"No, no; don't stop there," said the squirrel, very anxiously. "Don't stop there, dear; can't you see that great bough above you; that elm-tree is very wicked, and full of malice, do not stop there, he may hurt you."
"Pooh! what rubbish!" said Bevis; "I don't believe you. It is a very nice elm, I am sure. Besides, how can he hurt me? He has got no legs and he can't run after me, and he has no hands and he can't catch me. I'm not a bit afraid of him;" and he kicked the elm with all his might. Without waiting a second, the squirrel jumped down out of the oak and ran across and caught hold of Bevis by his stocking—he could not catch hold of his jacket—and tried to drag him away. Seeing the squirrel in such an excited state, Bevis went with him to please him, and sat down on the moss under the oak. The squirrel went up on the bough, and Bevis laughed at him for being so silly.
"Ah, but my dear Sir Bevis," said the squirrel, "you do not know all, or you would not say what you did. You think because the elm has no legs and cannot run after you, and because he has no hands and cannot catch you, that therefore he cannot do you any harm. You are very much mistaken; that is a very malicious elm, and of a very wicked disposition. Elms, indeed, are very treacherous, and I recommend you to have nothing to do with them, dear."
"But how could he hurt me?" said Bevis.
"He can wait till you go under him," said the squirrel, "and then drop that big bough on you. He has had that bough waiting to drop on somebody for quite ten years. Just look up and see how thick it is, and heavy; why, it would smash a man out flat. Now, the reason the elms are so dangerous is because they will wait so long till somebody passes. Trees can do a great deal, I can tell you; why, I have known a tree, when it could not drop a bough, fall down altogether when there was not a breath of wind, nor any lightning, just to kill a cow or a sheep, out of sheer bad temper."
"But oaks do not fall, do they?" asked Bevis, looking up in some alarm at the oak above him.
"Oh, no," said the squirrel; "the oak is a very good tree, and so is the beech and the ash, and many more (though I am not quite certain of the horse-chestnut, I have heard of his playing tricks), but the elm is not; if he can he will do something spiteful. I never go up an elm if I can help it, not unless I am frightened by a dog or somebody coming along. The only fall I ever had was out of an elm.
"I ran up one in a hurry, away from that wretch, the weasel (you know him), and put my foot on a dried branch, and the elm, like a treacherous thing as he is, let it go, and down I went crash, and should have hurt myself very much if my old friend the ivy had not put out a piece for me to catch hold of, and so just saved me. As for you, dear, don't you ever sit under an elm, for you are very likely to take cold there, there is always a draught under an elm on the warmest day.
"If it should come on to rain while you are out for a walk, be sure and not go under an elm for shelter if the wind is blowing, for the elm, if he possibly can, will take advantage of the storm to smash you.
"And elms are so patient, they will wait sixty or seventy years to do somebody an injury; if they cannot get a branch ready to fall they will let the rain in at a knot-hole, and so make it rotten inside, though it looks green without, or ask some fungus to come up and grow there, and so get the bough ready for them. That elm across there is quite rotten inside—there is a hole inside so big you could stand up, and yet if anybody went by they would say what a splendid tree.