WHAT FARMER BROWN'S BOY DID WITH SHADOW
Ribble, dibble, dibble, dab!
Some people have the gift of gab!
Some people have no tongues at all
To trip them up and make them fall.
_Happy Jack._
It is a fact, one of the biggest facts in all the world, that tongues
make the greatest part of all the trouble that brings uncomfortable
feelings, and bitterness and sadness and suffering and sorrow. If it
wasn't for unruly, careless, mean tongues, the Great World would be a
million times better to live in, a million times happier. It is because
of his unruly tongue that Sammy Jay is forever getting into trouble. It
is the same way with Chatterer the Red Squirrel. And it is just the same
way with a great many little boys and girls, and with grown-ups as well.
When the little people of the Green Forest and Green Meadows who fear
Shadow the Weasel found that he was a prisoner, many of them took
particular pains to visit him when the way was clear, just to make fun
of him and tease him and tell him that they were not afraid of him and
that they were glad that he was a prisoner, and that they were sure
something dreadful would happen to him and they hoped it would. Shadow
said never a word in reply. He was too wise to do that. He just turned
his back on them. But all the time he was storing up in his mind all
these hateful things, and he meant, if ever he got free again, to make
life very uncomfortable for those whose foolish tongues were trying to
make him more miserable than he already felt.
But these little people with the foolish tongues didn't stop to think of
what might happen. They just took it for granted that Shadow never again
would run wild and free in the Green Forest, and so they just let their
tongues run and enjoyed doing it. Perhaps they wouldn't have, if they
could have known just what was going on in the mind of Farmer Brown's
boy. Ever since he had found Shadow in the trap which he had set for him
in the henhouse, Farmer Brown's boy had been puzzling over what he
should do with his prisoner. At first he had thought he would keep him
in a cage the rest of his life. But somehow, whenever he looked into
Shadow's fierce little eyes and saw how unafraid they looked, he got to
thinking of how terrible it must be to be shut up in a little narrow
cage when one has had all the Green Forest in which to go and come. Then
he thought that he would kill Shadow and put him out of his misery at
once.
"He killed my pullets, and he is always hunting the harmless little
people of the Green Forest and the Green Meadows, so he deserves to be
killed," thought Farmer Brown's boy. "He's a pest."
Then he remembered that after all Shadow was one of Old Mother Nature's
little people, and that he must serve some purpose in Mother Nature's
great plan. Bad as he seemed, she must have some use for him. Perhaps it
was to teach others through fear of him how to be smarter and take
better care of themselves and so be better fitted to do their parts. The
more he thought of this, the harder it was for Farmer Brown's boy to
make up his mind to kill him. But if he couldn't keep him a prisoner
and he couldn't kill him, what could he do?
He was scowling down at Shadow one morning and puzzling over this when a
happy idea came to him. "I know what I'll do!" he exclaimed. Without
another word he picked up the cage with Shadow in it and started off
across the Green Meadows, which now, you know, were not green at all but
covered with snow. Happy Jack watched him out of sight. He had gone in
the direction of the Old Pasture. He was gone a long time, and when he
did return, the cage was empty.
Happy Jack blinked at the empty cage. Then he began to ask in a
scolding tone, "What did you do with him? What did you do with him?"
Farmer Brown's boy just smiled and tossed a nut to Happy Jack. And far
up in the Old Pasture, Shadow the Weasel was once more free. It was well
for Happy Jack's peace of mind that he didn't know that.