LITTLE WHITE FOX GOES FISHING
Little White Fox was hungry again. It would seem that a little white fox
is hungry most of the time. He went wandering all over the tundra,
looking for something to eat. At last he came to the bank of the river.
He was sniffing about there when he spied a door right in the ground
near the ice roof of the river. "Hello!" said he, stopping short, "I
wonder who made that door in there." He looked into the door but could
see no one. It was too dark. He shouted into the door, but no one
answered. He crept part way down the stairway. Then he stopped and
listened. He heard nothing, so he ventured on, and almost before he knew
it, he found himself in one of the biggest caves he had ever seen. It
was as wide as half the river and as long as he could see in each
direction. It had an ice roof and a good solid floor. Only the floor
stopped pretty soon, and then there was water.
"I don't believe anybody in the world could build a house like this!"
said Little White Fox. "I guess it just happened to be here, and some
one has discovered it. I wonder who it could be?"
He walked down close to where the water was, and there he found tracks.
Oh! hundreds and hundreds of them! But he could not tell whose tracks
they were. He had never seen such tracks before.
"Anyway, I believe there is something good to eat in that water," he
said to himself. "If there wasn't, that fellow wouldn't come down here
and stand around so much. It is nice and warm down here out of the wind,
and I guess I'll stand around a little myself and see what will happen."
Meanwhile, down below in the river, two of the little river people were
having a talk all by themselves. They were Unfortunate Flounder and Mr.
Salmon Trout. Salmon Trout is a very graceful fellow who always holds
himself erect in the water. When he swims, he goes so swiftly that you
can hardly see him. But Unfortunate Flounder goes floating around on one
side all the time, and looks more like a dead leaf than any member of
the fish family.
"Why do you not stand straight up in the water as I do?" said Salmon
Trout.
"Well," said Unfortunate Flounder, "it's only a little my fault. Can't
you see that my eyes are on one of my flat sides and my stomach on the
other? It wouldn't be very pleasant to go about looking one way and
going another, would it? When I was going south, I'd be looking west;
don't you see?"
"How does it happen that you are that way?"
"I was born that way. All my children are the same, and so were my
parents before me. You see, it's really a matter of ancestry. Way back
somewhere, one of my great grandparents found out it was easier to lop
around sidewise in the water than to stand straight up as you do, so he
lopped around all his life long. His son followed his example and lopped
around a little worse. So it went on, until to-day we could not
straighten up if we were to try. At least, it would take whole
generations before we could balance ourselves as well as you do. As for
me, I don't see as it matters much, for, after all, I quite agree with
my great grandfather that it is best to be comfortable, even if it does
make you ugly, ungraceful, and slow."
But just then Unfortunate Flounder learned what an unhappy thing it was
to be slow. Little White Fox from his station on the bank had been
watching, watching very sharply two dark spots that had appeared in the
water. He had watched them come closer and closer. At last he thought he
could reach out and grab one of them without getting in the water.
"Look out!" cried Salmon Trout, as he glided swiftly away. But poor
Unfortunate Flounder was too slow, and he felt Little White Fox's sharp
teeth close down on him.
Just then something happened. "Here! what are you doing in my fishing
house?" demanded an angry voice. It frightened Little White Fox so badly
that he dropped Unfortunate Flounder back into the river and looked
around.
It was Mr. Golden Marten, and this was his fishing house. At least, he
called it his, for he had made the stairway down to it. It took Little
White Fox only a moment to discover that while Golden Marten was not
quite as large as he was, his teeth were very sharp. The door to the
stairway was quite close to him, and before Golden Marten could stop him
Little White Fox was out of the door and racing for home as fast as his
little legs could carry him.
"All the same," he said to his mother that night, after he had told her
of the cave, "when I am as old as you are, I am going to have a fish
house all my own!"