peter rabbit found johnny chuck sitting on his doorstep, sunning himself. peter was quite out of breath because he had hurried so. “do you know that you are a squirrel, johnny chuck?” he panted.
johnny slowly turned his head and looked at peter as if he thought peter had suddenly gone crazy. “what are you talking about, peter rabbit? i'm not a squirrel; i'm a woodchuck,” he replied.
“just the same, you are a squirrel,” retorted peter. “the woodchucks belong to the squirrel family. old mother nature says so, and if she says so, it is so. you'd better join our school, johnny chuck, and learn a little about your own relatives.”
johnny chuck blinked his eyes and for a minute or two couldn't find a word to say. he knew that if peter were telling the truth as to what old mother nature had said, it must be true that he was member of the squirrel family. but it was hard to believe. “what is this school?” he finally asked.
peter hastened to tell him. he told johnny all about what he and jumper the hare had learned about their family, and all the surprising things old mother nature had told them about the squirrel family, and he ended by again urging johnny chuck to join the school and promised to call for johnny the next morning.
but johnny chuck is lazy and does not like to go far from his own doorstep, so when peter called the next morning johnny refused to go, despite all peter could say. peter didn't waste much time arguing for he was afraid he would be late and miss something. when he reached the green forest he found his cousin, jumper the hare, and chatterer the red squirrel, and happy jack the gray squirrel, already there. as soon as peter arrived old mother nature began the morning lesson.
“happy jack,” said she, “you may tell us all you know about your cousin, chatterer.”
“to begin with, he is the smallest of the tree squirrels,” said happy jack. “he isn't so very much bigger than striped chipmunk, and that means that he is less than half as big as myself. his coat is red and his waistcoat white; his tail is about two-thirds as long as his body and flat but not very broad. personally, i don't think it is much of a tail.”
at once chatterer's quick temper flared up and he began to scold. but old mother nature silenced him and told happy jack to go on. “he spends more of his time in the trees than i do,” continued happy jack, “and is especially fond of pine trees and other cone-bearing trees. he likes the deeper parts of the green forest better than i do, though he seems to feel just as much at home on the edge of the green forest, especially if it is near a farm where he can steal corn.”
chatterer started to scold again but was silenced once more by old mother nature. “i have to admit that chatterer is thrifty,” continued happy jack, quite as if he hadn't been interrupted. “he is very fond of the seeds of cone-bearing trees. he cuts the cones from the trees just before they are ripe. then they ripen and open on the ground, where he can get at the seeds easily. he often has a number of store-houses and stores up cone seeds, acorns, nuts, and corn when he can get it. he builds a nest of leaves and strips of bark, sometimes in a hollow tree and sometimes high up in the branches of an evergreen tree. he is a good jumper and jumps from tree to tree. he is a busybody and always poking his nose in where he has no business. he steals my stores whenever he can find them.”
“you do the same thing to me when you have the chance, which isn't often,” sputtered chatterer.
happy jack turned his back to chatterer and continued, “he doesn't seem to mind cold weather at all, as long as the sun shines. his noisy tongue is to be heard on the coldest days of winter. he is the sauciest, most impudent fellow of the green forest, and never so happy as when he is making trouble for others. he sauces and scolds everybody he meets, and every time he opens his mouth he jerks his tail. he's quarrelsome. worse than that, in the spring when the birds are nesting, he turns robber. he goes hunting for nests and steals the eggs, and what is even more dreadful, he kills and eats the baby birds. all the birds hate him, and i don't blame them.”
chatterer could contain himself no longer. his tongue fairly flew and he jerked his tail so hard and so fast that peter rabbit almost expected to see him break it right off. he called happy jack names, all the bad names he could think of, and worked himself up into such a rage that it was some time before old mother nature could quiet him.
when at last he stopped from sheer lack of breath, old mother nature spoke, and her voice was very severe. “i'm ashamed of you, chatterer,” said she. “unfortunately, what happy jack has said about you is true. in many ways you are a disgrace to the green forest. still i don't know how the green forest could get along without you. happy jack forgot to mention that you eat some insects at times. he also forgot to mention that sometimes you have a storehouse down in the ground. now tell us what you know about your cousin, happy jack.”
for a few minutes chatterer sulked, but he did not dare disobey old mother nature. “i don't know much good about him,” he mumbled.
“and you don't know much bad about me either,” retorted happy jack sharply.
old mother nature held up a warning hand. “that will do,” said she. “now, chatterer, go on.”
“happy jack is more than twice as big as i, but at that, i'm not afraid of him,” said chatterer and glared at happy jack. “he is gray all over, except underneath, where he is white. he has a tremendously big tail and is so proud of it he shows it off whenever he has a chance. when he sits up he has a way of folding his hands on his breast. i don't know what he does it for unless it is to keep them warm in cold weather. he builds a nest very much like mine. sometimes it is in a hollow tree, but quite as often it is in the branches of a tree. he is a good traveler in the tree-tops, but he spends a good deal of his time on the ground. he likes open woodland best, especially where there are many nut trees. he has a storehouse where he stores up nuts for winter, but he buries in the ground and under the leaves more than he puts in his storehouse. in winter, when he is hungry, he hunts for those buried nuts, and somehow he manages to find them even when they are covered with snow. when he comes to stealing he is not better than i am. i have seen him steal birds' eggs, and i wouldn't trust him unwatched around one of my storehouses.”
it was happy jacks' turn to become indignant. “i may have taken a few eggs when i accidentally ran across them,” said he, “but i never go looking for them, and i don't take them unless i am very hungry and can't find anything else. i don't make a business of robbing birds the way you do, and you know it. if i find one of your storehouses and help myself, i am only getting back what you have stolen from me. everybody loves me and that is more than you can say.”
“that's enough,” declared old mother nature, and her voice was very sharp. “you two cousins never have agreed and i am afraid never will. as long as you are neighbors, i suspect you will quarrel. have you told us all you know about happy jack, chatterer?”
chatterer nodded. he was still mumbling to himself angrily and wasn't polite enough to make a reply. old mother nature took no notice of this. “what you have told us is good as far as it goes,” said she. “you said that happy jack is all gray excepting underneath. usually the gray squirrel is just as chatterer has described him, but sometimes a gray squirrel isn't gray at all, but all black.”
peter rabbit's ears stood straight up with astonishment. “how can a gray squirrel be black?” he demanded.
old mother nature smiled. “that is a fair question, peter,” said she. “gray squirrel is simply the name of happy jack's family. sometimes some of the babies are born with black coats instead of gray coats. of course they are just the same kind of squirrel, only they look different. in some parts of the country there are numbers of these black-coated squirrels and many think they are a different kind of squirrel. they are not. they are simply black-coated members of happy jack's family. just remember this. it is the same way in the family of rusty the fox squirrel. some members are rusty red, some are a mixture of red and gray, and some are as gray as happy jack himself. way down in the sunny south fox squirrels always have white noses and ears. in the north they never have white noses and ears. rusty the fox squirrel is just a little bigger than happy jack and has just such a handsome tail. he is the strongest and heaviest of the tree squirrels and not nearly as quick and graceful as happy jack. sometimes rusty has two nests in the same tree, one in a hollow in a tree for bad weather and the other made of sticks and leaves outside in the branches for use in good weather. rusty's habits are very much the same as those of happy jack the gray squirrel, and therefore he likes the same kind of surroundings. like his cousin, happy jack, rusty is a great help to me.”
seeing how surprised everybody looked, mother nature explained. “both happy jack and rusty bury a great many more nuts than they ever need,” said she, “and those they do not dig up sprout in the spring and grow. in that way they plant ever so many trees without knowing it. just remember that, chatterer, the next time you are tempted to quarrel with your cousin, happy jack. very likely happy jack's great-great-ever-so-great grandfather planted the very tree you get your fattest and best hickory nuts from.
“way out in the mountains of the far west you have a cousin called the douglas squirrel, who is really a true red squirrel and whose habits are very much like your own. some folks call him the pine squirrel. by the way, chatterer, happy jack forgot to say that you are a good swimmer. perhaps he didn't know it.”
by the expression of happy jack's face it was quite clear that he didn't know it. “certainly i can swim,” said chatterer. “i don't mind the water at all. i can swim a long distance if i have to.”
this was quite as much news to peter rabbit as had been the fact that a cousin of his own was a good swimmer, and he began to feel something very like respect for chatterer.
“are there any other tree squirrels?” asked jumper the hare.
“yes,” replied old mother nature, “there are two—the handsomest of all the family. they live out in the southwest, in one of the most wonderful places in all this great land, a place called the grand canyon. one is called the abert squirrel and the other the kaibab squirrel. they are about the size of happy jack and rusty but have broader, handsomer tails and their ears have long tufts of hair. the abert squirrel has black ears, a brown back, gray sides and white underneath. kaibab has brown ears with black tips, and his tail is mostly white. both are very lovely, but their families are small and so they are little known.”
with this, old mother nature dismissed school for the day
