A TRAVELED DONKEY
After the many strange things that Buddie had come upon in Queerwood,
nothing could surprise her very much. Besides, as she never before had
seen a donkey, or a lute, or the combination of donkey and lute, it did
not strike her as especially remarkable that the musician should be
holding his instrument upside down, and sweeping the strings with one
of his long ears, which he was able to wave without moving his head a
jot. And this it was that gave to the music its soft and furry-purry
quality.
The Donkey greeted Buddie with a careless nod, and remarked, as if
anticipating a comment he had heard many times:
“Oh, yes; I play everything _by ear_.”
“Please keep on playing,” said Buddie, taking a seat on another clump
of reindeer moss.
“I intended to,” said the Donkey; and the random chords changed to a
crooning melody which wonderfully pleased Buddie, whose opportunities
to hear music were sadly few. As for the White Blackbird, he tucked his
little head under his wing and went fast asleep.
“Well, what do you think of it?” asked the Donkey, putting down the
lute.
“Very nice, sir,” answered Buddie, enthusiastically; though she added
to herself: “The idea of saying ‘sir’ to an animal! Would you please
tell me your name?” she requested.
The Donkey pawed open a saddle-bag, drew forth with his teeth a card,
and presented it to Buddie, who spelled out the following:
+----------------------------------+
| PROFESSOR BRAY |
| TENORE BARITONALE |
| TEACHER OF SINGING ALL METHODS |
| CONCERTS AND RECITALS |
+----------------------------------+
While Buddie was reading this the Donkey again picked up his
instrument and thrummed the strings.
“Did you ever see a donkey play a lute?” said he. “That’s an old saw,”
he added.
“I never saw a donkey before,” said Buddie.
“You haven’t traveled much,” said the other. “The world is full of
them.”
“This is the farthest I’ve ever been from home,” confessed Buddie,
feeling very insignificant indeed.
“And how far may that be?”
Buddie couldn’t tell exactly.
“But it can’t be a great way,” she said. “I live in the log house by
the lake.”
“Pooh!” said the Donkey. “That’s no distance at all.” Buddie shrank
another inch or two. “I’m a great traveler myself. All donkeys travel
that can. If a donkey travels, you know, he _may_ come home a horse;
and to become a horse is, of course, the ambition of every donkey!”
“Is it?” was all Buddie could think of to remark. What could she say
that would interest a globe-trotter?
“Perhaps you have an old saw you’d like reset,” suggested the Donkey,
still thrumming the lute-strings.
Buddie thought a moment.
[Illustration]
“There’s an old saw hanging up in our woodshed,” she began, but got no
further.
[Illustration]
“Hee-haw! hee-haw!” laughed the Donkey. “Thistles and cactus, but
that’s rich!” And he hee-hawed until the tears ran down his nose. Poor
Buddie, who knew she was being laughed at but didn’t know why, began
to feel very much like crying and wished she might run away.
“Excuse these tears,” the Donkey said at last, recovering his family
gravity. “Didn’t you ever hear the saying, A burnt child dreads the
fire?”
Buddie nodded, and plucked up her spirits.
“Well, that’s an old saw. And you must have heard that other very old
saw, No use crying over spilled milk.”
Another nod from Buddie.
“Here’s my setting of that,” said the Donkey; and after a few
introductory chords, he sang:
“‘Oh, why do you cry, my pretty little maid,
With a Boo-hoo-hoo and a Heigho?’
‘I’ve spilled my milk, kind sir,’ she said,
And the Cat said, ‘Me-oh! my-oh!’
“‘No use to cry, my pretty little maid,
With a Boo-hoo-hoo and a Heigho.’
‘But what shall I do, kind sir?’ she said,
And the Cat said, ‘Me-oh! my-oh!’
“‘Why, dry your eyes, my pretty little maid,
With a Boo-hoo-hoo and a Heigho.’
‘Oh, thank you, thank you, sir,’ she said,
And the Cat said, ‘Me-oh! my-oh!’”
If you would like to know what sort of composer the Donkey was, you may
play the song printed on the page opposite to this.
“How do you like my voice?” asked the Donkey, in a tone that said very
plainly: “If you don’t like it you’re no judge of singing.”
Buddie did not at once reply. A professional critic would have said,
and enjoyed saying, that the voice was of the hit-or-miss variety; that
it was pitched too high (all donkeys make that mistake); that it was
harsh, rasping and unsympathetic, and that altogether the performance
was “not convincing.”
Now, Little One, although Buddie was not a professional critic, and
neither knew how to wound nor enjoyed wounding, even _she_ found the
Donkey’s voice harsh; but she did not wish to hurt his feelings--for
donkeys _have_ feelings, in spite of a popular opinion to the contrary.
And, after all, it was pretty good singing for a donkey. Critics should
not, as they sometimes do, apply to donkeys the standards by which
nightingales are judged. So Buddie was able to say, truthfully and
kindly:
“I think you do very well; very well, indeed.”
[Music: “No Use Crying Over Spilled Milk”
MUSIC BY EMMA BONNER TAYLOR.
_With humor._
“Oh, why do you cry, my pretty little maid,
With a Boo-hoo-hoo and a Heigho?”
“I’ve spilled my milk, kind sir,” she said,
And the cat said “Me-oh. My-oh!”
“No use to cry, my pretty little maid,
With a Boo-hoo-hoo and a Heigho”
“But what shall I do, kind sir?” she said.
And the cat said, “Me-oh. My-oh!”
“Why, dry your eyes, my pretty little maid,
With a Boo-hoo-hoo and a Heigho.”
“Oh, thank you, thank you, sir,” she said.
And the cat said “Me-oh, My-oh.”]
It was a small tribute, but the Donkey was so blinded by conceit that
he accepted it as the greatest compliment.
“I _ought_ to sing well,” he said. “I’ve studied methods enough. The
more methods you try, you know, the more of a donkey you are.”
“Oh, yes,” murmured Buddie, not understanding in the least.
“Yes,” went on the Donkey; “I’ve taken the Donkesi Method, the
Sobraylia Method, the Thistlefixu Method--”
“I’m afraid I don’t quite know what you mean by ‘methods,’” ventured
Buddie.
The Donkey regarded her with a pitying smile.
“A method,” he explained, “is a way of singing ‘Ah!’ For example, in
the Thistlefixu Method, which I am at present using, I fill my mouth
full of thistles, stand on one leg, take in a breath three yards long,
and sing ‘Ah!’ The only trouble with this method is that the thistles
tickle your throat and make you cough, and you have to spray the vocal
cords twice a day, which is considerable trouble, especially when
traveling, as _I_ always am.”
“I should think it _would_ be,” said Buddie. “Won’t you sing something
else?”
“I’m a little hoarse,” apologized the singer.
“That’s what you want to be, isn’t it?” said Buddie, misunderstanding
him.
“Hee-haw!” laughed the Donkey. “Is that a joke? I mean my _throat_ is
hoarse.”
“And the rest of you is donkey!” cried Buddie, who could see a point as
quickly as any one of her age.
“There’s something to that,” said the other, thoughtfully. “Now, if the
_hoarseness_ should spread--”
“And you became _horse_ all over--”
“Why, then--”
“Why, then--”
“Think of another old saw,” said the Donkey, picking up his lute.