Secret of the Woods | Page 4

come back again,
finding curiosity so richly rewarded.
That is another point to remember: all the Wood Folk are more curious
about you than you are about them. Sit down quietly in the woods
anywhere, and your coming will occasion the same stir that a stranger
makes in a New England hill town. Control your curiosity, and soon
their curiosity gets beyond control; they must come to find out who you
are and what you are doing. Then you have the advantage; for, while
their curiosity is being satisfied, they forget fear and show you many
curious bits of their life that you will never discover otherwise.
As to the source of these sketches, it is the same as that of the others
years of quiet observation in the woods and fields, and some old
notebooks which hold the records of summer and winter camps in the
great wilderness.
My kind publishers announced, some time ago, a table of contents,
which included chapters on jay and fish-hawk, panther, and musquash,
and a certain savage old bull moose that once took up his abode too
near my camp for comfort. My only excuse for their non-appearance is
that my little book was full before their turn came. They will find their
place, I trust, in another volume presently.
STAMFORD, CONN., June, 1901. Wm. J. LONG.
CONTENTS TOOKHEES THE 'FRAID ONE A WILDERNESS
BYWAY KEEONEKH THE FISHERMAN KOSKOMENOS THE
OUTCAST MEEKO THE MISCHIEF-MAKER THE OL' BEECH
PA'TRIDGE FOLLOWING THE DEER SUMMER WOODS STILL
HUNTING WINTER TRAILS SNOW BOUND GLOSSARY OF
INDIAN NAMES

SECRETS OF THE WOODS
TOOKHEES THE 'FRAID ONE

Little Tookhees the wood mouse, the 'Fraid One, as Simmo calls him,
always makes two appearances when you squeak to bring him out. First,
after much peeking, he runs out of his tunnel; sits up once on his hind
legs; rubs his eyes with his paws; looks up for the owl, and behind him
for the fox, and straight ahead at the tent where the man lives; then he
dives back headlong into his tunnel with a rustle of leaves and a
frightened whistle, as if Kupkawis the little owl had seen him. That is
to reassure himself. In a moment he comes back softly to see what kind
of crumbs you have given him.
No wonder Tookhees is so timid, for there is no place in earth or air or
water, outside his own little doorway under the mossy stone, where he
is safe. Above him the owls watch by night and the hawks by day;
around him not a prowler of the wilderness, from Mooween the bear
down through a score of gradations, to Kagax the bloodthirsty little
weasel, but will sniff under every old log in the hope of finding a wood
mouse; and if he takes a swim, as he is fond of doing, not a big trout in
the river but leaves his eddy to rush at the tiny ripple holding bravely
across the current. So, with all these enemies waiting to catch him the
moment he ventures out, Tookhees must needs make one or two false
starts in order to find out where the coast is clear.
That is why he always dodges back after his first appearance; why he
gives you two or three swift glimpses of himself, now here, now there,
before coming out into the light. He knows his enemies are so hungry,
so afraid he will get away or that somebody else will catch him, that
they jump for him the moment he shows a whisker. So eager are they
for his flesh, and so sure, after missing him, that the swoop of wings or
the snap of red jaws has scared him into permanent hiding, that they
pass on to other trails. And when a prowler, watching from behind a
stump, sees Tookhees flash out of sight and hears his startled squeak,
he thinks naturally that the keen little eyes have seen the tail, which he
forgot to curl close enough, and so sneaks away as if ashamed of
himself. Not even the fox, whose patience is without end, has learned
the wisdom of waiting for Tookhees' second appearance. And that is
the salvation of the little 'Fraid One.
From all these enemies Tookhees has one refuge, the little arched nest
beyond the pretty doorway under the mossy stone. Most of his enemies
can dig, to be sure, but his tunnel winds about in such a way that they

never can tell from the looks of his doorway where it leads to; and there
are no snakes in the wilderness to follow and find out. Occasionally I
have seen where Mooween the bear has turned the stone over and
clawed the earth beneath; but there is generally a tough root in the