Part 6

Wabbles lost his joyous manner. He watched over his motherless babies with gentle care, but not a song did I hear after the tragedy. Later, he conducted the young birds to a warmer climate, and was lost to me until the next March.

When Wabbles returned in the spring he was alone, and his children did not appear later. I suppose some motherly bird had adopted the bereaved family, to take them into the fields or pastures.

In April, Wabbles deserted me for three days, then returned with another wife. This was an old bird, probably a widow. It was evident from the first that she thought Wabbles's first wife had spoiled him. She bossed him around in grand style. I tried to get acquainted with her, but, with a lordly air, she gave me to understand that she did not associate with hermits. After two days she ordered Wabbles out to the fields, and I did not see him again till October. He came in twice before migration. That was all. Wabbles, the warrior, was henpecked.

The next spring Wabbles returned from the South early in March. I think he was glad to escape from his wife, but three weeks later she swooped down on him, and packed him off to the pastures.

For eleven years Wabbles has lived with his second wife. Every spring he comes to the cabin for a long visit, but I seldom see much of him in the fall. Once I did not see him at all, and reported that probably he was dead, but the next spring he turned up as usual.

It is now fourteen years since I removed the shot from Wabbles's wing. He does not grow old in looks and is yet good for many years, if his wife does not worry him to death.

Dear old Wabbles. He has blessed me with a friendship as sincere and lasting as any that can spring from the human heart. As the years go by, I am more and more impressed with the little bird's individuality. Long ago he proved to me that he possessed a moral sense.

When Wabbles finds birds in the dooryard he threatens them for a short time, then darts at the nearest, and the feathers fly. After he has satisfied his appetite he will let the other birds return to glean the dooryard. He does not want to deprive them of food, but insists that they shall await his pleasure. Sometimes he will sing while the birds are eating. He firmly believes that he holds a mortgage on the dooryard, or, perhaps, that he is a joint owner with me; but he insists that his property rights must be respected.

One afternoon I found a wounded chickadee in the dooryard. Some wretch had shot away one leg and had injured a wing besides. I thought Wabbles would make short work of the helpless bird, but instead he hopped around him and talked to him in a low tone. There was no threat in his notes such as he uttered when angry. Up to the time that Wabbles left in migration the chickadee was allowed the freedom of the cabin dooryard.

When Wabbles's first wife was alive, he returned one spring the tenth day of March, and brought with him a male linnet. I was surprised, for it was peculiar that a linnet should return in migration three weeks before the usual time. A week later Mrs. Wabbles returned, and with her was the mate to the linnet. This incident opened up a wide field for reflection. It proved that two species of the bird family could communicate ideas to each other.

These birds must have met in the South. In the course of bird gossip either the linnets or sparrows had announced that the summer home was on Cape Ann. "That is where we live," is the glad reply, so the birds, having come from the same locality, associate together. Wabbles tells them about the hermit and the dooryard crowded with food. In some way he induced the male linnet to accompany him, three weeks out of season, with the understanding that Mrs. Wabbles, a week later, would pilot the female linnet to her husband. It must be remembered that linnets do not inhabit the woods. Wabbles gave the freedom of the dooryard to the linnets. They were invited guests, and were treated as such. It all goes to show that Wabbles knows what belongs to good breeding and possesses a moral sense.

IV.

BISMARCK, THE RED SQUIRREL

The red squirrel, or chickaree, leads all the wild things in the woodlands of Cape Ann for intelligence and the ability to maintain an existence under adverse circumstances.

His life during the spring and summer months is a grand hurrah, but in the fall he sobers down and plods and toils in his harvest-fields like a thrifty farmer.

Right or wrong, it is a fact that the red squirrel bears a disreputable character. He is called a thief because he takes the farmers' corn, and a bloodthirsty wretch for robbing birds' nests. From my experience with the chickaree I am led to believe that he is not so black as painted. I used to think that he spared neither eggs nor young, but savagely robbed every bird's nest which he chanced to find. I certainly got this idea from books, for I cannot recall an instance where a bird's nest was robbed by a red squirrel.

For years I thought a squirrel was seeking food when he chased the birds in my dooryard. Now my eyes are open, and I am heartily ashamed of myself. I awoke from my trance to find that the red squirrel was simply chasing the birds out of the dooryard and away from the food, which he claimed as his own.

Twice last summer I saw a red squirrel pounce on a young towhee-bunting, but both times he let the bird go without the loss of a feather. It was evident that he did not intend to injure the bird, but merely desired to frighten it away. The intention was so evident that I could not ignore it, and it led me to do a lot of thinking.

I carefully examined my notes for proof of the squirrel's guilt, and found no record against him. The guilty ones were the hawk, the owl, the snake, the stoat, the crow, the cat, the irrepressible boy, and the white-footed mouse. For fifteen years birds have nested around my cabin unmolested by the red squirrel.

It was always a mystery to me why the birds were not afraid of the red squirrel. Let a hawk, an owl, a weasel, a cat, a snake, or any of the animals known to prey on birds, enter my dooryard while birds were rearing their young, and the wildest alarm would prevail so long as the intruder was in sight. The red squirrel can come and go without a protest, which proves that the birds do not regard him as an enemy.

Whenever I have detected a squirrel investigating a bird's nest it has turned out that curiosity was the motive.

A pair of chickadees nested in a box that I had placed in an oak-tree, and a squirrel that spent the most of his time in the dooryard made it a duty to investigate the nest several times a day. He did not harm the young birds, and the old birds did not fear him.

While I was watching a red-eyed vireo's nest last season, I saw a red squirrel run out to the nest, stretch his full length on the limb (it was a very warm day), and look down on to the young birds that were squirming about in their confined quarters. I counted ninety-six before he left, and I did not begin at first. I think he was on the limb fully two minutes. These young vireos were not molested, for I saw them leave the nest when full fledged.

I have a record of an oven-bird that nested at the foot of a pine-tree which contained a red squirrel's nest. Four young squirrels were reared in a leafy nest in the top of the pine, and three young oven-birds in a domed nest on the ground.

My experience with the red squirrel has caused me to change my mind, and hereafter I shall hold him innocent until he is proved guilty.

The red squirrel in this locality is about seven and a half inches in length, measuring from the nose to the base of the tail. The tail is about six and a half inches in length, and is carried in a number of ways to suit the convenience of its owner. As to color, it seems as if there are two species, but it is only the difference between the young and the very old. Young squirrels are bright red on the back and sides, with the under parts usually a pure white. Old squirrels are red along the back bone, gray on the sides, and a dirty white below. Some specimens are shot that are nearly all gray. Gunners claim that such squirrels are a cross between the red and the gray, but they are simply old red squirrels.

Dame Nature has been unusually kind to the red squirrel. She has provided him with powerful weapons of offence and defence. She has set in his muscular jaws long, cruel teeth, which are whet to a keen edge on the hard-shelled nuts. She has conferred upon him claws sharp as needles, and a muscular system which seemingly is controlled by an electric current. There is a wicked wild fire in his bright eye that stamps him the bravest wild thing of the forest. He will fight to the death. He whips his great cousin, the gray squirrel, without effort, and is a match for the large stoat.

When pursued by a dog he makes a dash for the nearest tree, which he mounts, calling out "chickaree" as soon as he is out of danger. He does not, like the gray squirrel, seek a hiding-place in the top of the tree. No, he is far too bold to hide from a dog. He stops on a low limb, just out of reach, and fairly boils over with rage and fury. He barks, spits, and sputters; he makes furious rushes, as if he intended to come right down the tree, and "whip that dog." He violently jerks his tail, and pounds the limb with his hind feet, a picture of impudent, fiery energy.