Page:Summer - from the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau.djvu/77

Rh of so many farmers' boys when you can see and hear the small birds daily crying &quot;Thief and murder&quot; after these spoilers. What does it signify, the kingbird, blackbird, swallow, etc., pursuing a crow. They say plainly enough, &quot;I know you of old, you villain; you want to devour my eggs or young. I have often caught you at it, and I'll publish you now.&quot; And probably the crow, pursuing the fish-hawk and eagle, proves that the latter sometimes devour their young.

As I was wading in this Wyman meadow, looking for bull-frog spawn, I saw a hole at the bottom where it was six or eight inches deep, by the side of a mass of mud and weeds, which rose just to the surface three or four feet from the shore. It was about five inches in diameter, with some sand at the mouth, just like a musquash's hole. As I stood there within two feet, a pout put her head out, as if to see who was there, and directly came forth, and disappeared under the target weed; but as I stood perfectly still, waiting for the water which I had disturbed to settle about the hole, she circled round and round several times between me and the hole cautiously, stealthily approaching the entrance, but as often withdrawing, and at last mustered courage to enter it. I then noticed another similar hole in the same mass, two or three feet from this. I