Once there was a little pumpkin that grew on a vine in a field. All
day long the sun shone on him, and the wind blew gently around him.
Sometimes the welcome rain fell softly upon him, and as the vine
sent her roots deep down into the earth and drew the good sustenance
from it, and it flowed through her veins, the little pumpkin drank
greedily of the good juice, and grew bigger and bigger, and rounder
and rounder, and firmer and firmer.
By and by he grew so big he understood all that the growing things
around him were saying, and he listened eagerly.
“I came from the seed of a Jack-o’-lantern,” said this vine to a
neighbour, “therefore I must grow all Jack-o’-lanterns.”
“So did I,” said a neighbour, “but no Jack-o’-lanterns for me. It is
too hard a life. I am going to grow just plain pumpkins.”
When the little pumpkin heard he was supposed to be a
Jack-o’-lantern, he grew very worried, for he could not see that he
was in any way different from any ordinary pumpkin, and if Mother
Vine expected him to be a Jack-o’-lantern, he did not want to
disappoint her.
At last he grew so unhappy over it that the dancing little sunbeams
noticed it. “What is the matter, little pumpkin?” they cried. “Why do
you not hold up your head and look around as you used to do?”
“Because,” answered the little pumpkin, sadly, “I have to be a
Jack-o’-lantern, and I don’t know how. All I know about is how to be
a little yellow pumpkin.”
Then the merry little breezes laughed and laughed until they shook
the vine so that all the pumpkins had to tighten their hold not to
be shaken off. “Oh, little pumpkin!” they cried, “why worry about
what you will have to do later? Just try with all your might to be a
little yellow pumpkin, and believe that if you do the best you can,
everything will be all right. We know a secret, a beautiful secret,
and some day we will tell it to you.”
“Oh, tell me now!” cried the little pumpkin, but the sunbeams and
breezes laughed together, and chuckled,
“Oh no, oh no, oh no!
Just grow and grow and grow,
And some day you will know.”
The little pumpkin felt comforted. “After all,” he thought, “perhaps
if I cannot be a Jack-o’-lantern I can be a good pumpkin, and I am so
far down on the vine perhaps Mother Vine won’t notice me.” He looked
around, and saw that all his brothers and sisters were only little
pumpkins, too.
“Oh, dear,” he cried, “are we going to disappoint Mother Vine?
Aren’t any of us going to be Jack-o’-lanterns?” Then all his little
brothers and sisters laughed, and said, “What do we care about being
Jack-o’-lanterns? All we care about is to eat the good juice, and
grow and grow.”
At last came the cold weather, and all the little pumpkins were now
big ones, and a beautiful golden yellow. The biggest and yellowest of
all was the little pumpkin who had tried so hard all summer to grow
into a Jack-o’-lantern. He could not believe Mother Vine did not see
him now, for he had grown so big that every one who saw him exclaimed
about him, and Mother Vine did not seem at all disappointed, she just
kept at work carrying the good food that kept her pumpkin children
well fed.
At last one frosty morning, a crowd of children came to the field.
“The pumpkins are ready,” they cried. “The pumpkins are ready; and
we are going to find the biggest and yellowest and nicest to make a
Jack-o’-lantern for the Thanksgiving party. All the grandmothers and
grandfathers and aunts and uncles will see it, and we are going to
eat the pies made from it.”
They looked here and there, all over the field, and pushed aside the
vines to see better. All at once they saw the little pumpkin. “Oh!”
they cried, “What a perfect Jack-o’-lantern! So big and firm and
round and yellow! This shall be the Jack-o’-lantern for our
Thanksgiving party, and it is so large there will be pie enough for
every one.”
Then they picked the pumpkin and carried him to the barn. Father
cut a hole in the top around the stem, lifted it off carefully and
scooped out the inside, and the children carried it to mother in the
kitchen. Then father made eyes and a nose and mouth, and fitted a big
candle inside. “Oh, see the beautiful Jack-o’-lantern!” they cried.
The little pumpkin waited in the barn. “At last I am a
Jack-o’-lantern,” he said. After a time it grew dark, and father
came and carried him into the house, and lighted the candle, and put
him right in the middle of the table, and all the grandmothers and
grandfathers, and aunts and uncles, cried, “Oh, what a beautiful,
big, round, yellow Jack-o’-lantern!”
Then the little pumpkin was happy, for he knew Mother Vine would have
been proud of him, and he shone--shone--SHONE, until the candle was
all burned out.