#! perl -sw use strict; sub getRefs{ my( %h1, %h2 ); @h1{ qw[the quick brown fox] } = (1..4); @h2{ 'a'..'z' } = 1 .. 26; return \%h1, \%h2; } { our( %glob1, %glob2 ); local( *glob1, *glob2 ) = getRefs(); print "$_ $glob1{ $_ }\n" for keys %glob1; print "$_ $glob2{ $_ }\n" for keys %glob2; } __DATA__ the 1 fox 4 brown 3 quick 2 w 23 r 18 a 1 x 24 d 4 j 10 y 25 u 21 k 11 h 8 g 7 f 6 t 20 i 9 e 5 n 14 v 22 m 13 s 19 l 12 c 3 p 16 q 17 b 2 z 26 o 15