incessant noise. Again, you will see some steadily tacking this way or that in the middle of the pond, and often they rest there asleep with their heads in their backs. They readily cross the pond, swimming from this side to that.
March 30, 1859. 6 a. m. To Hill (across water). Hear a red squirrel chirrup at me by the hemlocks. It is all for my benefit, not that he is excited by fear, I think, but so full is he of animal spirits that he makes a great ado about the least event. At first he scratches on the bark very rapidly with his hind feet, without moving the fore feet. He makes so many queer sounds, and so different from one another, that you would think they came from half a dozen creatures. I hear now two sounds from him of a very distinct character, a low or base internal, worming, screwing kind of sound (very like that, by the way, which an anxious partridge mother makes), and at the same time a very sharp and shrill bark, clear, and on a very high key, totally distinct from the last, while his tail is flourishing incessantly. You might say that he successfully accomplished the difficult feat of singing and whistling at the same time.
p. m. To Walden via Hubbard's Close. . . . . See on Walden two sheldrakes, male and female (as is common), so they have for
