SABLE COAT

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 989, 4 June 1930, Page 16

SABLE COAT

A Tale of a Black Fox-Squirrel

Niger jumped. He jumped with all the force at his command, and bounded over the brown pine-needles as fast as his whip-cord mu sc lee could work his nimble legs. He did this because his life was in danger, and when one’s life is in danger, one jumps. On he flashed, spurning the ground on twinkling feet, his long, black tail held stiffly out behind. Giving a sudden, sideway leap, he seemed only to touch the trunk of a big sweet-gum tree, when, like a dark shadow, he was In the top-most branches. From these, he leaped to the branches of another tree, and then another; and soon silence reigned, because there was nothing on his trail now, and the danger had passed almost as quickly as It had come.

There had been that on Niger’s trail which made flight imperative, and he knew he was fortunate in that he could jump at all, for It was only by sheer accident that he had become aware of the danger. A second later, and there would have been no Niger, but now—Niger was a fox-squirrel. Back in the sweet-gum tree, a big, spotted bobcat came to pause at the small twigs which were even yet trembling because of Niger’s sudden passage. He knew that he had reached the end of the trail, and the knowledge ruffled his short temper. He opened hi« mouth and gave voice to an angry, high-pitched scream, which echoed hollowly in the dim aisles of the nearby cypress swamp. His ears lay flat upon his head, and the big, round face, with Its palely glowing eyes, turned quickly here and there, as the gleaming teeth were displayed in a baffled snarl Then, as if halfabashed at his petulant outburst, the wildcat whirled about, ran down the tree, and slunk away into the thickets Niger, meanwhile, had almost dismissed the Incident from his mind, and, except that his disposition was also ruffled, was none the worse. That he had had a very close shave was outweighed by the fact that he had exerted himself rather strenuously on a nearly empty stomach, and that these experiences were infrequent made it the more discomforting. The old squirrel was not an early riser. an«. had only emerged from his hole in a cypress-tree when the sun was some four hours high in the sky. He had awakened hungry, and had proceeded immediately to a long, dry ridge which ran through the pine-land from the near-by swamp. He had been busily investigating some turkey scratchings in the leaves for stray acorns, when an almost inaudible whisper of a turning leaf had caused him to whirl about, and catch sight of a lithe, spotted form in the very act of springing upon him from behind an old, moss-grown log. Then it was that he had jumped, and had led the cat a quick, stern chase over the forest floor. Unlike his gray relatives, who would have leaped for the nearest tree at once, he had remained on the ground until he saw that the wildcat was pressing him rather too closely. The latter had started the chase at full jump, and fit soon became clear to Niger that he must resort to aerial tactics, with the result already described. No, Niger disliked rush and hurry, being rarely forced into it, and he was now decidedly ill-tempered. He descended to the ground once more, and began to forage among the leaves for what might serve him in his interrupted breakfast. Nigger was good to look at; in fact, quite handsome. He was a perfect specimen in body, and a finished product of the hard school of experience, from which Nature graduated all her worthy scholars. Much larger than the abundant gray squirrels, he was a full two feet from the tip of his white nose to the end of his black, feathery tail, and would have weighed three pounds. All over, with the exception of a few grayish hairs, he was a lustrous, jetty black, this sable coat being the more Impressive because of the fact that his keen nose, and keener ears, were snowy white. A substantial meal of nuts, pineseeds, and other provender did much toward restoring him to his usual tranquil state of mind. He finished his repast without interruption of any kind, and topped it off with a long drink of cool water, which bubbled up from a little spring between the roots of an enormous oak. Niger was a fastidious animal, and after his drink (which he obtained, not by lapping, but by thrusting his mouth into the water and drinking steadily), he proceeded to make his toilet. Dipping his forepaws in the water, he passed them repeatedly over his face, rubbing the fur until it shone. This completed, he betook himself to liis abode In the hollow of the cypress, and composed himself to sleep. For some time the old squirrel had intended changing his residence. The hole in the cypress had, for some reason best known to himself, become distasteful to him, and as he wandered along the swamp edge, his eyes were suddenly arrested by the sight of a tempting-looking hollow in a big tupelo-tree, some distance out over the lagoon. Standing motionless, he considered it for a few moments. It was at least forty feet up. was over the water, and looked to be easily accessible by the branches of neighboring trees. He decided upon closer Inspection, and forthwith ran up a

near-bv tree and made an aerial journey through the branches toward the hole.

Arriving at the entrance, he was about to enter when a sudden scuffle, punctuated by a sharp hissing noise, sounded from within. He drew back in startled wonder, waited a moment, and the noise ceasing, again essayed an entrance. He was greeted at once by a redoubled commotion, an angry squawk came to his ears, and a vague indistinct shape rose to meet him. As he backed hurriedly out, he was suddenly beset from the rear also. A stiff wing-tip all but brushed him from the big tree, and then, about the trunk, whirling on rapid wings and uttering high-pitched notes of anger and alarm, circled an old drake woodduck. h

As Niger crouched, flattened against the trunk, the head and neck of the female of the species emerged from the hole just above, and he received a resounding peck from her bill fairly upon his head. Coming to the belated conclusion that the hole was already fully occupied, he beat a somewhat inglorious retreat, as is the way of the fox-squirrel kind under such conditions. Bending to the fact that possession Is nine points of the law, he had no mind to interfere with the home of the wood-ducks, and immediately departed, followed for some distance by the angrily scolding drake. By the time the bird had betaken himself back to his disturbed mate, Niger's temper was decidedly frayed, and he was a badly disgruntled squirrel.

It was In this frame of mind that he ventured much farther afield this day than was his wont. Usually remaining in the pine lands, and along the edges of the swamp, his wanderings took him now to the banks of the slowly moving tidal river, which swept its lazy, winding way toward the coast. He made his way deeper Into the woods, and gathered a belated meal along the forest floor as the shades of evening were falling about him. Then he ran up the trunk of a convenient sweetgum tree, and, nestling himself in a deep crotch, shortly fell asleep. The fresh spring morning which greeted him when he awoke found him in the best of spirits. He descended the gumtree, and investigated his unfamiliar surroundings with considerable interest. He found that not far from the river-bank, and making back into the forest, was a large stretch of old ricefield, which had been fed. in years gone by, by a long canal running in from the river. The green expanse of sawgrass and cane, was, however, abandoned as far as cultivation was concerned, and the water-level rose and fell through the neglected “trunks,” or flood-gates, according to the condition of the tide.

The banks which criss-crossed the field were everywhere grown up in wampee and cane, and making his way along one of these tangled ridges, Niger received a momentary start as a purplish-blue bird, with dangling yellow legs, suddenly leaped from a clump of wampee, barely a foot from his nose, and flapped away over the sawgrass to an accompaniment of discordantly clacking cries. He drew back for a breath, watched the awkward gallinule drop into the thick growth farther down the bank, and then pushed forward into the wampee clump. His good humour increased tremendously as he saw a neatly made platform of rushes attached to the stem of the arrow-shaped leaves, and in the slightly cup-shaped depression above it, six finely spotted, buffy-white eggs. He fell to at once, making a heaTty meal. Then he drew a few rushes over the remaining eggs, as he intended returning when his appetite gave him the signal once more. The bereaved owner remained out of sight, although an occasional chorus of the grunting calls, far out in the sawgrass, gave proof that she was complaining of her ill-fortune to other members of her kind.

Then the squirrel made his way to the river, and flattened himself out on the branch of an overhanging pine tree, there to meditate on the prospects of the day. Suddenly a burst of flame leaped from the smilax tangle on the brow of the bluff, and a loud report shattered the silence. A hot, searing pain shot through Niger’s shoulder. He lost his hold on the limb, and dropped limply from his perch. Out from his ambush ran the hunter. Down the river a black shadow was moving, leaving a trail of crimson In its wake. At a bend of the stream It left the water and scrambled into the undergrowth. “Well, that’s that,” said the hunter. “Such a game little beggar deserves to be given his chance.” And he turned his attention to other things.