keenness their eyes don't seem to _distinguish_ things as sharply as we
do. The very slightest movement they detect, sometimes at an
astonishing distance. But when a person is perfectly motionless for a
long time, they seem to confuse him with the stumps and stones and
bushes in a most amazing fashion. Perhaps it is that the eyes of some
of them have not as high a power of differentiation as ours. Perhaps
it is that when a fellow is a long time still they think he's dead.
We'll have to let the scientists work that out for us. But if you go
on the way you're beginning (and I'm bound to say you're doing very
well indeed, considering that you're not _very_ big), you'll often have
occasion to observe that some of the wild creatures, otherwise no
fools, are more afraid of a bit of colored rag fluttering in the wind
than of an able-bodied man who sits staring right at them, if only he
doesn't stir a finger. But only let him wiggle that finger, his very
littlest one, and off they'll be."

The Child put his hand behind his back and wiggled his little finger
gently, smiling to think what sharp eyes it would take to see _that_
motion. But his Uncle, as if divining his thoughts, went on to say:

"It's not as if those sly, shy watchers were all in front of you, you
know. The suspicious eyes will be all around you. Perhaps it may be a
tiny wood-mouse peering from under a root two or three steps behind
you. You have been perfectly still, say, for ten minutes, and the
mouse is just beginning to think that you may be something quite
harmless. She rubs her whiskers, and is just about to come out when,
as likely as not, you move your fingers a little, behind your
back"--here the Child blushed guiltily, and thrust both his grimy
little fists well to the front--"feeling quite safe because you don't
see the movement yourself.