The lady stood close by the cage and watched him, for she feared he might be frightened by it, and if he had seemed at all troubled she was ready to put in her hand and stop the wheel until he gradually learned how to use it.
IX
LITTLE MITCHELL’S HAPPY DAYS
Little Mitchell was a very happy squirrel in his Boston home. His lady’s room had a large bay-window in the end, that looked out over the tops of the houses and away off up the beautiful Charles River; and there was a large platform, almost like a little room, in the bay-window, and here, by the side of the writing-table, stood his cage. Its door was always open when the lady was at home, and he had glorious frolics all about the big room.
He climbed everywhere, but the best fun was racing over the Japanese screen. The lady had no tree for him to climb, so she gave him the screen to play with; and up and down it he would go, now this side, now that. But he had the best time biting the eyes out of the birds on the screen and unravelling the embroidery.
Then he would sit up on top of the screen and gnaw away at the wooden frame. You see, when he was spoiling the screen he was not spoiling anything else; and as he liked the screen better than anything else, his lady said he might as well eat it up if he wanted to, so she gave it to him.
It was very funny to see him go up the side of the screen, which stood upright, you know, like the wall of a house. His claws were as sharp as a cat’s, and he would hold on by his front feet, and jump up with his hind feet and get a new hold with his front ones, and so on. He looked as though he went hopping up the screen. And it was funnier still when he came down head-first.