Wood Folk at School | Page 3

dancing in
their soft eyes as they turned them back at me like a mischievous child
playing peekaboo. It is a tribute to our higher nature that one cannot see
a beautiful thing anywhere without wanting to draw near, to see, to
touch, to possess it. And here was beauty such as one rarely finds, and,
though I was an intruder, I could not go away.
The hand that touched the little wild things brought no sense of danger
with it. It searched out the spots behind their velvet ears where they
love to be rubbed; it wandered down over their backs with a little wavy
caress in its motion; it curled its palm up softly under their moist
muzzles and brought their tongues out instantly for the faint suggestion
of salt that was in it. Suddenly their heads came up. All deception was
over now. They had forgotten their hiding, their first lesson; they
turned and looked at me full with their great, innocent, questioning
eyes. It was wonderful; I was undone. One must give his life, if need be,
to defend the little things after they had looked at him just once like
that.
When I rose at last, after petting them to my heart's content, they
staggered up to their feet and came out of their house. Their mother had
told them to stay; but here was another big, kind animal, evidently,
whom they might safely trust. "Take the gifts the gods provide thee"

was the thought in their little heads; and the salty taste in their tongues'
ends, when they licked my hand, was the nicest thing they had ever
known. As I turned away they ran after me, with a plaintive little cry to
bring me back. When I stopped they came close, nestling against me,
one on either side, and lifted their heads to be petted and rubbed again.
Standing so, all eagerness and wonder, they were a perfect study in first
impressions of the world. Their ears had already caught the deer trick
of twitching nervously and making trumpets at every sound. A leaf
rustled, a twig broke, the brook's song swelled as a floating stick
jammed in the current, and instantly the fawns were all alert. Eyes, ears,
noses questioned the phenomenon. Then they would raise their eyes
slowly to mine. "This is a wonderful world. This big wood is full of
music. We know so little; please tell us all about it,"--that is what the
beautiful eyes were saying as they lifted up to mine, full of innocence
and delight at the joy of living. Then the hands that rested fondly, one
on either soft neck, moved down from their ears with a caressing sweep
and brought up under their moist muzzles. Instantly the wood and its
music vanished; the questions ran away out of their eyes. Their eager
tongues were out, and all the unknown sounds were forgotten in the
new sensation of lapping a man's palm, which had a wonderful taste
hidden somewhere under its friendly roughnesses. They were still
licking my hands, nestling close against me, when a twig snapped
faintly far behind us.
Now, twig snapping is the great index to all that passes in the
wilderness. Curiously enough, no two animals can break even a twig
under their feet and give the same warning. The crack under a bear's
foot, except when he is stalking his game, is heavy and heedless. The
hoof of a moose crushes a twig, and chokes the sound of it before it can
tell its message fairly. When a twig speaks under a deer in his passage
through the woods, the sound is sharp, dainty, alert. It suggests the plop
of a raindrop into the lake. And the sound behind us now could not be
mistaken. The mother of my little innocents was coming.
I hated to frighten her, and through her to destroy their new confidence;
so I hurried back to the den, the little ones running close by my side.

Ere I was halfway, a twig snapped sharply again; there was a swift
rustle in the underbrush, and a doe sprang out with a low bleat as she
saw the home log.
At sight of me she stopped short, trembling violently, her ears pointing
forward like two accusing fingers, an awful fear in her soft eyes as she
saw her little ones with her archenemy between them, his hands resting
on their innocent necks. Her body swayed away, every muscle tense for
the jump; but her feet seemed rooted to the spot. Slowly she swayed
back to her balance, her eyes holding mine; then away again as the
danger scent poured into her nose. But still the feet stayed. She could
not move; could not believe. Then, as I waited quietly