MISTER ROBIN DECIDES TO TAKE A VACATION
The days sped by, and the baby robins grew so fast that very soon the
four filled the nest chock-full, and so one day Robert Robin was not
much surprised to see two of them standing up in the nest.
"Sit down at once, children!" he said. "You might fall out and frighten
your mother!"
But the next day little Sheldon hopped out of the nest and stood beside
it, and Elizabeth insisted upon standing so near the edge of the nest
that Mrs. Robin was very nervous for fear she would upset the nest and
spill Montgomery and Evelina to the ground.
"Do sit down, child!" said Robert Robin. "Your mother does not like to
have you stand up in the nest that way!" But Elizabeth gave a great jump
and in a moment she was standing on a big limb fluttering her wings,
and getting ready to fly. Then little Sheldon gave a great jump and flew
clear into the maple tree. Mrs. Robin was very much excited, and was
screaming loudly, and Robert Robin was saying, "Tut! Tut!" and jerking
his tail up and down.
Suddenly Evelina stood up and jumped and the nest went rolling over and
over down the side of the tall basswood tree, spilling little Montgomery,
heels over head.
"Do be careful! Do be careful!" screamed Mrs. Robin. "You will all be
killed! You will all be killed!"
But Montgomery was already flopping his wings at a great rate, and had
started to fly when the heavy nest fell right on top of him, and there
was little Montgomery under the nest, and the nest was wrong side up on
the ground.
"Help! Help!" screamed little Montgomery. "Help! Help! I am under the
nest!"
Robert Robin tugged at the nest, but the nest was too heavy for him to
lift. Mrs. Robin came, and both of them tugged and pulled at the nest,
but it was so heavy that both of them together could not lift it.
"Let us tear the nest apart!" said Mrs. Robin, but the dry mud was so
hard that the twigs could not be pulled apart.
Just then Elizabeth went fluttering past, and little Sheldon fell off
his limb, and Evelina began crying--she was so frightened,--so both
parent birds were forced to leave poor little Montgomery under the heavy
nest and look after their other children.
And what a time they had with them! For over an hour the three little
robins went flying in all directions through the woods. Mister Tom
Squirrel sat on a limb and laughed and chuckled, and said to Robert
Robin: "The way your baby robins fly makes me remember the time I showed
my cousins--the flying squirrels--the way to fly straight down!"
But Mister Robin was too excited to feel like visiting with Mister Tom
Squirrel. He was afraid that he would lose one of his children. But at
last the baby robins were tired enough to feel like resting. Little
Sheldon was in the top of a cedar tree, Elizabeth was sitting in a
green osier, and little Evelina was sitting on Mister Chipmunk's stump,
but poor little Montgomery was still under the heavy nest, and neither
Robert Robin nor Mrs. Robin could think of any way to get him out.
Over in the pasture a cow was wearing a cowbell. Every time the cow
moved her head the bell said "Tonk! Tonkle! Tonk! Tonkle!" Robert Robin
could hear the cowbell making the noise to let the farmer know where his
brindle cow was. But Robert Robin kept hearing another sound. "Tonkle!
Tonkle!" Then he heard some one talking, and he saw two little girls
coming into the woods. They were out strawberrying, and they were
carrying tin pails on their arms, and whenever they dropped a strawberry
in their tin pails it made a noise like "Tonkle! Tonkle!"
"Let us go through this corner of the woods, and maybe we will find some
white strawberries!" said one little girl.
"Or some wintergreen berries!" said the other.
"Be careful and not tear your dress on the twigs!" said the first.
"This is an old dress, so I don't care!" said the other.
"There is a bird's nest!" said the first little girl.
"Turn it over and see what is inside of it!" said the other.
So the little girl poked Robert Robin's nest with the toe of her shoe
and turned it over, and out jumped Montgomery Robin, and the first thing
that he did was to open his mouth just as wide as he could. Both the
little girls laughed.
"It is a young robin!" said Lucy, "let's feed it some of our
strawberries!"
"You may feed it some of yours, if you want to, but I am going to take
mine home to mother!" said Lettie, who was a fussy little girl, and her
mother did not eat strawberries. They gave her neuritis and pimples.
"That poor little robin may have been under that nest, days, and days,
and he is almost starved!" said Lucy. "So I am going to feed the poor
thing some of my strawberries!"
So Lucy fed Montgomery three ripe strawberries. "Now that is all you may
have now!" said Lucy to Montgomery. "People who have been having a
famine should not overload their stomachs!"
"Don't touch the dirty thing or you will get bugs on you!" said Lettie.
"Oh! Bugs yourself!" said Lucy. "I hope you step on a snake! It would
serve you right for being so nicey nicey!"
"You are a very rude little girl, to say such things!" said Lettie.
"I am very sorry if I hurt your feelings, Lettie!" said Lucy. "It was
very rude of me to wish that you would step on a snake! I will take it
all back, but I would laugh if you got a spider down your neck!"
Then Lucy and Lettie went out of the woods and left little Montgomery
sitting on the ground, but in a very few minutes he started flying from
stump to stump, and soon he was sitting in the cedar tree close by
little Sheldon.
Towards night Robert Robin and Mrs. Robin coaxed the baby robins back
into the big basswood tree, and all that night the four of them sat on
the same limb and slept just as fine as could be.
At dawn, Robert Robin sang his "Hurry up!" song, then he came back to
see how his family was getting along. The four baby robins looked very
good in their new silky feathers, and they seemed almost as large as
Mrs. Robin, and if their breasts had been red instead of speckled you
could hardly have told them from full-grown robins. But they were still
quite babies, and had to be fed, and it was several days before their
parents taught them to find food for themselves.
"You are a great big man-bird, now. Almost as tall as your father, and
you ought to be ashamed to even think of letting your mother feed you!"
said Mrs. Robin to Montgomery, who still had the habit of opening his
mouth as wide as he could.
About the middle of the week, they were all flying around and getting
their own food, so Robert Robin said to Mrs. Robin: "I have had a
little matter on my mind for quite a while!"
"What is it?" asked Mrs. Robin.
"I have been thinking about taking a vacation!" said Robert Robin. "I
have been working pretty hard, this summer, and the strain is beginning
to tell! Only last night, I dreamed that seven spotted cats were chasing
me through a briar patch! When I awoke I was all covered with a cold
sweat! What I need is a little rest and relaxation!"
"What is relaxation?" asked Mrs. Robin.
"Something like rest, only more refined!" said Robert Robin.
"I think that I need a little vacation!" said Mrs. Robin, "so I will go
along with you!"
"That will be fine!" said Robert Robin, "and we will take the children!
But where shall we go?"
"Where have you been planning on going, dear?" asked Mrs. Robin.
"I would like to go to some quiet, restful place, where there was
plenty to eat and drink, and nothing to do."
"That would be a wonderful place to live!" said Mrs. Robin. "I should
like to stay there always!"
"I was thinking that I would like to loaf around Brigg's Brambles for a
few days, then go over to Black-bug Swamp for a few days, then drop over
to the river for a day or two, or possibly spend a short time at the
lake!"
"Brigg's Brambles is not a very safe place to take the children--there
are so many owls and hawks around, and there is such an odor to
Black-bug Swamp, and the last time we were over to the river, we saw all
those boys shooting with their air guns. I was thinking that if we went
to the mountains or to the seashore we would meet a great many more of
our friends,--but have your own way, dear--I will be perfectly happy
anywhere!"
"Perhaps we had better go to the mountains!" said Robert Robin. "It
would be safer for the children!"
"That would be fine if the weather stays warm, but I shall never forget
that awful chill I had, year before last!"
"That settles it!" said Robert Robin. "We will go to the seashore, where
the weather is almost always good!"
"You have the best judgment about everything, dear!" said Mrs. Robin.
"You always know just how to decide it! It is perfectly wonderful how
quickly you make up your mind!"
"My father was the same way!" said Robert Robin. "I think it runs in our
family!" Then Robert Robin felt so fine that he flew up to the top of a
hickory tree and sang his "Pick Pickles" song.
"Pick pickles!
Pick pickles!
A teasel tick tickles!
A peasel pick pickles!
A teasel pick pickles!"
And old Mister Woodpecker stopped drumming on his tree, and looked at
Robert Robin and laughed and said:
"Every time I hear you sing that foolish song, I have to laugh in spite
of myself!"
Then Old Mister Woodpecker started to drill another hole, but he was
still so full of giggles that he could not get his mouth closed, and
every time just as he went to tap the tree with his bill he would give a
giggle.
"A teasel pick pickles! Ha! Ha! Ha!" laughed Old Mister Woodpecker. "Ho!
Ho! Ho!" and it was four minutes before he could get the corner of his
lips down so that he could get his mouth closed.
So Old Mister Woodpecker could not laugh and work at the same time, and
that may be the reason why only a very few people have ever heard Mister
Woodpecker laugh out loud, and not so very many people have even seen
him smile.