Nuts or Squirrels Keats remarked in a famous poem that
the squirrel's granary was- full. It is not only, or chiefly, the granary that is filled, at any rate in the case of the grey squirrel. There is a country house remarkable, almost famous, for the number and excellence of the walnut trees round about it. They bore well this year ; but sic vos, non vobis. The owners failed to secure a single dish of nuts. The house is situated on the north side of London about twenty miles or less out. All this district is so populous with grey squirrel, that any fruit, even peaches within a greenhouse, are difficult to protect. • It is unexpected but, I _think, true that the towns or suburbs keep up the supply- of the less desirable animals of the country. The swarming grey squirrels of South Hertfordshire and Buckingham- shire, though originally colonised in part from Woburn, are fed by the squirrels that spread north from such sanctuaries as Regent's Park. The towns are great breeding haunts of sparrows and rats. 'More surprisingly, the carrion crow has a liking for the suburbs, at any rate as a feeding ground ; and the brown owl, which is much the most predatory of the tribe, nests in numbers in many towns. The grey squirrel is, doubtless, the most perfect of town dwellers : tame, engaging and very little. harmful ; but he can be over-er. coaraged. Incidentally, does the urban squirrel habitually or ever attempt to hoard ?
Previous page
