BILLY LIVES HIGH
Misunderstandings cleared away
Bring peace and happiness to stay.
_Billy Mink._
Billy Mink was living high. Yes, sir, Billy Mink was living high. For
the first time in his life he didn’t have to hunt for his meals.
Whenever he became hungry, all he had to do was to slip out from under
the woodpile—and there was a meal waiting for him. Of course it hadn’t
taken Billy long to find out where those meals came from. After the
first day Billy had watched. Peeping out from his hiding-place under the
wood, he had seen the farmer come from the house and leave something for
him to eat, and then go on to feed the hens.
Sometimes Billy would find scraps of meat. Sometimes it would be a piece
of fish. Once, when the farmer and his wife had had a chicken dinner,
Billy found a couple of chicken heads, of which he is very fond. Always
it was something Billy liked. He was living so high that he was actually
growing fat and lazy.
And as the days went on, Billy grew less and less afraid of that farmer.
He decided that no one who meant harm to him would be so good to him. So
after a while Billy would come out in broad daylight. In fact, the
farmer would have gone hardly ten steps away before Billy would be out
to see what had been left for him. And the farmer, on his part, took the
greatest care not to do anything to frighten Billy. In short, Billy and
the farmer were becoming very good friends.
Just for exercise Billy would occasionally run over to the big barn and
hunt for mice. Once he visited the henhouse and found that no longer was
there a hole by which he could get into the henhouse. The farmer had
blocked up the hole through which Billy had once entered. After he
discovered this, Billy kept away from the henhouse. He knew that it was
of no use to go there. You see, he is not like the Rats; he doesn’t gnaw
holes. He makes use of holes some one else has made. His teeth are not
made for gnawing.
But Billy wasn’t especially disappointed because he couldn’t get into
the henhouse. In fact, he seldom thought about chickens. You see, he had
plenty to eat, and having plenty there was no temptation to try to kill
a chicken. So Billy felt very much at home and worried about nothing at
all. There was nothing to worry about. He felt as if he quite belonged
in that farmyard. Yes, sir, that is how he felt.