and fell like a stone down through
the green screen of leaves and twigs that stretched between him and
the ground far below. Even as he whirled through space, his little
brain was alert to seize upon every chance for life. As he struck twig
after twig, he clutched at them with his forepaws but could get no
firm hand-hold. Fifty feet down, he managed to hook both of his little
arms across a twig about the size of a man's thumb. A cross-twig kept
his hold from slipping off, and swinging back and forth like a
pendulum, he at last managed to clamber up into a crotch of this outer
branch and crouched there, panting.
In a moment there was a scratching noise along the tree trunk, and the
weasel came down in long spirals instead of climbing straight down as
would a squirrel. The branch at the end of which the chipmunk was
perched ran out from the main trunk, then turned at right angles and
grew down almost perpendicularly, making a sharp elbow. The weasel
descended, weaving his broad, triangular head back and forth, with
little looping movements of his long neck, and sniffing the air as he
came. When he reached the branch where the chipmunk was, he stopped
and crept along the limb to the elbow. This was too much for him,
skillful climber as he was. The perpendicular drop of the branch, its
small size and smooth bark, all combined against him. Three times he
tried to follow it down. Each time he slipped so that it became
evident to him that another step would break his hold and send him
crashing to the ground.
All this time the chipmunk was in full sight, yet the bloodshot eyes
of his enemy seemed to overlook him entirely. Again and again the
weasel sniffed the air, and repeatedly returned to the limb, evidently
convinced that his intended prey was there.
Throughout, the chipmunk clung to the branch, silent and motionless.
Only the throbbing of his silky white breast showed how his heart
pounded as he watched the trailing death approaching. At last, the
weasel seemed to give up the hunt and reluctantly wound his way down
the main trunk and disappeared behind the tree.
For a full half-hour the chipmunk clung to his refuge without the
slightest movement. Finally, when it seemed as if his pursuer were
gone for good, the little animal moved cautiously up the branch, and
managed to negotiate the elbow which had baffled his heavier pursuer.
With the same caution he crept down the trunk and, after looking all
around, finally leaped to the turf beyond. As he struck the ground,
there was a rustle from the depths of a thicket a few rods away, and
out darted the weasel, which, with the fierce patience of his kind,
had been lurking there and came between the chipmunk and the scattered
homes of the colony.
Over the hilltop was the only way of escape. There lay a patch of deep
woods, where the trees grew thick and dark over a ledge of rock which
stretched up to the very summit. There, too, was hidden some mystery
as black as the shade above that lonely ledge. Often there had been no
return for chipmunks crossing that dark crest. Instinctively the
fugitive avoided the woods and circled the hill hoping to find some
refuge on the farther side.
Long ago, the weasel-folk have learned that a straight line is the
shortest distance between two points. Wherefore to-day the hunter
followed the diameter of the circle that the chipmunk was making
around the wooded hilltop. Like a flash, with tail up and head down,
the weasel wound his way among the rocks and crowded trees which
covered the hill's crest. As his triangular head thrust itself beyond
a pointed rock which jutted out from the ledge, his quick nostrils
caught a sinister, sickly scent, and he checked in his stride but--too
late. His flaming red eyes looked directly into the fixed glare of two
other eyes, black, lidless, with strange oval pupils, and set deep in
a cruel heart-shaped head, which showed a curious hole between eye and
nostril, the hall-mark of the fatal family of pit-vipers to which the
rattlesnake, copperhead, and moccasin belong.
For a second the fierce beast and the grim snake faced each other.
The eyes of none of the mammals have a fiercer, more compelling gaze
than those of the weasel-folk when red with the rage of slaughter. Yet
no beast can outstare that grim ruler of the dark places of the
forest, the timber rattlesnake, and in a moment the weasel started to
dodge back. Not even his flashing speed, however, availed against the
stroke of the snake. Faster than any eye could follow, the flat head
shot forward, gaping horribly, while two keen movable fangs were
thrust straight out like spear-points. They looked like crooked white
needles, each with a hole in the side below the point, from which
oozed the yellow venom. Before the darting weasel had time to gain the
shelter of the rock, both fangs had pierced his side, and the great
snake was back again in coil. Tottering as the deadly virus touched
the tide of his fierce blood, and knowing that his life was numbered
by seconds, the weasel yet sprang forward to die at death-grips with
his foe. As he came, the great snake struck again, but as it snapped
back into coil, the needle-like teeth of the other met in its brain.
The great reptile thrashed and rattled, but the grip of the red killer
remained unbroken long after both were still and stark.
Beyond the black circle of the woods, away from the fatal ledge and
through the sunlight, the chipmunk sped, expecting every minute to
hear the fierce patter of his pursuer close behind. Little by little
he circled, until at last, hardly able to believe in his own escape,
he found himself once more in the depths of his own burrow.
As the spring lengthened into summer, Chippy found himself strangely
interested in another burrow which had been dug near to his own. So,
too, were half a dozen other gay young bucks of the colony, who, with
tails erect and with sleek and well-groomed fur, frequently tried to
visit the owner of said burrow. She treated them all alike. Every
chipmunk who passed her front door received such a succession of nips
and scratches that he was only too glad to back out again in a hurry.
As time went by, with every new experience and with every new escape,
Chippy grew larger and wiser and stronger. Then came the glittering
summer afternoon when he won the right to rank with the bravest and
best of the colony. The heat eddied across the hill in shimmering
waves as he started home from where he had been foraging, his
cheek-pockets full of samples for his storehouse. As he neared his
front door by the stone wall he saw Death itself entering his little
neighbor's burrow. Black, sinuous, terrible, a giant blacksnake over
six feet in length had found its way from its den on the other side of
the hill to the chipmunk colony. Its smooth scales showed an absolute
black in the sunlight, and made a crisp, rustling noise as it streamed
over the dry leaves and grass of the hillside. Except for that sound,
there was silence. At times the great snake would stop and, raising
its head two feet from the ground and swaying back and forth, would
stare here and there with fixed lidless eyes while the white patch on
its lower jaw gleamed in the sun, and its long, black forked tongue
played in and out like the flicker of a flame.