When there was no bed at hand?
|IF you have had that happen, then you know exactly how Bobby Coon felt
when he was obliged to crawl out of Prickly Porky's bed and go hunt for
another. He was so very, very sleepy that he felt almost as if he could
go to sleep standing right on his feet. This was because he had been up
all night and awake most of the day before. Now he wished that instead
of spending the night in fishing and playing about the Laughing Brook,
he had hunted for a house.
To be sleepy and not able to sleep makes Bobby cross, just as it does
most folks. So, as he hurried away from the neighborhood of Prickly
Porky and his thousand little spears, he was in a bad temper. Of course,
he knew it was his own fault that he was in such a fix, and this didn't
make him feel a bit better. In fact, it made him feel worse. It usually
is that way.
So he grumbled to himself as he went along. He didn't know where he was
going. He was too cross and sleepy and upset to do any thinking. So
he went along, aimlessly looking for a place where he might sleep
undisturbed. At last he came to a tall stump, a great big old stump that
had stood in the Green Forest for years and years. Bobby climbed to the
top of it. It was hollow, just as he had hoped. Indeed, it was just a
shell. Looking down, Bobby saw with a great deal of satisfaction that
the bottom was covered with a great mass of rotted wood. It would make a
very comfortable bed. Moreover, it was plain that no one else was using
it.
Bobby sighed with satisfaction. It was just the place for a good long
nap. He could sleep there all day in perfect comfort. It wouldn't do
for a home, because the top was open to the sky, and on a rainy day the
inside of that stump would soon be a very wet place indeed. But for a
nice long nap on a pleasant day, it would be hard to beat. Bobby sighed
again, looked all about to make sure that no one was watching him, and
then climbed down inside.
“I guess,” muttered Bobby, as he curled up on the bed of rotted wood,
which is sometimes called punk, “that at last I shall be allowed to
sleep in peace. I never was more sleepy in all my life.” He yawned two
or three times, changed his position for greater comfort, closed his
eyes, and in a twinkling was asleep.
Now, though he thought no one saw him go into that old stump, some one
did. That some one was Peter Rabbit. Peter had followed Bobby just out
of curiosity. He had hidden behind trees so as to keep out of Bobby's
sight. So he had seen Bobby climb the stump and disappear inside.
“I guess,” said Peter, “that this time he will sleep in peace. No one
is likely to find him there unless it should be that Sammy Jay or Blacky
the Crow happens to fly over and so discover him. They wouldn't give him
a bit of peace if they should. Hello! There's Blacky's voice now, and he
seems to be coming this way. I think I will hang around a while longer.”