Little Mitchell: The Story of a Mountain Squirrel

by Margaret Warner Morley

So they got all ready again, with Little Mitchell sitting on his lady’s knee; but again he flirted off, just in time to spoil the picture.

Then he climbed up on his lady’s arm, and the photographer whistled, and Little Mitchell cocked up his tail and his ears,—just as you see him in the picture,—and listened, and in a trice the man had pressed the bulb and the restless Little Mitchell had his picture taken after all. Whether it was a success or not, you can decide for yourself; for it is the frontispiece to this very book.

When the lady was ready to go, she could not find Little Mitchell. That is because he was in the photographer’s pocket. He had climbed in there to hide away after the excitement of having his picture taken; and at last the photographer laughed, for he knew the little rascal was there all the time, and hauled him out, squirming and protesting, and handed him to the lady.

In a few days she was ready to go on to Boston; and she said she would be glad to get there, so as to have a suitable place for Little Mitchell, where he would not have to be shut up so much and yet could not get into mischief.

So they said good-bye to the Hartford friends, and started for Boston, Little Mitchell in his little box, which he did not like at all.

They had their lunch on the train, and Little Mitchell’s lunch was chestnuts and chinkapins, which he ate sitting in the corner of the seat next the window. But his lady had some very dainty sandwiches, made of thin slices of bread and butter with cream cheese between.

Presently Little Mitchell smelled the lady’s lunch, and it smelled better than his own; so he threw down his nut and ran up on her arm and tried to take her sandwich away from her.

She said no, for she feared it might not agree with him; but he said yes, he would have some, and he snatched and got a crumb which he crowded into his mouth.

The lady set him down on the seat and gave him his nut; but he threw it down, and again snatched at her sandwich. He nearly got it all this time, but the lady caught it away just in time. Then he began to scream and struggle and fight for the sandwich, until the people in the car began to laugh, and then the lady gave him a little piece, and he sat up very straight, eating cheese sandwich and looking as solemn as an owl.