05

The Squirrel's Policeman

Have you ever watched a family of squirrels? As you read this true story, see if it tells you anything about squirrels you did not know before.

On a street corner in a busy town there lived a boy named Billy. His father was a policeman, whose work was to help old people and children cross the streets safely.

Billy was very proud of his father and wanted to be like him. “Some day,” he said to himself, “I will be a policeman, too. Then I will help people to cross the streets.”

Near Billy's bedroom window was a big elm tree. High up in the tree the boy could often see a mother squirrel sitting close to her nest. Sometimes Billy put peanuts outside his window, and it did not take long for the sharp eyes of Mother Squirrel to see them there.

Down she would come on a long branch of the elm. Quickly she would pick up a peanut, put it into her mouth, and scamper away.

Billy liked to watch the squirrel hiding her food. Almost always she hurried away to the garden with the peanut.Scratch,scratch, went her sharp front paws until she had made a little hole in the ground. Then she took the nut from her mouth, put it into the hole, and covered it up.

Mother Squirrel had a family of four tiny gray squirrels. How excited Billy was the first time he saw them sitting outside their nest!

The old squirrel was very busy every day teaching her little ones all the things they should know. They learned to jump from one branch to another and to run up and down the tree trunk. They learned where to find the best branches to nibble at. And they, learned to follow their mother wherever she went.

Sometimes one of the little squirrels would start to go somewhere by himself. Then Mother Squirrel would give him a hard pat with her paw and make him go back.

Day after day, Billy watched the little gray squirrels learning their lessons. How he hoped that he would see them when they made their first trip to the ground.

One Saturday morning Billy was raking the grass. Suddenly an excited chattering told him that something was happening, and he stood very still.

In a minute Mother Squirrel came down the tree. One by one, the little squirrels followed her. The smallest squirrel was the very last.

Across the street from Billy's house was a garden in which grew a walnut tree. It was to this tree that Mother Squirrel wanted to take her family. She ran to the sidewalk, and in a moment was safely across the street and in the garden. The first little squirrel followed, and the next and the next. But the last little squirrel was very tiny, and could not run so fast.

Just as he reached the street, along came a big automobile.“Oh!”said Billy to himself,“what will happen to the baby squirrel?”

The tiny squirrel was so frightened that he looked for some safe place to hide in. A dark hole like his nest was the best place he knew. So he jumped into the first hole he saw. It was the opening to a sewer at the corner of the street.

Mother Squirrel did not see what happened, but Billy did. He ran to the sewer-opening and looked in. There was the poor baby squirrel, trying to climb up the wet sides of the hole. He could not get out by himself, and he was too far away to call his mother. Even if she could come to him, Billy knew that she could not help him.

But Billy knew how to help. He was a policeman's son. He could think quickly, and he remembered his rake. At once he put the rake down into the hole. The little squirrel, who had been taught to climb so well, came up, up, up the handle.

The little fellow was very wet and frightened when he climbed out of the hole. But Billy took him off the rake gently and rubbed his fur clean and dry with soft grass. Then he carried the baby squirrel across the street to the garden where the other squirrels were playing. Mother Squirrel heard the lost one chatter when Billy put him down on the grass, and she came running.

Billy watched her while she carried the little squirrel safely across the street to the nest in the elm tree. After she had put her baby to bed, she went back to the garden.

That evening Mother Squirrel came to Billy's window for her peanuts. She chattered and tried to talk to the boy. “She wants to say ‘Thank you,'”thought Billy. “I am glad I helped her. That's what a policeman does. I was the squirrel's policeman. Some day I'll be a real one.”

1. What did you learn about squirrels that you did not know before?

2. Why is this story called “The Squirrel's Policeman”?

3. How does a squirrel hide a nut in the ground?

4. What are four things that a mother squirrel teaches her babies? Read the story again if you do not remember all of them.