Once more they haste to their mother dear;

“Oh mammy dear, see here, see here,

We’ve washed our mittens clean!” they cry.

“You darling kittens,

To wash your mittens,”

She says, and fondles them till they’re dry—

Purr, purr, purr,

Purr—pu-r-r—p-u-r-r!

[THUMB]
[PAGE]

[ THE GROUND SQUIRREL.]

THE GROUND SQUIRREL.

By PAUL H. HAYNE.
I.

Blessus, and save us! What’s here?

Pop!

At a bound,

A tiny brown creature, grotesque in his grace,

Is sitting before us, and washing his face

With his little fat paws overlapping;

Where does he hail from? Where?

Why, there,

Underground,

From a nook just as cosey,

And tranquil, and dozy,

As e’er wooed to Sybarite napping

(But none ever caught him a-napping).

Don’t you see his burrow so quaint and queer?

II.

Gone! like the flash of a gun!

This oddest of chaps,

Mercurial,

Disappears

Head and ears!

Then, sly as a fox,

Swift as Jack in his box,

Pops up boldly again!

What does he mean by thus frisking about,

Now up and now down, and now in and now out,

And all done quicker than winking?

What does it mean? Why, ’tis plain—fun!

Only Fun! or, perhaps,

The pert little rascal’s been drinking?—

There’s a cider-press yonder all say on the run!

III.

Capture him! no, we won’t do it,

Or, be sure in due time we would rue it!

IV.

Such a piece of perpetual motion,

Full of bother

And pother,

Would make paralytic old Bridget

A Fidget.

So you see (to my notion),

Better leave our downy

Diminutive browny

Alone, near his “diggings;”

Ever free to pursue,

Rush round, and renew

His loved vaulting

Unhalting,

His whirling,

And curling,

And twirling,

And swirling,

And his ways, on the whole

So unsteady!

’Pon my soul,

Having gazed Quite amazed, On each wonderful antic And summersault frantic, For just a bare minute, My head, it feels whizzy; My eyesight’s grown dizzy; And both legs, unstable As a ghost’s tipping table, Seem waltzing, already!
V.
Capture him! no we won’t do it, Or, in less than no time, how we’d rue it!