twigs for supper. In southern rivers the manatee crawls over the white
sand among the reeds. On island beaches little seals go paddling in
safe pools. Out at sea great whales glide through the waves.
On the plains buffalo calves kick up their heels near the grazing
herd. Elk, with ears twitching at every strange sound, wander down
from upland meadows. In the woods rabbits hop away under the bushes.
Little shrews dart from leaf to leaf among the shadows. In wilder spots
pointed noses sniff and bright eyes twinkle from the dens of wolves and
foxes. Bears shuffle softly through the underbrush, and panthers steal
out on tiptoe to their hunting.
In the trees squirrels scamper from branch to branch. Now and then a
mother opossum trots by with her pocket full of young ones. Bats fly
this way and that in hungry pursuit of insects dancing in the twilight
air. Under the ground moles dig busily after worms.
All these mammals and, many others live wild in the United States, and
there are many others still, more or less like them, in foreign lands.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
Text in italics is surrounded with underscores: _italics_.
Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.
Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.
End of Project Gutenberg's Wilderness Babies, by Julia Augusta Schwartz