CHAPTER XXVIII
THE RATTLESNAKE DEN
FUZZY often wandered far down the mountain side.
One hot week in July his restless wandering carried him almost down to the valley. He had been chasing a jack rabbit through the tall grass when he was startled by a sound like the rustling of a dry leaf, only ever so many times louder. He jumped out of the way till he could find out what it would be that could make such a queer sound.
As he did so, a great snake shot from its coil to the spot where he had been but an instant before. Its mouth was open and it displayed two long, sharp fangs. Its scaly back was mottled with cross-wise stripes, dark, reddish brown, with yellow edges to the lighter spots.
Fuzzy’s fur rose along the back of hisneck. He had caught many a snake and eaten it with relish, but not this kind. This one was different. This must be what had made that ominous rattling sound. He had nearly stepped on it.
He started to climb between two bowlders and go on his way, but no sooner had he set foot on the spot than there came another of those peculiar rattling sounds, then another, and another. He had stepped into a den of rattlesnakes.
Now the rattler always plays fair. It gives warning before it strikes. As an actual fact, it will not strike at all unless some one comes near stepping on it or makes it fear for its life. But the unfortunate Fuzzy-Wuzz had actually stepped into the retreat of a whole colony of baby snakes. And the babies themselves were equipped with poison fangs. There must have been other mothers there, too, the way they rattled. And now the first snake was all coiled ready to spring again, her ugly flat head rising straight up out of the middle of the coil and her tail again rattling its buttons warningly.
The little bear leapt for his life, but he was not quite quick enough. One of the snakes, (he never knew which one,) struck his left hind foot a terrific blow, driving its fangs in till it had squeezed the little poison bag that lies at the root of each fang, so that the poison ran down a groove in the fang.
Fuzzy ran till he was safely away from that dangerous neighborhood, then he began to feel the effects of the poison. His foot swelled, and he felt as if he could lie right down and die.
A great many animals would have died. A man who has been struck by a rattler can only be saved by drawing all the poison out of the wound, and other mighty serious treatment.
It was a mighty serious matter with the little bear. But bears are hardy specimens. They can survive a great many things that other animals cannot. He was pretty ill for a time, but three weeks later he came limping back to the Ranger’s cabin.
My, how glad the children were to see him! How they hugged and feasted him!He liked it, too. He had been through a lot since last he went exploring.
Wiggledy was just as glad to greet his chum. Every one was glad except Clickety-Clack, the little screech owl, whom he was soon chasing as merrily as ever, and Dapple, the yearling fawn, who had never had much to do with him. After that for several days the pup and the bear dug quietly for ground squirrels.
These ground squirrels were skimpy tailed and stupid, and lived in holes that they dug for themselves and their large litters of young along the edges of the mountain meadows. Several families of them had home-steaded in one corner of the Ranger’s garden patch, where they ate things as fast as they grew. The Ranger was mighty glad when he saw Fuzzy after them.
The chums would each select a hole and see which could dig out a squirrel the quickest, dog or bear. But Fuzzy always won, for his long claws were much better digging implements than the pup’s.
There were mice, too, to be found under the fallen logs farther back in the woods. These mice of the high Sierras were red-backed fellows whose coats so matched the reddish soil that they were hard to see, even when they sat right out in plain sight. Fuzzy depended more on his nose than his eyes when he followed their run-ways around the stumps and rocks that hid their homes.
Sometimes he would find a whole mossy nestful of them in some hollow stump or under a rock. Then the young mice, if they were old enough to run, would race in all directions, and Fuzzy-Wuzz could only turn around and around, wondering which one to chase first, while Wiggledy barked and hopped about in wild excitement.