rain, and the snow. Often a family of four or five squirrels live together in the same home.

Gray squirrels are easily tamed when they are young. While some of them are gentle, playful pets, others are inclined to be cross and will probably bite the hand that would caress them.

In the large city parks there are usually many squirrels. These become quite gentle and quickly learn to come when called, sitting up on their hind legs and reaching out for the nut or other dainty which is offered them. Some will even venture to hunt in one's pockets for choice bits of food.

The squirrel has many enemies, such as the weasel, the fox, and the hawk. A hawk flying alone in search of food is not a very dangerous foe, for the squirrel can easily take care of himself by dodging among the trees. But when two hawks are hunting together, he is likely to become confused, and, while hiding from one, fall into the clutches of the other.

The gray squirrel often leaves his home and travels long distances. Just why he does this, no one knows. If rivers or lakes are in his way, he swims bravely across them. It is said that sometimes he pushes a piece of bark into the water, seats himself upon it, and using his bushy tail as a sail, drifts before the wind to the opposite shore.

THE SQUIRREL'S PROBLEM

High on the branch of a walnut tree
A bright-eyed squirrel sat;

Of what was he thinking so earnestly,
And what was he looking at?

He was solving a problem o'er and o'er,
Busily thinking was he

How many nuts for his winter's store
He could hide in that hollow tree.

He sat so still on the swaying bough
That he seemed almost asleep.

But, no; I suppose he was reckoning now
How many nuts he could keep.

Then suddenly he frisked about,
And down the tree he ran;

"The best way to do, I have no doubt,

Is to gather all that I can."

WORD STUDY: Learn to spell and pronounce the following words. Copy them, and divide them into syllables.

THE LITTLE LAND1

When at home alone I sit
And am very tired of it,

I have just to shut my eyes
To go sailing through the skies
To go sailing far away

To the pleasant Land of Play ;
To the fairy land afar

Where the Little People are ;
Where the clover tops are trees,
And the rain pools are the seas,
And the leaves like little ships
Sail about on tiny trips;

And above the daisy tree

Through the grasses,

High o'erhead the bumble bee
Hums and passes.

In that forest to and fro
I can wander, I can go;
See the spider and the fly,
And the ants go marching by

Carrying parcels with their feet,

Down the green and grassy street.

1 From "A Child's Garden of Verses," by Robert Louis Stevenson.

I can in the sorrel sit

Where the ladybird alit.

I can climb the jointed grass
And on high

See the greater swallows pass
In the sky,

And the round sun rolling by,
Heeding no such things as I.

Through the forest I can pass
Till, as in a looking glass,
Humming fly and daisy tree
And my tiny self I see,
Painted very clear and neat
On the rain pool at my feet.
Should a leaflet come to land,
Drifting near to where I stand,
Straight I'll board that tiny boat
Round the rain-pool sea to float.

Some are pied with ev'ry hue,

Black and crimson, gold and blue;
Some have wings and swift are gone; -
But they all look kindly on.

When my eyes I once again
Open, and see all things plain;
High bare walls, great bare floor;
Great big knobs on drawer and door;
Great big people perched on chairs,
Stitching tucks and mending tears,
Each a hill that I could climb

And talking nonsense all the time —
Oh, dear me!

That I could be

A sailor on the rain-pool sea,

A climber in the clover tree,

And just come back, a sleepy head,
Late at night to go to bed.

EXPRESSION : Read this poem silently and think of yourself in Fairyland among the Little People. Name the little things that you would see in the clover and the grass, and the larger ones that fly overhead. Now read the poem aloud, so as to tell what you have seen and what you think.