Sciuricide

Tree Moss as a Sciuricide.—A man who lives near Templeton has been telling the Times how he exterminated the squirrels with whose holes his land was honey-combed.

Source: wiktionary

Sir,—My old friend Mr. [William James] Stillman’s captivating account of his experiences with squirrels published in the Spectator of December 19th, appeals strongly to my empathy. When, as a boy, I levelled my gun at every bird, great or small, that would give me a sitting shot, my bloodthirstiness revolted from the massacre of a squirrel; and only once in my very early days did I commit sciuricide, for which abominable wickedness my conscience long reproached me as keenly as if I had been guilty of an unprovoked murder. Very many years afterwards I became possessed of a beautiful specimen of the American grey squirrel, upon which I lavished all the affection which might propitiate the manes of the slaughtered innocent of my boyhood.

Source: wiktionary

Any human being who has been so fortunate as to have enlisted the love, and awakened the intellect of these little quadrupeds, will henceforward, like Sir Edmund [Monson], regard sciuricide as only some grades lower in the scale of wickedness than homicide, but no less to be abhorred. / Your careless readers will question the soundness of my mental state when I say that I learned of my squirrels lessons of love to all living creatures, such as a varied and dramatic experience of humanity had never taught me, and which make it impossible for me even now, though I am an old man, to tell of their lovely lives with dry eyes (for they are both dead);

Source: wiktionary

Within anyone’s memory, we had but one vehicular sciuricide, a gentleman squirrel, on an errand of love. He paid for his disregard of safety rules with his life—as any jaywalker might.

Source: wiktionary