THE SUN SONG OF BANNERTAIL
CHAPTER VII
THE SUN SONG OF BANNERTAIL
THE sun was rising in a rosy mist, and glinting the dew-wet overlimbs, as there rang across the bright bare stretch of woodland a loud "Qua, qua, qua, quaaaaaaa!" Like a high priest of the sun on the topmost peak of the temple stood Bannertail, carried away by a new-born inner urge. A full-grown wildwood Graysquirrel he was now, the call of the woods had claimed him, and he hailed the glory of the east with an ever longer "Qua, qua, quaaaaaaaaaa!"
This was the season of the shortest days, though no snow had come as yet to cover the brown-leaved earth. Few birds were left of the summer merrymakers. The Crow, the Nuthatch, the Chickadee, and the Woodwale alone were there, and the sharp tang of the frost-bit air was holding back their sun-up calls. But Bannertail, a big Graysquirrel now, found gladness in the light, intensified, it seemed, by the very lateness of its coming.
