To the squirrels this had been a day of unusual anxiety, for the school
had taken up again after its two weeks' holidays, and the boys were a
little more inquisitive than usual, and unfortunately, the snow happened
to be good for packing. It had been a bad day for nerves, and Mr. Bushy,
as the boys called him, found it impossible to keep his tail in one
position for more than one second at a time. It was in vain that his
more sedate and self-controlled partner in life remonstrated with him
and urged a more philosophic mind.

"It's all very well for you, my dear," Mr. Bushy was saying, rather
crossly I am afraid, "to urge a philosophic mind, but if you had the
responsibility of the family upon you--Goodness gracious! Owls and
weasels! What in all the woods is that?"

"Can't be the wolves," said Mrs. Bushy, placidly, "it's too early for
them."

"Might have known," replied her husband, quite crossly; "of course it's
those boys. I wonder why they let them out of school at all. Why can't
they keep them in where it is warm? It always seems to me a very silly
thing anyway, for them to keep rushing out of their hole in that stupid
fashion. What they do in there I am sure I don't know. It isn't the
least like a nest. I've seen inside of it. There isn't a thing to eat,
nor a bit of hair or moss. They just go in and out again."

"Well, my dear," said his wife, soothingly, "you can hardly expect them
to know as much as people with a wider outlook. We must remember they
are only ground people."