Chapter X: In the Woods

A number of trees stood so closely together that they seemed like a solid wood; but, when the squirrel had made a way for Minnie to pass under the heavy boughs, she found inside a circle, covered only with fine soft grass and moss, a few wild flowers nodding across it, and the leaves, with their low, pleasant rustle, closing around it like a wall.

"Now," said the old squirrels, who were too wise to be proud and boastful like their son, "now, Minnie, you know better than we what is proper, and you must tell us how everything shall be arranged."

Nothing could please Miss Minnie better than this. Her mother had not even allowed her to go into the supper-room before company came; and here she was to order all things, and be herself the little mistress of the feast!

They decided to have their party in the afternoon, because at that time the sunshine always slanted so pleasantly through the wood. If they waited till evening, the dew would begin to rise, and there was no depending on the moon for light; and their children, besides, would be needing them at home.

First, Minnie said, they must have a more convenient entrance to the supper-room. On one side stood a large azalea, or wild honeysuckle, in full flower, and near it a sweet-brier; between these were some whortleberry bushes, around the roots of which last Minnie made the squirrels burrow till she could drag them away.

Then, smoothing the broken earth, she covered it with sods of fresh moss, while overhead the sweet-brier and azalia met in a beautiful archway of fragrant leaves and flowers.

And it was so much prettier to have flowers growing in the ground than if they had been cut and brought from some green-house! Both Minnie and the squirrels were delighted with their dining-hall.

Next they spread shining oak-leaves for a table-cloth, which was better so than if it had all been in one piece, because now, wherever a tuft of violets grew, or any of the slight starry flowers that dotted over the grass, they could remain there, and save the trouble of arranging vases.

Then came a great variety of food,--nuts, honey, grain and berries, apple and quince seeds, bits of gum, and strips of fragrant bark. Minnie was shocked when she saw among the game a dish of dead ants, and one of frogs' feet, and another of red spiders; but the squirrel said she must have something to suit all tastes, and the birds would be disappointed if they had not animal food.

Then she begged Minnie to slice some cold meat for her, and brought a big black beetle to be shaved up like dried beef, and an angle-worm to be cut in slices for tongue.

"O, dear!" exclaimed Minnie, as the little round slices of this last fell into the plate, "can this be what I mistook for tongue, and relished so heartily last night?"

"Very likely," squirrel answered; "it is one of the tenderest meats we have."

Minnie resolved to eat no more dainties in the wood, until she had first found out their names; but she had not time to grieve much over her mistake, for the father-squirrel came to tell that he had promised his oldest children a race in the woods, and invited her to make one of the party.

She was glad to take lessons in running of such a quick little body as he; and, while his young ones frisked and bounded, and chased each other, he was very patient in teaching her all his arts. Before many such lessons, Minnie could balance herself on the most uneven and unsteady place; could climb slippery boughs, skip without stopping over the crookedest places, and even leap from branch to branch, so nimbly that squirrel was proud of his pupil.

He would not let her go very far that day, because she must be fresh for the afternoon, when his guests would come.