up to the farm. He listened, and, hearing no sound, he crept into the
barnyard. He was just about to reach a fat goose when all the animals
began. The dog barked, the pig squealed, the donkey brayed, the cow
mooed, the geese quacked, the rooster crowed, and Puss, true to her
word, yowled and sprang at Old Fox, who was so frightened at the
terrible noise he forgot to run until Puss struck at him with her sharp
claws; then he took to his swiftest speed, and away he went over the
hill and far away, and was never again seen near that farm.
He told some of his friends that a most horrible animal lived there and
must have eaten all the hens and geese and was big enough to eat them,
for he saw at least twenty feet and claws and heads of all sizes.
[Illustration: headpiece to Dinah Cat and the Witch]
*DINAH CAT AND THE WITCH*
Once upon a time there was a little girl named Betty. She was an
orphan, and a bad landlord turned her out of her home. The only friend
she had was a black cat named Dinah. Betty was crying as she walked
along the road, and Dinah Cat ran beside her, rubbing against her feet.
All at once she ran in front of Betty and stood on her hind legs. "Do
not cry, mistress," she said. "I'll take care of you."
Betty was so surprised to hear Dinah Cat speak that she stopped crying
at once. "You poor Dinah Cat," she said, "what can you do? We must go
to the city, and if I can find work we shall be able to live; if not,
you must take care of yourself, for you can catch mice and keep from
starving."
"You come with me, mistress," answered Dinah Cat, "and you will not need
to work and you will not starve." And she put out her paw for Betty to
take and walked alongside her. When they came to a path leading into
the wood Dinah Cat led Betty along this path until they were in front of
two very large trees which had grown together, but there was a big
opening in the trunk. "We'll go in here," said Dinah Cat, and as they
stepped through they were in a hall. She led Betty up the stairs to a
room where there was a snowy-white bed and pretty furnishings. "Dinner
will be served as soon as you are dressed, mistress," said Dinah Cat.
After she had gone Betty looked around, and in the closets she found
pretty dresses which just fitted her. She put on one of them, and in a
few minutes she was ready for dinner. Just then she heard a soft,
scratching noise at the door, and when she opened it Dinah Cat walked
in.
"How do you like your new home, mistress?" she asked.
"Very much," Betty answered. "But we cannot live in such a nice house.
We have no money, and, besides that, this house must belong to some one.
And this dress I have on must belong to some little girl. I should not
wear it."
"The dress did belong to a little girl," said Dinah Cat, "but she cannot
wear it now, and she wants you to have it. And do not fret about the
house. It belongs to me. I cannot tell you any more just now, but you
need not worry any more about anything, for you are to live here, if you
wish, after you have dinner, for then you will meet a boy, and you may
not like him."
Dinah Cat led Betty into a room where the table was set for three
persons, and when they were seated a boy about Betty's age came in and
sat with them. He wore his hat, and a thick veil hung from it.
"I am sorry I cannot remove my hat," he said, in a very sweet voice,
"and I will go away if you'd rather I would."
"Oh no," said Betty, feeling very much like an intruder. "I am very
grateful to you for letting me stay, and I will help to do the work."
"You do not need to work," said the boy. "If you will stay we will be
very glad."
Betty did not once get a glimpse of his face, he lifted the veil so
carefully. And there sat Dinah Cat, using her knife and fork like any
lady. Betty smiled to herself when she thought of her eating from a
saucer.
Suddenly Dinah Cat slid out of her chair and crawled under it, and the
little boy trembled so that his chair shook. Betty looked around to
find the cause of their strange behavior, and saw standing in the
doorway an old woman with a staff in her hand. She hobbled over to where
Dinah Cat sat and raised the staff. Betty thought she was going to
strike her.
"Don't you hurt Dinah Cat!" she cried, running toward the old witch, who
was so startled that she dropped the staff, and Betty picked it up.
"Don't let her have it again," said the boy; "that is the cause of all
our trouble."
Betty threw the staff in a closet and locked the door. All this time the
witch was stepping backward toward the door by which she entered, and
she grew smaller with each step. By the time she was out of the house
she looked like a black speck, and a breeze blowing just then carried
her out of sight. "But how shall we ever be ourselves again?" said the
boy. "She has gone, and here we are, in this state."
"Perhaps the stick will do it," said Dinah Cat.
Betty wondered what they meant, and the boy told her that Dinah Cat was
his sister before the witch changed her into a cat, and made his face so
hideous that he had to wear a veil, and they had lived very happily
together. "But one day the old witch came and wanted to live with us,
and we let her for a while, but she was so cross and made us so unhappy
we told her she must go away. Then she brought all this change upon us,
and every once in a while she returns and frightens us, for we do not
know what she will change us into next."
"Let me get the stick," said Betty. "Perhaps we can change Dinah Cat to
your sister again."
Betty opened the door of the closet, and instead of the stick there was
a bright streak of light, and walking on it was a little Fairy who held
a wand in her hand.
"You will soon be happy again," she told them. "I have destroyed the
stick and the old witch will never return."
Then she walked over to Dinah Cat and touched her with her wand and
there stood a little girl about Betty's age in place of the black cat.
"Now close your eyes," said the Fairy, "for I want the boy to remove his
veil, and his face is not pleasant to look upon."
Betty did as the Fairy told her, but I am sorry to tell you that she
peeked a very little. Betty closed her eyes tight after the first
glimpse and waited for the Fairy to tell her to open them again, and
when she did there stood the boy with a very smiling face. His sister
ran to him and put her arms around him. "Now we shall be happy," she
said, "and Betty will live with us. How can we thank you?" she asked
the Fairy.
"Oh, I shall be repaid by seeing you all happy," the Fairy replied.
"And now I must go."
"Will we see you again?" asked Betty.
"No," answered the Fairy. "I only appear when people are in trouble,
and you will never need me again."
[Illustration: headpiece to The Star and the Lily]
*THE STAR AND THE LILY*
Once there bloomed in a garden a beautiful white lily, on a long stalk
so tall that she towered over all the flowers that bloomed near her.
Of course, the sunflowers at the back of the garden were much taller and
the hollyhocks that grew in front of the sunflowers were taller, too,
and also the sweet peas. But they were not near the beautiful lily.
Beside her bloomed pansies and poppies, and many other beautiful
flowers, but they were not so tall as the lily.
A rose-bush growing near the lily noticed that she drooped and did not
look as happy as usual one morning, and she asked what had happened.
"Oh, I am thinking of some one I love," answered the lily, with a sigh.
"That should not bring a sigh or make you look sad, my fair friend,"
said the rose. "Love should make you happier than anything else in the
world."
"Yes, I suppose it should," answered the lily, "but my love is so far
away I am not sure that I am loved in return."
"Oh, immodest lily!" said the rose. "I thought you the most modest of
all of us, and here you are in love with some one you do not know. Tell
me about it, do?" said the rose, alert with interest.
"I will tell you, dear rose," said the lily, "and perhaps you can tell
me how to win the love of my beloved, or how I can overcome my great
love for him."
"I will do anything I can for you, my dear," said the rose, "but do tell
me quick all about your love-story."
"One night," began the lily, "when everything was quiet in the garden
and all the other flowers were fast asleep, I happened to raise my head
and open my petals. The moonlight was streaming over the garden, and I
looked around at all the sleeping flowers and wondered how I happened to
awake at that hour, when, looking up to see the moon in all her
splendor, I beheld a beautiful star looking down at me.
"At first I thought it was looking at the whole garden, but then I knew
all the others were asleep and I must be the one it was smiling at, for
it twinkled and brightened as I gazed at it.
"I lowered my head and slyly looked again, and still the star was
looking, and every time it saw me raise my head it would twinkle a smile
at me. The next night I wanted to make sure it was I that the star
really smiled at, and when it was bedtime I only bowed my head and did
not sleep.
"Then when the garden was still and I was sure you all slept I again
raised my head and saw my star smiling straight down at me.
"This time I was sure I was the only one that the star could be smiling
at, and I raised my head and opened my petals and let all the perfume of
my heart go up to him, and I did not feel that I was bold, for we were
all alone and he smiled down upon me, his love for two nights.
"But now I am sorrowful, for it is day and I cannot see my beloved. He
seems only to show his love for me at night. What shall I do, dear
rose? I am not strong enough to stay awake all day and all night too.
Soon I will die if I do, and yet I cannot live if I do not see my star
each night. That is why I sigh and look so sad, for I might sleep all
night some time and my star will think I do not love him."
The rose shook her head. "I cannot advise you, my friend," she said;
"you are in love with some one far above you, and are not even sure you
are loved in return. Be wise and sleep through the night as the rest of
us do, and give up this uncertain lover."
But the lily only drooped her head and sighed, and that night looked for
her lover again, but the sky was dark and no bright smile greeted the
poor lily. All night she gazed into the dark sky, and when the first
light of day came she was still looking for her lover.
The rose looked at her when the sun came upon them that morning, but the
lily did not raise her head; she was too full of sorrow to lift her face
to the sun, and by and by the rose saw that she was drooping lower and
lower, so she spoke to her.
"Lily," she said, leaning closer to her, "raise your head and let the
sun cheer you. You will die if you do not open your petals and get the
light and air."
But the poor lily was past caring for sun or air; her petals were limp
and her stalk withered.
The rose leaned closer to her as she faintly answered, and this is what
she heard:
"Good-by, my friend; I shall bloom no more. My bright star hid his face
from me last night and I have no desire to live longer. Perhaps I may
see him after I am gone from here, and if that is true I shall be happy,
but I cannot live here and not see his face.'"
The wind blew through the garden just then and took the lily from her
stem, scattering her petals far out of the garden.
"Poor lily!" murmured the rose, "she went the way we all will go, but
her heart was broken and she died before her time. If she had only
looked for love here in the garden instead of looking so far above her
she might be blooming now, poor lily."
[Illustration: headpiece to Lazy Gray]
*LAZY GRAY*
All the other squirrels called him Lazy Gray, which was really not a
very nice name for a squirrel to have, but it fitted this squirrel, and
I am going to tell you how he came to be called by such an unpleasant
name.
When Lazy Gray was born there were three little squirrels in his family,
but he was the youngest and his mother thought he was the prettiest, and
all the rest of the family used to wait on him a great deal, and his
mother did not ask him to do errands or to climb trees or any other of
the hard tasks that most squirrels have to do. And Lazy Gray took
advantage of the kindness of his mother and his brothers and sister, and
used to ask them to wait on him. When he was thirsty and wanted a drink
of water he would call to his mother and say, "I am thirsty"; and she
would take a nutshell and go down to the brook and fill it with nice
cool water and bring it to him for him to drink. And sometimes he
wouldn't even say "Thank you" when he had finished.
And he used to make his brothers go on long journeys through the woods
to get a particular kind of nut of which he was very fond; and if they
happened to bring him one that was not good he would find fault with
them and tell them that they did not know good nuts from bad ones.
All through the summer he fooled away his time sleeping and lying in the
sun and never a single nut did he gather for himself. But when fall
came and his two brothers were taken ill, his mother said that he would
have to help her gather nuts because she could not gather enough to last
the whole family through all the long winter. Lazy thought it was very
hard that he should be called upon to work for his brothers even if they
were sick, and he complained very bitterly about how hard it was for him
to climb trees all day and store nuts. Whenever he could he stole away
and lay down behind a rock and kept hidden until his mother came and
found him. And then she would tell how, when it got cold and there was
snow all over the ground and he was hungry, he would wish that he had
been a good squirrel and had gathered the nuts while he could.
But he did not believe her and said, "Oh, I have gathered all the nuts I
shall want and am not going to work any more," and then he would go to
sleep again.
Weeks passed by, and it grew colder and colder and the snow came, and
all the squirrels began to draw on their stores of nuts. Lazy found
that he got pretty hungry sometimes and that the habit of eating and
drinking all he wanted in the summer made him want to eat and drink all
he wanted in the winter. And as he had never taught himself
self-denial, he ate all he wanted, and very early in the winter he began
to see that the nuts he had gathered would not last him half-way through
the winter, and almost before he knew it his whole store was exhausted
and he had nothing to eat.
Then he asked his mother to let him have some of the nuts that she had
gathered, and being a kind mother, she let him have just as many as she
could, but she still had to keep some for his sick brothers. When she
would not give him all he thought he ought to have he decided that he
would go over to a neighboring tree and ask a squirrel over there for
some of his nuts, and for weeks he went from one tree to another begging
nuts, until every squirrel in the woods hated to see him coming, for
they knew he was going to beg food that he should have gathered for
himself.
At last he became so much of a nuisance that all the squirrels in the
wood held a meeting and decided that each one of them would give two
nuts to "Lazy," as they now all called him, and that he would have to
live for the rest of the winter on the store they contributed or else
starve.
When Lazy saw what a small store of nuts he would have to live upon
until spring he was frightened, for he had eaten almost as many nuts as
there were there in a week.
But he knew he had to make them last, so he ate very sparingly, and his
sides began to be less plump and his cheeks less full, and by springtime
he was a pretty sorry-looking squirrel, with his ribs showing plainly
through his sides and his bushy tail looking bigger than the whole of
the rest of him.
But it taught him a good lesson, and early in the next summer, just as
soon as there were any nuts to be had, he began to store them away, and
when winter came again he had a big hole in the tree filled full and his
mother was much pleased.
"You see," she told him, "how wicked it is not to provide for the future
and store up things that are necessary against the time when you will
need them."
And Lazy agreed with her and told her that never again so long as he
lived would he merit the name of "Lazy."
[Illustration: headpiece to The Old Gray Hen]
*THE OLD GRAY HEN*
"Oh, dear!" said the Old Gray Hen, "what a life this is! Up in the
morning at the break of day in answer to the summons of that crowing
rooster; scratch all the forenoon for worms; sit on a nest and leave a
beautiful egg there, and in half an hour along comes somebody and takes
the egg and I never see it again. Then every spring I am put on a lot
of eggs that I never saw before and am supposed to sit there until a
brood of chickens are hatched out, and then for weeks I have to scratch
for them as well as for myself. I don't see anything in this sort of
life, and I propose to change it until it is more to my liking and more
as the life of such a fine hen as I am ought to be."
Old Daddy Gander happened along just as the Gray Hen finished talking to
herself. "What's the trouble this morning?" he asked. "Why all this
sputtering and spluttering? One would think that the whole barnyard had
turned upside down and the corn had all fallen off into the sky."
"There's matter enough," said Gray Hen. "What have we fowls to live
for? I scratch and you waddle and you waddle and I scratch, and what
does it all amount to? Something has got to be done, and, if no one
else will do it, why, I shall. Things are going to be different with
me."
"I guess I'll keep on as I am," said old Daddy Gander as he waddled
away. "I might make them worse than they are, and they are not so bad,
anyway."
"Good morning, Gray Hen," said Madam Duck. "What a fine day we are going
to have! The water will be nice and warm for my ducklings, and I can
give them a good swim in the pond."
"It is neither a good morning nor is it going to be a fine day, and as
for swimming in the pond, if I had to mother a lot of children with as
homely feet as your brood has I would want to keep them in the water all
the time so that no one would see them."
"What a mean disposition Gray Hen has!" said Madam Duck to the turkey
gobbler as she went on her way to the pond. "I tried to be agreeable to
her and she insulted me and spoke so unkindly of my children that I felt
quite like crying."
"I almost wish that she had been a little more unkind," said the
gobbler, "for I have never seen a duck crying and I imagine it might be
an almost sight. Perhaps Gray Hen needs some of my good advice, and I
will walk over shortly and see her."
But the old gobbler was saved his trouble, for in a few minutes he saw
Gray Hen coming down the path toward him. As she came up to him he
said: "What a miserable feeling morning this, Mrs. Hen; my feathers will
none of them lie straight, and every worm that I have tasted for
breakfast has been bitter."
"You are quite right," said Gray Hen. "It is just like all the mornings
recently, uncomfortable and disagreeable, and there does not seem to be
any promise of anything better."
"You are quite right," said the gobbler. "What the gander and the duck
see in the present to be so satisfied with I don't understand, and as to
the future, I don't know why we should expect any more of that than the
past."
"I have always felt," said Gray Hen, "that you, Mr. Gobbler, never got
half your deserts in this barnyard. Everybody seems to think that the
rooster, because he crows every morning at sunup, is the wisest bird in
the yard, but as for me, I have always held you in greater esteem and
have often spoken of the nobility of your looks and the regal way in
which you walk about the place. If I had any voice in the matter I
should suggest that you be recognized as superior to the rooster. But,
you see, the hens have nothing to say, although some day I feel sure
that it will be different."
"You are very kind," said the gobbler, "and I feel as you do, while I
have no wish to be ruler of the yard, that the hens should have more to
say. You should at least have independence and do as you like."
"Oh, I have determined on that already," said Gray Hen, and she told him
how she had decided to lay no more eggs and to scratch as little as she
had to.
"Well," said the gobbler, "I must be off and see that none of those
turkey hens get so far into the wood that they cannot find their way
back again. I certainly gave the kind of advice she wanted," he said,
when he had got out of her hearing, "and that was easier than getting
into an argument. And, besides that, discontented people and animals
are always so much more comfortable if they think others are just as
unhappy as they are."
Old Gray Hen, however, was as good as her word. She stopped laying eggs
and the amount of gravel that she scratched was scarcely worth
mentioning. She stole worms from the younger chickens, who were too
polite to punish a hen so old as she was, and, altogether, she became a
general nuisance to all the rest of the barnyard flock.
They could not protect themselves, but Farmer Johnson, walking through
the yard one day, noticed that the Old Gray Hen's toes had grown to a
most unusual length. "I guess she doesn't do much scratching," he said
as he passed along, "and I suspect she doesn't lay many eggs. I must
ask mother about it when I get back to the house."
"No," said Mother Johnson, when he asked her, "I haven't found an egg in
Gray Hen's nest for a month or more."
"She won't pay to winter, then," said Farmer Johnson. "We had better
eat her." And the following Sunday, when Farmer Johnson sat down for
dinner, they brought a big platter of steaming fricassee to the table
and that was the end of Old Gray Hen.
A day or two after, when the gobbler happened to meet Madam Duck, she
said: "I hear that Gray Hen has left us."
"Yes," said the gobbler, "and I hope she is happier than she was here,
but her contentment was greatest when others were distressed."
[Illustration: headpiece to The Worsted Doll]
*THE WORSTED DOLL*
Good Mother Munster and her husband Jacob had five daughters. Of course
they loved them dearly, but they often wished for a son.
"Then he could help me in the shop," said Jacob, who was a maker of
dolls. "Not that I would exchange one of our girls for a boy," he
added, "but I wish we had a son as well as the five girls."
Whether the stork heard this talk between Jacob and his wife and took
offense because they questioned his judgment, or whether he thought
Jacob and his wife had their number of children, I do not know; but he
never called again at their door and their daughters grew up to
womanhood without a brother.
One day Jacob hurried in from his shop, which was back of his house. He
was very much excited, and talked so fast that good Mother Munster could
not understand half he said.
"They want worsted dolls," he explained at last, "two dozen worsted
dolls to be sent across the water in time for Christmas."
Jacob raised his hands with a gesture of despair, for at his shop they
did not make worsted dolls, and he could not understand why any one
should want them.
"There is plenty of time to make them," Mother Munster said. "The girls
and I can knit them, and we will make half of them girls and half of
them boy dolls." And so the knitted dolls were begun by good Mother
Munster and her daughters.
One day when Mother Munster was knitting on the last doll, which was a
boy, she began to think how much she would miss them when they were
finished and sent across the sea.
"I will make you extra large," she said as she added a few stitches to
the length and breadth of the doll, "and if I could I would knit you a
tongue so you could talk and legs that you could run on, and have you
like a live boy."
Mother Munster knitted as she thought, and though she did not know it,
she knitted all her wishes into the boy doll's body, so that when he was
finished he could do all the things she had wished.
But he was a wise little fellow, and did not betray himself for fear he
would not be shipped across the water with the other dolls, and he
wanted to see the world.
It was a long journey to the other side of the ocean, and the boy doll
thought it never would end. But by and by he was taken from the big
packing-case and with other dolls placed in a window of a big shop.
"I wish some one would speak to me," thought the boy doll, but not a
word did the other dolls utter, and as he did not wish to appear forward
he kept silent also.
One day a lady came into the store and carried Boy Doll away with her,
and then one night he was put on a tree trimmed with glittering ropes of
tinsel.
A little girl came into the room after a while, and when she saw Boy
Doll she exclaimed, "Oh, I hope the boy doll is for me!"
"So do I," thought Boy Doll, "for I am sure you will talk to me."
And sure enough he was given to the little girl. "I am so glad you were
for me," she told him, "for I do need a father for my doll family."