Stories of humble friends

ALBERT R.. MANN LIBRARY
CORNELL UNIVERSITY

Cornell University

Library

The original of this book is in
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AUVHSM ALISHSAINN 117:

——_

ECLECTIC SCHOOL READINGS

STORIES OF

HUMBLE FRIENDS

BY

KATHARINE PYLE

WITH PICTURES BY THE AUTHOR

NEW YORK -::- CINCINNATI -:: CHICAGO
AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY

Copyright, 1902, by
KATHARINE PYLE

Entered at Stationers’ Hall, London

Stories of Humble Friends
we. 6

“ Fe prayeth best who loveth best
All things, both great and small ;
For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all.”

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER PAGE

I, The Story of a Caterpillar ‘i . ‘ . 7
II. Little Brown Hen . F F 5 - j 13
III. Bianca. : z ‘ : ; 5 » 23
IV, Jerry . : ‘ . . . . . 29
Vv. Barry ; ; ; : : : : - 36

VI, Fax 2 ‘ i . é ‘ 2 - 44
VII. The Two Little Crabs. ‘i ‘ z a, 3
VIIL James Crow . ; : . . ; » 62
IX. Firefly. é . ; 7 . 2 40

X. The Story of a Sie : . . . ~ 47
XI, The Tame Bat. : . ri : . 98
XII. The Captive Robin. g : ; a . 106
XIII. Flora and her Cat . i . : . . 118

XIV. The Two Worlds . ‘ ‘ ‘ . 5, 4125
XV. The Partridges ; ‘ F : ‘ . 134
XVI. Limpety . A ; . : . » 138

XVII. The Opossum Family ‘ ‘ 4 i - 157
XVIII. Polly : : , ‘ . ; . . 163
XIX. The Pet Lamb F ‘ : ‘ . . 191
XX. What Became of the Kittens . . 2 . 178
XXI. Graywings . : ‘ . * . . 183
XXII The Flying Squirrel ‘ . . . . 188

STORIES OF HUMBLE FRIENDS

THE STORY OF A CATERPILLAR

A CATERPILLAR had crawled up ona twig. It
looked the twig all over, then fastened itself tightly
to it by its hind legs and began twisting itself and
moving its head up and down with a weaving motion. .
Every time the caterpillar’s head moved it left be-
hind it something that looked like a glistening
thread of silk.

An ant that was crawling along the branch stopped
and stared with wonder. ‘ What in the world are
you doing ?” it asked.

The caterpillar paused to rest fora moment. It
was hard work bending and doubling itself in that
way. ‘ I’m making a house,” it said.

“ Making a house!” cried the ant.

A bee that had lighted close by began to buzz
with laughter. ‘“ Will you tell me, if you please,
what sort of a house that is?” he cried.

7

8

“The only sort of house I know how to make,”
the caterpillar answered humbly.

“T never heard of anything so absurd. Why
don’t you hunt about and find a hollow tree, or a
good hive, and live in that? Then you would be
safe.”

“Or you might find a hole under a stone,” added
the ant. ‘That's a very good place.”

The caterpillar shook its head. ‘ This is the
only sort of house I know how to make,” it repeated.
Then it set to work again.

As for the bee and the ant they went their ways.
‘A poor sort of a house indeed,” each one thought
to itself,

But the caterpillar went on working,

Up and down, up and down its head moved,
weaving and weaving. Now the silk was likea thin,
silvery veil about it. Through the veil you could
still faintly see the caterpillar moving.

At last the veil grew so thick that you could not
see the caterpillar at all. You could only guess
that it might still be at work inside.

After a while the bee came by that way again.

It stopped and looked the little house all over.
Then it flew down to the ant-hill. ‘“ Miss Ant, Miss

9

Ant, come out here,” it buzzed.“ I’ve such a joke
to tell you.”

The little ant stuck its head up from the hill.

“ Such a joke! That caterpillar we were watch-
ing has finished its house, and has forgotten to
leave any door,” and the bee buzzed very hard.

“That is too bad,” said the ant; “ I’m afraid it
will starve to death.”

But the caterpillar did not die. It was not even
hungry. It was fast asleep in its little cocoon
house. While it slept the sun shone or the rain
beat, but the little house let in if
neither sun nor rain. Jt was snug i
and dark.

If anyone had opened the cocoon
now he would have found a won-
derful thing. Inside the hard, gray
outside shell was a lining as soft
as silk, and still inside of this was
something—what was it? Nota
caterpillar; not a moth either,
though if one looked carefully one

could see what looked like tiny Cocoon cut open
wings folded closely down each side of folded legs,
and the shape of feathery antennz such as moths

10

have, but these too folded closely down. All were
sealed together in what looked like a brown, soft
skin, This thing was what we call a pupa.

Days and nights passed and at last what had once
been the caterpillar began to stir and wake.

“ How strange I feel! How strange I feel,”
said the thing to itself. ‘“ I must have light and air.”

One end of the cocoon was very soft and loose.
It was through this end that what had once been the
caterpillar pushed its way out into the air.

Oh, how weak and ill it felt! Fastened to it on
each side were two crumpled wet things which it
began to move feebly up and down. As it moved
them it felt its strength returning and the crumpled
things began to spread and dry. Broader and
broader they spread until they were strong vel-
vety wings, two on each side. They were of the
most beautiful soft brown color with a pinkish
border along the edges. In the middle of each of
the lower wings was a glistening spot like the

53

“eye” spot ona peacock’s feather

This thing was no caterpillar ; it was a beautiful
winged moth.

Presently it walked from the twig down upon the

gray cocoon within which it hadlain solong. Then

II

it spread its wings and floated softly off through the
airand down totheearth. It did not fly far, for it
had not its full strength as yet.

When it alighted,
where should it be but
on theant-hill, The little
ant was very busy there,
tugging at twigs and
leaves, and hunting for
food. It stopped its work
to stare with awe at the
wonderful stranger.
“You beautiful thing,”
it said, “where did you 4
come from?” ida

“Don’t you remember the caterpillar that made
itself a house on the twig above ?”

“Oh yes, poor thing, it must have died long
ago,” said the ant. “I went up there once or twice
to see if I could help it, but there was no sound
nor stir.”

“T am that caterpillar,” said the moth gently.

The ant stared and wondered, “I was once a
pupa myself,” it cried. “ But I did not hatch out
with such wings as those.”

12

Just then who should come buzzing by but the
very bee that had laughed at the caterpillar’s
house. It, too, stopped to gaze at the wonderful
stranger. When it learned that this moth was
that very caterpillar it buzzed for wonder. ‘‘ Well,
well!” it said, “so that was what you were about,
was it; growing wings in your queer house!”

But the moth stirred itself. ‘ Now I must go,”
it said. “I must
find a shelter under
a rock or in some

¢ hollow tree until
F the sun goes down.
- But to-night—ah,
Moth, Bee, and Ant to-night! Then I
shall come out to fly wheresoever I will.”
So it waved its great wings and flew softly and
noiselessly away out of sight.
The ant and the bee sat looking after it.
“ And to think,” cried the bee, ‘“‘ that we should not
have understood what that caterpillar was doing !
After all, every one knows his own business best.”

13

LITTLE BROWN HEN

LitrLe Brown HEN is a brown Bantam.

There are beautiful shadings of blue and red
and gold on her feathers, like the colors on
burnished metal. She is as slender and prettily
shaped as any bird, and her eyes are as bright as a
bit of glass.

She is a gentle little thing. She will let her
mistress pick her up at any time, and then she will
crouch on her mistress’s arm, talking softly with
little throat sounds.

Little Brown Hen likes to see everything there
is to be seen. When the door is left open she
comes walking daintily into the house, peering this
way and that and making remarks to herself ina
low tone.

She peeps into closets and pecks at the string
that ties boxes. Sometimes she flies up on the
mantel and looks into the jars, or listens to the
clock, with her head on one side.

A place that she finds even more interesting than
the mantel is the dressing table in her mistress’s

room.

14

She goes hop, hopping up the stairs, and then
flies upon this dressing table. There she walks up
and down and pecks at the rings and brooches to
try if they are good to eat.

What interests her most of all, however, is the
reflection of herself in the looking-glass. She
thinks it is another little brown hen just her own
size. She looks at it and talks to it, and every time
she lifts her foot or turns her head that other little
hen in the mirror does exactly the same. Often
after she has talked to it for awhile she walks to the
corner of the looking-glass and looks around back
of it. Nothing there! Little Brown Hen gives a
surprised cluck and steps back, and there directly in
front of her is the hen again.

She never gets over the surprise of it.

Little Brown Hen used to be very eager to raise
a brood. She was always trying to sit, but we '
did not want her to hatch any of her eggs. We
did not want more Bantams.

It was a longtime before Little Brown Hen
would believe that we were so unkind. Again and
again her eggs were taken from her, but again and
again she laid more and began to sit.

No doubt, as she sat cuddling her small eggs

15

under her, she had dreams of cunning, downy little
chicks that would grow up into lovely sons and
daughters, brown like herself. What pride she
would take inthem! What a pleasure it would be
to teach them the ways of the house and to show
them to that other little brown hen that lived back
of the looking-glass !

But when, time after time, and time after time,
her eggs were taken from her, Little Brown Hen
began to droop. She lost her cheerfulness; when
we lifted her on our arms and talked to her there
was a dispirited tone in her voice as she answered
us.

At last we could not be hard-hearted any longer.
Little Brown Hen must be allowed to have her way.
But we would not give her Bantam eggs; she
should have Brahma eggs instead.

When she found she was allowed to sit, she was
happy indeed.

She was the most devoted little mother even be-
fore the eggs hatched. She.would sit there on
the nest hour after hour, and actually ruffle up at
us angrily if we dared to come too near.

She would hardly leave the nest even to eat, and
the moment she had finished, back she would hurry

16

to the nest, afraid that something might have hap-
pened to those wonderful eggs.

Little Brown Hen must have been rather aston-
ished at the size of the chickens she hatched out.

However, she led them forth bravely. She
scratched and clucked for them just as all hens do,
and was busy from morning till night.

But how those chicks did grow! Soon they
were so large that when they tried to find. shelter
under the little hen’s wings at night they fairly
lifted her from the ground.

Sometimes she looked a little uncomfortable, but
still she clucked bravely, and tried to make room
for them all under her wings.

Soon they quite outstripped her in size. They
were taller than she was—great, ungainly, half-
fledged things.

It was funny to see Little Brown Hen scratch-
ing away for chickens so much bigger than herself,
and to see the long-legged things run when she
called them to a worm she‘had found.

At last they grew too big for Little Brown Hen
to pretend any longer that they needed her care.

She began to think about sitting again, and we
decided to give her some duck’s eggs.

17

Little Brown Hen looked curiously at the broad
bills and webbed feet of the new brood that soon
hatched out. They were fine looking children no
doubt, but still it did seem strange that her chicks
should always look so unlike anything she ex:
pected.

This brood did not prove as easy to bring up as
the other. Still Little Brown Hen managed pretty
well until one day the little ducks found a pond.

Little Brown Hen and her Ducklings

Then to their little mother’s terror she saw one
after another of them hasten to its edge and go sail-
ing off across the water.

In vain the little hen danced up and down calling
to them to come back. The naughty ducklings
floated happily about over the pond, heedless of

their mother’s cries.
Pyle’s Humble Friends.—2.

18

Little Brown Hen even tried to wade in after
them, but the water was too deep and she was
obliged to come back to the bank. There she had
to wait until the little ducks were ready to return.

After that Little Brown Hen’s life was not a
happy one.

Regularly every day her disobedient brood started
for the pond, waddling in a row, one after the other.

In vain Little Brown Hen scolded and tried to
head them off. They always escaped her, and one
after another would slip into the water like downy
yellow boats and paddle off across the pond.

It was hard on the little mother, and her mistress
felt sorry for her. She made up her mind that, as
Little Brown Hen had done so well with those two
broods, she should have her reward. She should be
allowed to sit on real Bantam eggs and raise a
brood of her very own,

Any one might have thought that Little Brown
Hen would be delighted.

But not so. She had other ideas than that.
After such large, splendid eggs as she had been
hatching she quite scorned to spend her time on
any such poor little eggs as those.

She refused to sit on them and left them to

ig

spoil or to be takencare of by some hen of humbler
spirit than her own.

As no other eggs were provided for her, Little
Brown Hen chose her third brood for herself.

And what do you suppose it was? Three kittens
that had been deserted by their mother, and left
as poor little orphans ina box in the woodshed.

There Little Brown Hen found them. She sat
on the edge of the box for some time, looking curi-
ously at them as they squirmed and mewed below.

Then her mind was made up. Down into the
box she hopped and tried to comfort the little
orphans with cozy mother sounds. ;

The kittens were so young that their eyes were
not yet open. It hardly seemed possible they could
live after their mother left them. When the chil-
dren found, however, that Little Brown Hen had
adopted them as her brood, they made up their
minds to save them for her.

So they took turns through the day in feeding
the kittens. They fed them from a bottle of
. warmed milk with a rag stuck in the end of it for
them to suck,

At first Little Brown Hen had half a mind not to
let us touch the kittens. She seemed to be afraid

20

we were going to hurt them, and ruffled up her
feathers whenever we came near.

Soon, however, she understood that what we were
doing was for their good.

Then, when she saw us coming with the bottle,
she would fly upon the back of a broken chair close
by, and watch the feeding of the kittens. The
moment we turned away, she would fly down into
the box again.

With so much care from us all, the kittens throve
and grew. One day one of them climbed out of
the box. Poor little Brown Hen was almost dis-
tracted. She could neither get that one back nor
the others out. She flew backward and forward
from one place to another, ruffling and entreating
and threatening.

At last one of the children came in, and put the
kitten back into the box. How delighted and re-
lieved Little Brown Hen was! She flew back into
the box herself and trampled about in it clucking
softly, and then settled down calling to the kittens
to come under her wings.

When the kittens were old enough to leave the
box Little Brown Hen still tried to mother them.
She would scratch and scratch until she turned up

21

a worm or a grain or a beetle. Then she would
call to the kittens to come and get it. When they
would not touch it she would eye it wistfully, peck
at it, and at last eat it herself.

She learned to know, however, that the bringing
out of a certain pie plate meant dinner for her furry
brood. When the plate was set down she would
hurry to it, clucking very urgently. We had no

Little Brown Hen and her Kittens

need to call the kittens ourselves. They knew what
that cluck meant and would come running to see
what she had for them. She would not allow the
other cats-nor the terrier Gyp to come near the
plate.

While her kittens ate she would walk around
and around them with contented little clucks, now
and then pecking at a stray morsel herself.

22

The neighbors used to come in on purpose to
see Little Brown Hen and her kittens.

One day one of these visitors brought his dog
with him,—a big Newfoundland.

The dog started to chase one of the kittens. If
he had caught it his great jaws would have made
short work of it. But brave Little Brown Hen flew
at him so fiercely and beat him so with her wings
that the dog fairly turned tail and ran away yelp-
ing.

When the kittens had grown to be almost cats
two of them were given away. Little Brown Hen
missed them sadly at first. She went about calling,
and looking for them everywhere.

Then she devoted herself entirely to the one that
was left. The two were always seen together.

When winter came the cat slept at night on the
hearth before the kitchen stove. Little Brown Hen
scorned the chicken house. She must sleep in the
kitchen, too. Every night she perched on the back
of a kitchen chair, tucked her head under her wing
and slept there till morning.

One night a big rat came out of a hole by the
drain pipe. There was Little Brown Hen fast
asleep,—a plump, fine morsel for a hungry rat.

23

She would have had little chance for her life, indeed,
against those cruel teeth.

But Little Brown Hen’s adopted child was there,
no longer a kitten, but a great, brave cat. As the
rat was creeping stealthily across the floor the cat
pounced upon him. There was a struggle, short»
but fierce, and then the rat lay dead upon the floor,
and Little Brown Hen was saved by her faithful
kitten, °
' The next morning when the cook came down-
stairs she found the cat busy over the dead rat, and
Little Brown Hen looking on curiously from her
perch on the chair back.

Many months have passed since that time. The
cat is a mother herself now, and Little Brown Hen
has raised other broods,—fine strapping chickens
that might make any hen proud. But none have
ever been quite so dear to Little Brown Hen’s
heart as those three little kittens she found lying
deserted in the box in the woodshed.

BIANCA

Bianca was a beautiful English setter belonging
to Major Smith.

24

She was a fine hunting dog, and very intelligent.
Every fall she went out hunting with her master.
They always went on a certain train from a railroad
station in the lower part of the city. The conduct-
ors on the train knew Bianca.

* One day just before the hunting season opened
the Major was called away from home on business.
Bianca searched the house for him everywhere.
Then she trotted down to his office.

Last of all she went to the station. One train
after another passed. Bianca waited for the train
on which she and her master always traveled.
Then she jumped on it. She went in the car and
took a seat.

“Hello, Bianca, where’s your master?” asked
the conductor.

It was not until the train had started that he
found Major Smith was not aboard. Then it was
too late to put Bianca off.

She rode to the station where her master always
went. There she jumped off, and trotted away
toward the open country.

In the evening she was waiting for the train ; she
got on, took a seat, and came home again.

This she did every day while her master was

25

away. She never madea mistake about the time
of the trains, nor took the wrong ones. When her
master came home she whined and cried with
delight, and gave up her trips on the cars.

Bianca’s master lived on the outskirts of the city.
Opposite the house were fields and a little wood.

Three times a week the butcher came driving
along the road and stopped at the Major’s house to
serve the family with meat. Bianca was always
waiting at the gate to meet him. She waited there
on Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays, the days
he came ; never on any other day.

Brock, Major Smith’s Newfoundland dog, used
to follow her out and wait there too. Then the
butcher would give them scraps of meat from the
wagon.

One day the butcher was slow and the dogs had
to waita longtime. Bianca seemed to think it out.
There was evidently going to be a short allowance
of meat that morning,—barely enough for one.
She must get Brock away somehow or other.

Suddenly, just as the butcher’s wagon came in
sight, she turned her head and pricked up her ears
as though she heard something. Thenshe gave the
yelp that meant game, and started toward the wood.

26

Brock was sure she had seen a rabbit or some-
thing. Very much excited he ran after her, wish-
ing to have his share of the fun.

He was a much heavier dog than Bianca and
could not go so fast.

She led him far up into the woods and lost him
there. Then she came tearing back and looked up
eagerly into the
butcher’s face,
wagging her tail
as if to say,
“Please give me
some scraps
quickly.”

When Brock,

panting and with

hanging tongue,

=® came hurrying

Bianca and the Butcher

back Bianca had
eaten all the scraps; and the butcher was just
shutting up his wagon before driving away.
One time Bianca had a litter of five little puppies.
They were very cunning little things, with plump,
warm bodies covered with downy hair. They had

wiggly little tails and sprawling legs.

oS

27

Bianca thought there had never been such won-
derful or beautiful puppies before. She was so
delighted with them that she could hardly take time
to eat during the first few days. The moment any-
one came into the woodshed where they were kept
she began to wag
her tail so hard you
could hear it beating
against the side of
the box.

Any one might
have thought that
Bianca would be
satisfied with five
babies to take care
of. So she was at
first.
| Then one day

Bianca with the Rabbit when Major Smith
went to the woodshed, there in the box with the
puppies was a live baby rabbit. Bianca must
have gone out to the fields and caught it there.

Bianca looked up at her Master with the proud-
est, most pleased look, as though to ask, “ Well,
and what do you think of that?”

28

The next day there were two rabbits in the
box.

Bianca was very gentle with the rabbits, but they
both died.

She was very anxious when the dead rabbits
were carried away. She followed them whining
and wagging her tail. The Major told his coach-
man to shut her up in the woodshed and then to
bury the rabbits back of the stable.

When Bianca was allowed to go out, she ran all
about looking for the rabbits and whining to her-
self. She seemed to forget about her puppies and
would not pay any attention to them, even when
they were crying with hunger. She had to be shut
up in the woodshed again, as she would not go
back of her own choice.

When, an hour or solater, the Major peeped in
there was Bianca curled up in the box with her
babies quite contentedly. She wagged her tail as
he looked in, but made no attempt to leave them or
to look further for the rabbits.

Bianca lived to be very old—so old that all her
teeth dropped out, and she could only eat soft foods
such as bread and milk.

She reared a.great many litters of puppies, but

29

she never again adopted any rabbits into her
family.

JERRY

JERRY was a strong, rough, fierce dog. He was
loved only by his master and his master’s family,
and with them he was never cross. They could
tease him and pull his ears and do what they chose
to him. He would only wag his stump of a tail,
and gaze up in their faces with brown eyes that
looked very mildly at them.

The first few years of Jerry’s life were spent on a
farm. There he had his own special work to do,
and that was herding the cows,

If Jerry was lying quietly in a room with people
talking around him, his master had only to say, “Go
get the cows now, Jerry,” and Jerry would jump up
and trot out ina businesslike way. Down to the
pasture he would go. There was one place there
where he could take the bars down with his teeth.
He would do this and drive the cows up to the
milking stable. If one of them were missing, Jerry
needed only to be told. Then he would trot away
again. He would hunt through the pastures and

30

woods and not come back until he had found the
cow and brought it with him.

Only once did he make a mistake. Then he
brought home a cow belonging toaneighbor. The
cow had broken through into his master’s pasture.

“Why, Jerry,” said his master when he saw it

“this isn’t our cow.”

Jerry and the lost Cow

No dog could have looked more ashamed than
Jerry did then. His ears drooped; he clapped his
little stump of a tail tight down, and turned to
slink away. ‘Go get the other,” said his master.

Jerry ran down to the pasture for the third time.

31

He was gone for quite a while but when he came
back he was driving the right cow. Dog and cow
were both covered with mud. Thecow must have
been lost in a swamp.

As long as Jerry lived in the country he was not
across dog. It was only after his master came to
the city to live that he grew so fierce. He did not
have enough to do in the city. He had no cows to
herd, and so he fought instead.

He would fight any dog no matter how big or
how little. Most dogs that will attack a dog smaller
than themselves are bullies. They are afraid of
big dogs. But Jerry feared no other beast, no mat-
ter what might be its size.

When Jerry’s master took him out for a walk he
fastened a chain to his collar. He kept the dog
close to him as long as they were in the city.
When they reached the country he would loosen
the chain and set him free. He generally waited
though until there was no living thing in sight, for
Jerry was so delighted at having the chain unfas-
tened that he would rush at anything he saw.

In such cases he had to be punished. But this
did very little good. He was so glad when the
punishment was over that he generally ran and did

32

the same thing again. After he had had a brisk
run he would quiet down. Then he would even
let a dog come up and sniff at him without attacking
it.

Jerry’s master owned another dog, a black-and-tan
terrier named Flicker.

Flicker was a great coward.

When Jerry was punished, his master used a
heavy whip ; and Jerry always took his punishment
without a sound.

When Flicker was whipped a light switch was
used—a switch so light that striking the bare hand
with it scarcely stung. But the moment it was
raised over him, and before it touched him, Flicker
would begin to whine and yelp.

There was nothing the terrier enjoyed more than
getting Jerry into a fight. When they were out
walking and met a dog Flicker would go up to the
stranger, moving his legs stiffly and snarling.

The dog would growl in answer. Then Flicker
would glance round at Jerry as if to say, “ Did you
hear that? He’s growling at you.”

Jerry’s temper could hardly ever stand this. A
fight would follow, and Flicker, in high glee, would
prance about the heap of dogs, nipping at any leg

33

or tail that happened to be convenient. Often it
was Jerry’s leg.

Once when he did this Jerry whirled round from
the other dog, and under the excitement of the
moment caught Flicker and gave hima good shake.
Then seeing who it was, he dropped the terrier
immediately and returned to his real enemy.

The little terrier came running over to his master
limping, and howling for sympathy. His master
was afraid from his cries that he was almost killed,
but he was not really hurt at all. He was only
frightened.

Once Jerry was terribly bitten by two great blood-
hounds that he had attacked. The family nursed
him until his wounds had healed, and they hoped he
had learned a lesson. But as soon as he was well
he was just as eager to fight as ever.

One morning the garden gate had been left open
and Jerry got out into the street alone. He lingered
about for awhile and then trotted down to his
master’s office.

It was so early that no one was about except the
man who attended to the fires. He had left the
office door ajar and had gone out for something.

When he came back he sawa dog there in the
Pyle’s Humble Friends.—3.

34

office. The man shouted and made a motion as if
to throw something at the dog.

Instead of running away as the man expected the
dog tuenen and rushed at him with a fierce snarl,
and sucha wicked
look that the man
was terrified. He
had barely time
to climb up ona
high office desk
before those
white teeth click-
ed behind him.

When Jerry’s
master came
edown to the
office, he found

“Terry and his Captive the building still
cold and the fires unmade. On top of the desk the
man was crouching, ready to weep with rage and
fear. Before the desk was Jerry, still keeping watch
and snarling every time the man moved.

Jerry ran to meet his master, his stump of a tail
wagging joyfully. His look of pride seemed to say,
‘“Come and see what I’ve caught for you.”

35

Though Jerry was so bold, there were some
things of which he was afraid. He was a perfect
coward in athunderstorm. At the first distant peal
of thunder he always showed signs of fear. As the
storm came nearer he would rush upstairs and hide
under a bed. There he would lie trembling until
the storm was over, and the last low mutterings
had died away in the distance.

Then he would crawl out looking thoroughly
ashamed of himself. The next storm would frighten
him just as much.

He was afraid of strange things that he could
not understand.

One day a newspaper and an old hat had been
thrown out beside the pump. Jerry was trotting
through the yard when he saw them. He did not
know what they were. He stopped short with a
low growl, The hair on his back rose.

Just then the wind stirred the hat, and some
one rattled the latch of the alley gate. He could
not stand that. He turned tail and ran back to the
kitchen as fast as he could go.

Though the dog was gentle with his master and
the family, he was so fierce with other people that
it did not seem right to keep him in the city. A

36

good home was found for him—a home in the
country where he would have herds to attend to
and could be busy and happy.

The children cried when he went away and Jerry
tried to lick their faces through the muzzle that had
been put on him. The muzzle would be taken off
when he was in his new home; and his master said
he was sure Jerry would be happier there than he
could ever have been in the city.

His master was right, and he heard from the new
owner that he had never had a dog on his farm that
was as faithful and useful as Jetry proved to be.

BARRY

WuEeEN Barry first came to the house he was a fat
and downy little puppy with paws that seemed too
big for him.

He yelped at night when he was left alone and
he tore things to pieces as all puppies do. Then
when he had done all the mischief he could, he
would drop down and go to sleep wherever he hap-
pened to be.

He ate great quantities of bread and milk,—half a
loaf at a meal,—and grew very fast, but his paws

37

seemed to grow faster than any of the rest of him.
He was always falling over them.

One of the first things the boys tried to teach
Barry to do was to follow them. They took him for
along walk, and Barry followed them very well until .
they turned to come home. Then he sat down in
the middle of the road. He was tired.

They called and coaxed, but Barry sat there
with his tongue lolling out and his eyes half shut.

dhe Buppy Keryasieen
He paid no attention to their calling except to beat
the dust with his tail. When they pretended to
leave him he cried, but he would not walk. At last
they had to carry him, big, fat, heavy puppy that
he was, all the way home.

After Barry had torn and spoiled a great many
skirts and shoes and other things with his puppy
teeth, he began tohave moresense. Healso began

to feel his bigness and dignity,

38

He was a very handsome dog. He was tan-
colored with a white line down his forehead and a
white breast. The color deepened about his nose
to a velvety blackness.

He was so big that his back was on a level with
the dining-room table. He could look across it and
see what there was to eat, but he was too well-bred
to ask for anything.

When Barry wagged his tail in the house he
generally knocked something over. Then there
was acrash. Barry learned to know this. When
we saw something going and shouted “ Barry /”
he would drop his tail hastily and look behind him.
His look seemed to say, ‘‘Oh dear! What have
I done now ?”

Once he knocked a little child over by wagging
his tail when he stood close by it. When it cried
Barry was very sorry. He wanted to lick the tears
from its face.

Barry loved all children, and all little helpless
things. The children in the street used to run up
to him and pat him and hang on to his collar or even
his tail. Barry never hurt them or even so much
as growled.

At different times several small kittens were

39

brought to the house. Then Barry could not
rest. Every time they moved he moved. If
they mewed he was as excited as though such a
thing had never been known before. He worried
the kittens almost to death by putting his nose so
close to them, when they lay down to sleep, that
every breath he drew stirred their fur.

In the end they always became very fond of him
however. They would play with his ears or tail, and
curl up between his paws to sleep. Then Barry
would be perfectly happy. He would hardly stir
for fear of disturbing them.

But Barry’s favorite companion was a pet rac-
coon. It was brought to the house when it was
a little baby thing that had to be fed with a bottle.

Barry was deeply interested. We could not keep
him away from the little beast.

As the raccoon grew older it used to play with
Barry. Sometimes it bit him so sharply in its play
that Barry yelped.

Coonie delighted in teasing Barry when he was
trying to sleep. It would steal up and nip his ears,
or his feet. It annoyed him more than the flies.

When he was gnawing a bone the raccoon would
lift his lips and try to pull it away from him. It

40

liked to tuck nuts and things under his broad cok
lar. But Barry was never cross to it.

After it died he hunted for it everywhere with an
anxious look. For years afterward if any one called
‘“Connie, Coonie,” Barry would start up eagerly
and look all around,—back of sofas and chairs, or out

Barry and the Raccoon

in the hall. Then he would come back and look
into his mistress’s face, and whine. He seemed
never to forget his little friend.

Barry’s mistress always felt perfectly safe when he
was with her. One evening she had to go out onan

41

errand. As there was no one to go with her but
Barry, she took him along. He trotted a little in
front of her, his tail waving cheerfully.

In a dark and lonely place they met a lounger.
‘Barry stopped with a low, deep growl. He waited
until his mistress caught up with him. He walked
along close at her side being careful to keep between
her and the man until they had passed him.

Then Barry dropped back. He turned his head
and looked at the man with a low growl that seemed
to say “Remember, I am here,” and trotted on
behind his mistress. He knew he was her protector
and was proud of it.

Barry was polite to everybody and expected in
return to be treated with respect. He would not
forgive an insult. Once the grocer’s boy came to
the house with some groceries. Barry knew him

_well and was always friendly.

This day the boy was impatient or out of, humor
Barry was in his way and the boy gave him a little
kick. It was not a hard kick but Barry’s dignity
was terribly hurt. His eyes flashed. He sprang up
with a deep growl. He would have jumped upon
the boy if one of the family had not been there to
stop him.

42

Barry never forgave that kick, Whenever the
boy came to the house Barry gave a low growl
and walked away. The boy became so much
afraid of him that he persuaded some one else to
bring the groceries to the house.

Barry’s great-grandfather had belonged to the
monks of the hospice or monastery of St. Bernard in
the Alps in Switzerland, and it was said that he had
saved the lives of twenty travelers who had been
lost in the snow at one time or another.

It must have been some instinct come down to
Barry from this great-grandfather that made him
act as he did when the boys wrapped themselves in
shawls and lay still, They did this sometimes to
see what he would do.

After they had lain perfectly motionless for
awhile Barry would grow very anxious. He would
whine and poke them with his nose. If they did
not stir he would paw them over. If that did no
good he would begin nipping them through the
shawl, at first gently, then harder and harder, until
they were obliged to move.

When at last they stirred Barry would be per-
fectly delighted. He would jump about with heavy
gambols until the windows shook.

43

Once or twice the boys took Barry with them
when they were going swimming. But as soon as
he saw them splashing in the water he grew very
much excited. He was afraid they were drowning.
He almost drowned one of the boys himself by go-
ing in after him, catching him by the arm, and
dragging him to the shore in spite of his struggles.
After that the boys left Barry at home when they
were going swimming.

But Barry was to have his tale of a saved life.
One time, out in the country, the baby of the
family had run away from her nurse. She was
playing at throwing sticks into the water. The
water was a mill stream and very swift.

- Again and again Barry caught the child by the
skirts and drew her away from the shore. At last
the child grew angry. She was about to throw a
stick in the stream when Barry caught her by the
skirt again.

The child turned and struck at him. That made
her lose her balance. She fell backward into the
water with a great splash.

Instantly Barry plunged in after her. He caught
her by the frock and swam against the stream that
swept down toward the mill wheel. The bank was

44

too steep for him to climb out and the current
swept him down with it in spite of his struggles.

But a man who was passing along the road had
seen the accident. He ran and threw himself
down beside the mill stream and reaching over
caught the child. He pulled her out, and then
Barry could climb out by himself.

If the family had been fond of Barry before, you
may be sure that they loved him after that. Barry
lived to be very old, and few dogs have had a hap-
pier life or been more petted than he. He deserved
it, too, for he was brave and faithful and noble.

FAX

Fax was a homeless, starved, forsaken cur. No-
body seemed to want him. He had been driven
from one place after another, sometimes with
threats, sometimes with blows. When the Wilsons
first saw him he was trying to find something to eat
among the scraps in their garbage bucket.

“Poor thing,” said Mrs. Wilson. Then she
called to the cook who had appeared threateningly
at the kitchen door: ‘ Don’t drive the poor thing
away. He looks almost starved.”

45

After the cur had gotten all he could from the
bucket, he went away. But he came back before
many days, and then againand still again. He be-
gan to seem to feel at home in the yard, sometimes
curling up in a corner of it and going to sleep there.

It was so quiet and pleasant. Noone threatened
him or drove him away. When any of the family
came into the yard, he would look up at them
appealingly and beat the ground with his tail.

After a while he made friends with the kitchen cat.
Often they would eat together from the plate of
scraps that the cook set outforthem. This pleased
the cook so much that sometimes, when the nights
were cold, she allowed the cur to come in and sleep
before the fire.

He had been very abject while all the world
was against him, but now that he had something of
a home he began to pluck up a little spirit.
Once he even barked at a tramp who came to the
door, though immediately afterward he dropped his
tail and looked ashamed, seeming to feel he had
gone too far.

One evening when the library door was open
the cur’s head appeared peeping around the jamb
at the assembled family. Then he crept farther in,

46

his tail down and wagging humbly, his look
seeming to say, ‘ May I come in?”

They did not encourage his hopes, however.
He was driven down to the kitchen, and the hall
door was closed. But the next day while the
Wilsons were at dinner his white face appeared
again at the dining-room door.

The family had a Skye terrier, very old and fat.
His one accomplishment was sitting up to beg. He
went around the table from one person to another,
begging and waving his feathery paws. Some of
them rewarded him with bits of food from the table.

The cur watched the terrier awhile from the half-
opendoor. Then he gravely walked across the floor
to Mrs. Wilson, sat down, and after one or two
attempts lifted his front paws from the ground and
begged just as he had seen the other dog do.

It was so clever of him to do that of himself that
everybody laughed and applauded. After that the
cur was accepted as one of the family. He was
allowed to come and go as he chose, and was given
the name of Fax.

The little Skye was very jealous. He growled
and snarled and tried to pick a quarrel with the
new dog. But Fax was very quiet and dignified.

47

He was not afraid, but he would not fight, and if
the terrier grew too unpleasant he simply rose and
walked away to an-
other part of the
room.

The eldest son of
the family, Mr.
Richard, as the ser-
vants called him,
thought he would see
if he could not teach

Fax some more tricks,

since he had been so %& +
clever about learning ” Fax Begging
to beg. Every evening he gave Fax a lesson and
it was wonderful how quickly the dog learned. Be-
fore long he would roll over and play dead dog at
the word of command, leap through a hoop, sit up
and beg with something on his nose, then toss it
up in the air and catch it in his mouth, close the
door and fetch a glove, a shoe or a letter as he
was told.

In return for these lessons Fax adopted Mr.
Richard as his especial master to be followed and

obeyed. The obeying was all right, but as to the

48

following, his master did not always care for his
company. ;

One of the duties Fax took upon himself was to
escort Mr. Richard down to the office every
morning. Nothing was allowed to interfere with
this. If his master tried to scold him, back he
cringed ; if sticks were thrown at him he dodged
them, but follow he would.

At last the young

ee

man was obliged to

give up and allow
the cur to go with
him. Then Fax
was a proud and

happy dog. Every

Fax with a Shoe morning he was

ready and waiting, trotting off at Mr. Richard's
side with ears up and tail curled jauntily over his
back. If any dog dared even to look at him he
growled haughtily. He never tried to go into the
office. After seeing his master safely there he
would turn and trot home again by himself, quite
contented,

And now every day Fax grew more and more

proud and dignified. When he first came to the

49

house he had been so humble-minded that he
was very grateful to be noticed at all, and eager
to learn tricks and show them whenever they
were called for. But now he refused to do anything
unless he felt in the humor for it.

One day some visitors were at the Wilsons’ when
Fax came strolling quietly into the parlor where they
sat. Mrs. Wilson began telling them what a clever
dog he was and how many tricks he knew. The
visitors said they would like to see him perform
some of them.

“J don’t know whether he'll do them to-day or
not,” said Mrs. Wilson. “ He’s not always very
obedient.” Then she told Fax to close the door,
but he only sat down in the middle of the room and
looked around him cheerfully. He would not
jump, he would not fetch a glove; he would not do
anything but play dead dog, and then, when he had
once lain down he
would not get up again.
There he stayed

~ stretched at length un-

til the visitors rose to

Playing ‘‘ Dead Dog”

go. Then he jumped

up and politely escorted them to the door,
Pyle’s Humble Friends.—4.

50

Mrs. Wilson felt mortified by his behavior, but
when she told her son of it he only laughed.

Mr. Richard was soon to be married, and one
day Mrs. Wilson said, ‘“‘ I suppose when you have
a home of your own you'll take Fax with you.”

“I don’t know,” he answered; “ [ hadn’t thought
of it.”

Fax however decided that matter for himself.
The family was all very well, but he felt his place
was with his master. So when Mr. and Mrs.
Richard moved into their new house Fax moved
there too, only coming back now and then to
call at his old home.

Fax found his new mistress quite to his mind,
even if she did laugh at him and call him “obsti-
nate Fax.” There was only one thing about which
they had a standing quarrel. Whenever the door
of the guest chamber was left open Fax would go
in and get on the bed. There he would snuggle
down under the covers with only his head showing
as it lay upon the pillow.

His mistress kept a little switch, and whenever
she found him there she switched him. The punish-
ment did not hurt Fax much but it offended him
deeply. After it had happened, he would not take

51

any notice of his mistress or have anything to do
with her, sometimes for a whole day.
Time slipped by, and after a while there was alittle

master in the new house,

a baby boy, and his name
too was Richard. Fax was very much interested
in the baby. Heno longer followed his older master
down to the office. Instead he slept beside the baby’s
crib or walked beside the baby-carriage as the nurse
wheeled it through the streets. He seemed to feel

it his special charge. As the baby grew to be first

Fax to the Rescue

a toddler and then a sturdy little boy, Fax was still

his devoted companion.

One day the little child was playing on the pave-
ment before the house. Fax, now grown to be
quite an old dog, lay upon the steps watching him.

Suddenly around the corner came a large and
dangerous looking dog. It was frothing at the

mouth and now and then it turned its head aside

52

and snapped at the air. The little boy stopped his
play and watched it coming. There was no one
else in sight. Fax too had seen the dog. He rose,
and the hair bristled on his back. Then he sprang
down and placed himself before the child.

On came the dog directly toward them. Fax
seemed to feel there was something wrong with it.
As it came so close that in a moment it would have
to turn aside or be upon them, Fax gave a snarl and
sprang at its throat. Then they tumbled over and
over in the street.

Mrs. Richard heard the noise of the fight, and
running out she caught up her child and carried
him into the house.

Presently Fax came running into the house, too.
He looked up into her face whining and half bark-
ing. His neck was bitten but not very badly. The
big dog had shaken itself free and trotted on down
the street.

A few blocks further on it was shot, for its master
had come running after it with a gun. He said it
was mad.

The man wanted to shoot Fax, too, when he
heard he had been bitten. But his mistress said
no. She shuddered and turned white at the

53

thought of the danger from which the faithful dog
had saved her little son. She said they would shut
Fax up where he would be safe, but she could not
bear the thought of his being killed unless it was
perfectly certain that he was going mad.

Fax’s master said the same. He longed to show
his gratitude to Fax. How they petted and praised
him.

They were obliged to shut him up, however,
~ where he could not getaway. They gave him every
care and attention but very soon he drooped and
sickened. It was hydrophobia. When he grew
worse it seemed only the best and kindest thing to
put an end to his sufferings.

In his master’s yard now stands a little headstone
and on it are these words :—

In Lovine anp GraTEFUL Memory
OF FairHFuL Fax

THE TWO LITTLE CRABS

Aut along the miles of hard, flat beach the waves
rush up to break witha long roar. Then they slip
back into the ocean only to come roaring back

again.

54

Far away from the cottages and big hotels is a
stretch of shore called Pebbly Beach. It is very
lonely there, with no sound but the rush of the
breakers and the cries of thesea gulls. Little sand-
pipers with legs no thicker than straws run up and
down hunting for things to eat. The white sand
fleas that are washed up on the beach with the waves
make haste to burrow down out of sight in the wet
sand. They are afraid the sandpipers will catch
them.

Scattered about this beach are many sea shells.
They are all around, but the greatest number are
down in a shallow salt pool that lies in a hollow of
the sand.

These shells do not lie still. They move about
as though they were alive.

This is not magic. Anyone looking closely at
the shells would see peering out from almost every
one of them something that looks like two staring
eyes. He would also see two little claws and per-
haps four little spiny legs put out to walk.

These belong to the hermit crabs who find these
shells and then curl themselves in them as though
they were little houses, and live there.

There used to be one shell in this pool that was

55

perhaps the prettiest of all. It was such a shell as
one does not often see; beautifully curled and
curiously marked with greenish colorings. It had
washed up after a storm from far away.

The little crab who lived in this shell was very
proud of it. He curled his soft tail comfortably
inside and held it tight with a sucker. Then he
walked about as he chose to go. With that shell
to protect him, there was no fear of being gobbled
up by some of the greedy beach birds. He would
feel quite safe even if the breakers rose so high that
he was washed out to sea.

When the crab first found the shell, he was quite
little—so small that it was almost too big for him to
drag about.

But day followed day, and as time passed the little
crab grew and grew.

The shell did not grow, however, and so after
a while it began to be too small for him. It was a
beautiful little house, but it was a tight fit.

‘““Yes, there is no doubt about it ; I need a larger
shell,” said the crab.

‘““Yes you do. You certainly do need a larger
shell,” said a smaller crab who had crawled up close

to him.

56

The larger crab looked at the other. ‘I should
think you would be looking for another shell your-
self,” he said; ‘yours must be a tight fit for you.
And more than that it is a very ugly shell. Why
didn't you hunt up a pretty one while you were
about it ?”

The smaller crab twiddled his feelers. ‘Oh I]
will wait awhile,” he said. ‘ Maybe I'll find a better
house without bothering myself to hunt.”

After that wherever the larger crab crawled the
smaller one kept close beside him. The big crab
was now really hunting for another shell, but none
of them seemed just what he wanted.

““Why don’t you try them?” the little one kept
asking him. ‘ Why don’t you try them ?”

“ But they’re none of them what I want,” said the
larger crab.

“How can you tell that? For all you know,
any one of them might do if you were not too lazy
to try.”

So he kept on taunting the other with being too
lazy to get out of his shell until the larger one be-
gan to be quite ashamed. ‘ Well, I will try one,”
he said at last, ‘but I know it won’t do.”

He unfastened his sucker and crawled out of his

57

house. No sooner was he well out of it, however,
than whisk ! the smaller crab had popped out of his
own ugly little shell and into the handsome one
that belonged to the other.

“Wait! Wait a bit!” cried the larger crab.
‘This new shell will not do for me at all. I can’t
even get into it. I must have my own house back.”

‘““Must you indeed !” cried the other, “‘ We'll see

about that. I mean to keep it myself since you

Two Little Crabs

were dunce enough to leave it,” and he looked at
the other fiercely with his little pop-eyes, and
shrank back into the shell so that only his sharp
claws were out.

Now the larger one was in a bad way indeed.
He was too big to get into the shell that he had
found or into the one that the smaller crab had left

empty.

58

“Never mind!” cried the little thief, as it
peered out from the stolen house. ‘“ You needn't
bother about finding a shell. Something will come
along and eat you up in a minute. You'll be a
dainty morsel.”

The houseless crab looked wildly about him.
Where could he find a shelter? Where hide him-
self ?

Close by he saw an old clay pipe that had been
washed up by the ocean. The stem was broken
and it was ugly and heavy, but still it might shelter
him from danger.

Suddenly a shadow passed across the pool.
Quick as a flash the crab was in the pipe with
his soft tail curled up behind him and only his claws
showing.

How the smaller crab in the stolen shell twiddled
his feelers and jeered athim! ‘“ Well, I’m going,”
he cried, “I find this avery good shell, thank you.
Very much better than what I had.”

He put out his legs to walk. Then suddenly he
curled them up again, drawing as far back into his
house as he could. There was a heavy rumbling
on the beach that came nearer and nearer. They
could hear it down in the salt pool.

/
59

““Weet ! Weet!” cried the sandpipers, and they
lifted their legs and flew away.

A broad-wheeled carriage was driving along over
the hard, wet sand close to the edge of the waves.
“This is Pebbly Beach,” said the driver.
“Plenty of shells here, Professor.”

“ Oh, papa, mayn’t I get out and gather some?”
cried a little girl who was on the front seat.

“Yes; I'll get out too,” said the Professor. ‘I
feel quite cramped with driving.”

He climbed out and then lifted the child down
on the sand.

“Oh, look at the shells!” shecried. ‘“ Heaps of
them. Oh, where’s my bucket? And just look at
these in the pool. Aren’t they beauties?” She
took one out of the water, but a moment after she
threw it from her witha cry. “Ugh! There’s a
horrid bug in it.”

Her father laughed as he lifted the shell and
looked at it. “It’s nothing but a little hermit
crab,” he said. ‘* You've frightened him more than
he frightened you. That shell is his little house.”

He picked up one shell after another from the
pool and in each one was a frightened crab,

“Never mind, my dear. You have plenty of

60

shells like these,” he said. ‘They are none of

them very pretty.”
“This one‘is,” said the little girl. She had
picked the very one the thievish little crab had

stolen, ‘ But it has something in it, too.”
Her father took it from her. ‘Why, this is
rather a rare shell,” he said. ‘I’ve never seen one

like it on this beach before. We must add this to
our collection.”

“ But it has something in it, papa.”

“We'll manage to get that out somehow. Let
us see if we can find any more like it.”

He began to look more carefully. Presently he
came upon the old pipe with the crab curled up in-
side it. ‘Come look here, little daughter,” he said.
‘““Fere’s a curious thing. I suppose this poor little
crab couldn’t find a shell, so it had to take shelter
in this heavy, ugly pipe. Let us look about and
find a better house for it.”

‘But would it go into it if it had it?” asked the
child,

“Yes, indeed, and be glad of it.”

The Professor began to search about the beach
for a better house for the little crab.

““T know,” said the child. “Tl get one of those

61

I have in my bucket in the carriage. I'll pick out
a pretty one, too, because he must have been such
a poor little crabby to have to live in an ugly house
like that.”

The little girl ran over to the carriage, and when
she came back she had a pretty shell in her hand.

She put it down in the water in front of the crab,
and then she and her father waited very quietly
hoping to see him move into his new home.

But he was much too frightened. He only
curled up closer in the pipe.

It was not until they had been gone some time
that he had the courage to look out from his shell
again.

Everything was as quiet and lonely as ever.

Then in a twinkling he was out of the clumsy
pipe and into the new house set ready for his use.

And what a fine house it was! Light and pretty
and just the right size.

“TI wonder what became of that poor little crab
they carried off with them,” he said, as he settled
himself in his new home. “I wonder.”

But he never knew.

62

JAMES CROW

His name was not Jim, but /ames Crow ; and
a very dignified gentleman he looked as he walked
across the lawn all dressed in black, and cawing
gently to himself.

He was a very young bird when we bought him
from a ragged little boy in the country.

After we had bought him we put him in an old
soft hat, closed the brim gently over him and car-
ried him home in that fashion.

He was very quiet all the way, and when we
released him at last he sat all crouched together
for awhile. Then he straightened himself out and
began to settle his wings and to look about him
with his round bright eyes.

Some food was brought in, and a piece was
offered to him. James gulped it down greedily,
and immediately all timidity or strangeness was for-
gotten.

He opened his beak wide, spread his wings, and
stooped his body, all the while cawing and crying
wildly to us for more.

That was James’ first introduction to the house,

63

but very soon he was as much at home there as
though he had lived with us all his life.

We clipped the feathers of one of his wings so
that he could not fly away, and then turned him
out onthe lawn. But James liked the house better,
and came in upon every occasion. Then nothing
was safe. He tore the leaves of books with his
sharp, hard beak. He tore a bunch of peacock
feathers quite to pieces. He stole everything that
he took a fancy to.

Whenever anything was missing—that is any
small thing—James was immediately suspected,
perhaps not always fairly. We wondered whether
he had any special place for hiding things and one
of the boys said he was going to watch him and
find out.

We put temptation in his way in the shape of a
long bright-red ribbon. We knew James never
could resist anything as bright as that. We laid it
on the lawn where James would be apt to see it
and then Ned hid around the corner of the house,
keeping a sly watch on the ribbon.

Presently up came James with his dignified walk.
He hurried his steps a little as he saw the ribbon, and
stopped beside it cocking his head this side and that.

64

Here was a find indeed, and no one in sight to
scold him or to shout to him to drop it. Ina
moment James had seized the ribbon and was
hurrying across the lawn with it and on down the
lane. :

Ned followed, taking care that the crow should
not see him. Down at the very end of the lane was
an old willow tree.

James flew up into this with the ribbon, and then
Ned lost sight of him among the branches.

Presently James flapped down into the lane
again. He did not have the ribbon. He stopped
to rub his beak on the grass. Then he walked idly
up the lane again, cawing gently to himself. After
he was out of sight Ned came from behind the
hedge where he had been hiding and swung himself
up into the willow tree.

There he found a hollow among the branches,
and in this hollow was the greatest collection of
things,—a ball of yarn, a rusty jack-knife, a screw,
two apple cores, a peach stone and a silver thimble.

Ned took the thimble and the jack-knife, and
then slid down the tree leaving the other things
undisturbed. It seemed a good thing to let the crow
still think no one knew of his hiding spot. Then if

65

he stole anything of real value, the loser would know
where to look for it.

James was very greedy from the time he was a
young bird, and it was a fault he never got over.
His dinner hour was.a time when all dignity was
cast aside.

As soon as he saw anyone coming with a dish of
food he would hurry forward with outspread wings
and loud cries. Stopping in front of the person,
he would fairly dance up and down in his eagerness,
cawing all the time.

As each piece
of meat was

thrown to him

he would gulp it neocon
d own w i t h a James and the Stovepipe

choked caw, and then dance and shriek again with
open beak.

When the last morsel had been given him, and
he had made sure of the fact that there was no
more, he would fold his wings sedately. With his
usual dignity he would walk away to some quiet
spot. There he would disgorge the hastily swal-
lowed meat and eat it again at his leisure.

One time the boys teased James by putting some

Pyle’s Humble Friends.~s.

66

meat in the middle of a piece of stovepipe that was
too small for him to get into,

The crow tried to squeeze himself in first at one
end and then at the other.

Finding he could not manage this after several
attempts, James lifted one end of the stovepipe and
let the meat slip down to the other. Then he hur-
ried around and seized the prize.

James was like a monkey in liking to imitate
what he saw others doing. One morning the
mistress of the house was busy planting some slips
and seedlings in flower pots. As she worked, the
crow walked about her, cawing softly to himself.

When she finished her work she put the flower
pots ina row on the porch and went away. No
sooner was she
out of sight than
James was _ busy.

though he knew James and the Plants

In haste, as

that if anyone saw him he would be driven off,
he pulled up every one of the plants, laying them
side by side on the porch.

Then he looked about for something to put in
their places.

67
¢
On the window sill was a bag of candies, left

there by little Annie. Her aunt had brought them
to her the day before.

With these the crow filled the holes left in the
earth, covering them carefully with the loose soil.
Then he went away to look for something else to do.

When Annie came back for her candies they

were nowhere to be found; instead was the empty
bag. ‘I do believe those greedy boys have eaten
up all my candies,” cried the little girl, her lip
trembling and her eyes filling with tears. But her
brothers declared they had not touched them.

While she was still wondering and complaining
her mother found the plants where they lay dead
and withered in the sun. ‘Oh, that mischievous
crow!” cried the mother, running her finger down
into the loose earth. ‘‘Why, what’s this?” she
added, for she felt something hard. She dug it
out with her finger. It was one of Annie’s candies,
gritty with soil.

The earth was emptied from the other flower
pots and then all the candies came to light.

The mother said they were spoiled, but Annie
didn’t think so. She brushed them off very care-
fully and she and her brothers ate them later on.

68

James did not like to be touched or handled.
He would not allow any of the children except his
master to pick him up.

He never showed his really finest manners how-
ever to anyone but the mother; when she came
out of the house he would hurry to meet her, duck-
ing and bowing in the most absurd manner, and
cawing softly.

James’ master tried to teach James to talk, and
declared that the crow really tried to call him by
name. The others would hardly believe it.

But at any rate James could laugh. He often
used to startle people by harsh peals of laughter as
he sat hidden among the shrubbery. He seemed
to be enjoying some huge joke all by himself among
the leaves.

All through the summer and winter, James seemed
very happy in his half-captive life. But when
spring came, and everything was bursting into bud
and the birds were busy about their nesting, the
poor crow drooped and seemed sad.

He would crouch on the lawn looking up at the
moving clouds above, and sometimes when he heard
the wild crows out in the fields he would half spread
his wings with an answering caw,

69

The mother said it was cruel to keep him away
from his kind, and so his master agreed to let his
clipped wing feathers grow.

Even after they had grown, however, James
seemed in no hurry to leave his old home.

To be sure he did go farther afield, but he always
came back at night.

At last, however, there came a night when James
did not return, though he reappeared the next
day. Then he went away again and that time he
did not come back at all.

It was not until the fall that they saw anything
of him. Then one day as one of the boys was cross-
ing a plowed field a crow flew down ona furrow
near by with a friendly caw.

“James, James!” called the boy.

The crow cocked his head on one side and seemed
to listen.

“James, come here, old fellow,” said the boy again.

He went over toward the crow and it sat quite
still watching him until he was so close that he put
out his hand to touch it.

Then it rose with a caw and flew away, flapping
heavily across the blue sky, on and on beyond the
hill and out of sight.

70

And that was the last glimpse that any one of the
family ever had of James Crow.

FIREFLY

FIREFLY was a beautiful little chestnut colt
with one white foot.
She was a great pet with the children, and she

Firefly and the Children

was so tame she would come up and eat grass from
their hands, Then she would poke them with her
velvety nose and gallop off across the field kicking

71

up her heels, and seeming to say, ‘Come play with
me,

Once she caught hold of the end of a handker-
chief that was sticking from the pocket of one of
the children. Inamoment, with a jerk of her head,
she had pulled it out and was cantering away with
it.

The little boy whose handkerchief it was ran
after her to get it, but she kept out of his reach.
She waited until he was so close that he could
almost touch her, and then away she galloped,
tossing her head as if to wave the handkerchief.
All around the field she went, and then coming back
she stopped just in front of him with alert eyes and
ears pricked forward. It was as if she said,
“ Now try to catch me.”

At last with a quick motion the boy did catch
one end of the handkerchief. He pulled and she
pulled, and it ended in the handkerchief being torn
almost in two.

The mother of Firefly had beena famous jumper,
and as Firefly grew older she became a great
jumper herself. It was difficult to keep her in any
field. She would go over a five-barred fence as
lightly as a bird.

72

Her master was very proud of her.

When she was old enough he broke her to the
saddle, and he did not like to have anyone else ride
her. She knew him, and when she saw him coming
she would turn her head and whinny to him. He
often brought her an apple or a lump of sugar, and
if he did not have it in his hand she would nose at
his pockets to see if he had not hidden something
about him.

Firefly was gentle as well as swift and spirited.
She was the best hunter in the neighborhood, but
when the children begged to ride her, and their
father set them in a row upon her back,she minced '
around the lawn as smoothly as she could, trying
not to jolt them.

When Firefly was six years old a war broke out,
and Firefly’s master said that he must go away
and fight for the right. His wife wept, but she
did not say no.

He put on his uniform and Firefly was brought
around to the door. She arched her neck and
pawed the ground proudly as she stood waiting.
The master’s wife and children clung to him and he
kissed them again and again. Then he came
hastily down the steps, his spurs jingling, and

73

sprang upon Firefly’s back, and away they went;
—away from the quiet, peaceful home life toward
the smoke and thunder of battle.

Firefly had much to learn in the days that
followed. She had to learn to march with other
horses. She had to learn what the words of
command meant, and the loud and thrilling calls of
the bugle.

Then Firefly and her master were ordered
forward to the place where the war was the
fiercest.

At last came a day when a great and bloody
battle was fought. Firefly and her master were in
it. At first, as they stood waiting for the order to
charge, Firefly quivered all over, and the sweat ran
down her sides like water she was so afraid.

But when at last the order was given, and her
master’s troop swept forward, the chestnut mare was
at the head and all fear was forgotten. Behind was
the thunder of hoofs, before were the ranks of the
enemy, and all around was a murderous rain of
bullets. On went Firefly like the wind, her nostrils
wide; one delicate ear pricked back for the word of
command ; her hoofs beating steadily on the flying

ground.

74

It was a brave charge, but it was not successful.
The enemy was too strong, and the order to retreat
was given,

It was inthis retreat that her master was struck
by a bullet. Firefly suddenly felt him give a violent

start. She did not see him put his hand to his side

Firefly and her wounded Master

however. She did not see that that hand was
stained with red.

On he rode, but now he was swaying in the saddle.
His face grew drawn and white. Then without a
sound he slipped and tumbled to the ground and lay

still in a crumpled heap.

ia

When consciousness came back to Firefly’s
master the first thing he saw was something chest-
nut colored and something blue. There was a
roaring in his ears.

Then he heard the ping of flying bullets, and
saw that the chestnut color was Firefly, standing
over him, and the blue was the sky beyond as he
lay looking up.

He was still on the battlefield. He was there
alone; alone with the dead and wounded. His
friends were gone. And yet he was not alone after
all. His faithful Firefly was with him.

He was not holding her bridle ; there was noth-
ing to keep her. She was trembling with fear, and
she smelled the blood around, but she would not
desert her fallen master.

He raised himself on his elbow, and Firefly
whinnied. Then, staggering, he got upon his feet.
He mounted Firefly and gathered up the reins, and
then away they fled, fast, fast across the field, back
to safety.

Firefly’s master was so badly wounded that he
was sent to a hospital. Firefly followed back of
the ambulance in which they carried him. For a
long time after that she was not ridden at all.

76

One day her master’s wife, her mistress, came to
where she stood. The mistress kissed her on the
neck and wept.

All this while, though Firefly did not know it, her
master was very ill, When at last he was able to
be moved he was taken home, for he was not
strong enough to go back to the war.

Firefly hardly knew him when she saw him again,
he was so gaunt and white, and one sleeve was
empty and was pinned across his coat.

After a while he grew strong again and was able to
ride about, but he held the bridle in his right hand
now.

Firefly was so glad when she felt him upon her
back again that she curved her neck and pranced
proudly.

“ Good horse,” said her master. He could not

pat her neck for his one hand held the bridle, but

”

his tone was like a caress. ‘“ Except for you
Then his voice broke as he thought of his wife
and children, and how, but for Firefly, he would
have died upon that field of battle.

If Firefly was loved and petted before you may
imagine how it was with her now. Even.when she

grew so old that she could no longer be used, there

77

was no horse in her master’s stable that was held in
such honor as she.

THE STORY OF A SLAVE
PART I.

Nipper was a little slave ant.

She had been a slave from the moment she had -
opened a hole in her cocoon and other slave ants
had drawn her out, straightened her antenne and
smoothed out her soft legs.

Nipper did not know then that she was a slave.
Allaround her she saw little black ants like herself,
hurrying to and fro intent on business.

Those who had drawn her out of the cocoon did
not stay with her long, but hurried away to offer
the same help to others, that is, to draw out from
their cocoons those who were too weak to free
themselves.

Nipper sat there beside her cocoon looking about
her, but feeling too soft and helpless to stir.

Presently she began to move her legs a little.

Then an ant came to herand fed her from its
mouth with something as sweet as honey.

That made Nipper feel stronger, and as she

78

saw how busy everyone about her was, she began
to wonder if she could not help them in their labors.

An ant had stopped close by to arrange some
cocoons,

“Can’t I help you?” asked Nipper.

The other looked at her. ‘‘ Why yes,” she said
after a moment, “if you are strong enough, but you
have been out only a little while.”

“T feel quite strong now.”

“Then you can help arrange these, if you like.”

Nipper cheerfully set to work. At first she felt
rather numb and weak, but as she moved, her
strength began to come to her, and soon she was
running about as briskly as any of them.

After a while Nipper noticed that there was a
difference in the cocoons. Some were like the one
from which she had come; some were larger; and
others were of a brown color.

A little later, from one of the larger of these she
helped to draw forth an ant quite different from
herself ; one much bigger; it was red, too, and had
strong, fierce-looking jaws.

Wondering, but without saying anything, she
helped in unfolding its legs, and making its toilet.
It seemed quite helpless.

79

This new red ant sat there for a long time
getting its breath and strength after its imprison-
ment. Even after it seemed quite itself, however,
it still made no effort to stir about or help the
others.

Presently Nipper, who by this time was as busy
as the best of them, spoke to the red ant as she
passed by. ‘“ Don't you think it’s time to bestir
yourself and set to work ?” she asked.

The red ant stared at her but made no answer.
Nipper’s black friend drew her hastily away.
“Hush! hush!” she whispered. ‘Don’t you
know any better than to say such a thing to her?
She is one of our mistresses.”

“One of our mistresses!” echoed Nipper in
surprise.

Her friend looked at her pityingly. “My poor
little ant,” she said; ‘don’t you know you are
nothing but a slave? A little black slave ?”

“No, I didn’t know that ?”

“Well, you are. And off beyond there, in the
larger rooms, live our mistresses, all big red ants
like that one. All we are here for is to wait on
them, to feed them and keep their houses in order,
and to take care of their young.”

80

“But why ?” cried Nipper rebelliously. ‘* Why
must we do all that ?”

“‘ Because ” began her friend; but they were
interrupted by asturdy, important-looking black ant
who joined them for a moment. ‘ What's this?”
she cried ina severe voice. ‘“ Idling in work hours?

Away with you both. There is too much to

be done for any such wasting of time.”

“Come,” whispered Nipper’s friend, turning
away, ‘we must go back now, but to-night after
working hours I'll tell you all about it. And few
can tell you more than I,” she added with a
sigh.

All day long Nipper was hard at work with the
others. The only rest was when they stopped for
something to eat.

Nipper was pleased to find herself beside her
friend at this hastily eaten meal, but they had no
time to talk until late that evening when everything
was tidy and in order, and the bands of toilers
were preparing for their night’s rest.

“ And now,” said Nipper eagerly, settling down
beside her black friend, whose name proved to be
Riddler, ‘‘now tell me how I came here, and how
it is that there is so much difference between us and

8I

the large red ants. Why should they be our mis-
tresses, and why must we do all the work for
then?”

Riddler sat silently moving her antennz for a
while, and when she spoke at last it was in a sad,
low voice.

“T will tell you first how you came here,” she
said, ‘and then you will understand how it is with
us, and why we never can hope to free ourselves
from our slavery.

‘It was about five or six weeks ago that I awoke
one morning to find all the nest in an unusual stir
and bustle. Slave ants were running up:and down,
and even our mistresses were bestirring themselves.

‘“‘T knew immediately what was going on. There
was to be a slave-making expedition that day, and
they were getting ready for it.

‘For some time we had been short of slaves in
the nest, and for that reason there had been trouble
in getting the work done as it should be. Now
our mistresses had made up their minds that they
must supply themselves with fresh slaves.

“This could be done only by carrying off the
eggs or larvee or cocoons from the nests of black

ants. You see if they carried off the black ants
Pyle’s Humble Friends.—6.

$2

who were fully grown there would be trouble about
making them work in a strange place.

“What are the larvae?” asked Nipper, for
everything was still new to her.

“Well, you see, before ants are really ants they
are eggs,” explained Riddler. ‘That is at the
very first.

“These eggs are laid by the queen generally,
though sometimes the others lay eggs too.

“Out of these eggs are hatched the little larve or
grubs as they are called. These larve have no legs
or antennze; they are white and soft, and very
helpless, and have to be fed and taken care of by
the workers.

Ants feeding Larvz

‘“‘ After a time these larve or grubs spin cocoons,
or else a little shell hardens around them, and there
they lie sheltered and safe while they slowly turn
into ants.

“Then when at last they make holes in the co:

coon and are drawn forth they are no longer help-

83

less little grubs but full grown ants just as you
are yourself.”

“Then I was once a helpless little grub!” said
Nipper wonderingly.

“Yes, and I too, and every one of the ants you
see about us. But to go on,” said Riddler. ‘“ The
slave-catching expedition was not to start until after-
noon, and it was only a short time before it was
ready to go that I and a score or so of other black
ants were told that we were to accompany it to
carry home the cocoons that were captured.

‘It was hard enough to be ordered out for such

Ants on the March

a duty I can tell you ;—to go with the red ants
against ants of our own kind.

“ But, after all, the red ants were not going to
hurt them, and the cocoons they captured would be
well taken care of.

“At any rate knew I had no choice in the
matter, so about the middle of the afternoon when

84

the army started I, as well as other black ants, was
with it.

“Tt was a long journey across rough ground, and
around a piece of water, but after a while I knew
by the fresh speed and excitement that scouts had
brought news that we were coming near the nest
we were to attack.

‘“Tand the other slaves were hurried on with the
rest, and so I saw almost everything that happened.

“The nest was a very large one. There must
have been many more black ants in it than there
were ants in our attacking party, but they knew how
fierce and strong the red ants are in battle.

“They made little or no resistance and soon hid
away in the lower part of the nest. I think—I
hope—that few of them were hurt, but there were
some brave ones who suffered.

“One I remember especially. She was trying
to guard a narrow door into the nest. A great red
ant rushed at her, and before the black ant could
protect herself her head was seized in those terrible,
strong, red jaws.”

Nipper shuddered with horror, and drew closer
to her friend.

“Even then,” Riddler went on, “ all might have

85

gone well if the black ant had kept quiet. Instead
of that she struggled and tried to resist. Then in
an instant those terrible jaws tightened, and when
the red ant dropped her she was either dead or
dying.

‘““She was one of the very few, however, who re-
sisted, and the others who hid away were left un-
harmed. Then our mistresses broke their way into
the large chambers where the larve and cocoons
were kept.

“ After that came our part in the ugly business. We
were given these larve and cocoons to carry away
with us. Soon our whole army, loaded with its
helpless prisoners, was on its way home again.

“T have always had especial care of the cocoon
that I myself carried, and it was from that very
cocoon that you were hatched this morning.

‘So now you see how it is that you came to be a
slave, and why it is that we black ants are content
to be only that. Ifawhole nest of black ants were
not able to defend themselves against a small party of
red ones, and that in their own country, what chance
have we here in the red ants’ nest,—slaves as we
have always been ?

“But after all we are very happy here. We

86

love our work. We have a good home and plenty
to eat and drink, and our mistresses are always
kind to us. What more could we want ?”

But Nipper made no answer. Her heart was
heavy at what she had heard, and to have a good
home and food seemed not enough for her. She
wished for freedom, too.

Note. The facts of this account of the life and battles of the
Polyergus rufescens, or slave-making ants and their captives are
taken from“ The Natural History of Ants,” by Pierre Huber,
and “ Ants, Bees, and Wasps,” by Sir John Lubbock,

Lubbock also speaks of the black ants carrying the red ones-on
their backs from place to place, a point used in Part Il,

PART II.

Ir did not take long for Nipper to get used to
the life of the ant hill where she lived, and a very
busy life she found it.

First of all there was the house to be kept neat
and in order, and this was a great labor. It was a
large house with many halls and rooms.

Then there were the eggs to be cared for, and the
grubs to be fed and tended. Sometimes, if it was
very hot, all the grubs and cocoons had to be carried
to acooler room. Then it would turn cold and

rainy and they were al! carried back again.

87

There were other cocoons in the nest differ-
ent from those of either the red or the black ants,
and at first Nipper did not know what they were.

She knew later, however, when out from them
were hatched
little Aphides,
or ant cows.
These are little
insects such as
one often finds

on thestems of

rosebushes_ or “@
other plants,or\%,
sometimes on
roots under
the ground.

They are the

COWS of the are and their Cows
ants,

Nipper learned, too, how delicious was the
honey, or ant-cow milk, that could be coaxed from
them. Riddler taught her how to stroke their
bodies gently with her feet and antennz till the
tiny drop of honey came from them just as milk

does from a cow, and then how to lick it up.

88

The ant cows did not stay in the nest long after
they hatched, however, but were driven out to
pasture on some daisy leaves near by

The red ants never did any of the work. They
did not even feed or clean themselves. All this
was done for them by their slaves.

Nipper, being a strong, lively ant, was one of
those chosen for outside work, that is, attending to
the cows, or bringing in food. She worked hard,
and when night came was so tired that she slept
without dreams.

Still she was not happy, for she remembered
that after all she was only a slave, and she thought,
“T would not care how small the nest was, nor how
poor the food, if I were only free.”

There were two queens in the ants’ nest, and
Nipper often heard about them, but only three
times did she see a queen in all the while she lived
in the red ants’ nest.

The first time she was hurrying through a long
gallery and happening to take the wrong turning
she found herself in a chamber that was new to her.

There, surrounded by her guards, sat a very
large, handsome, solemn-looking red ant, and
Nipper knew she was in the presence of the

89

queen. No one noticed her and she slipped quietly
away.

The second time Nipper was helping one of the
other outside workers to drag a dead beetle.

Coming around a bunch of grasses near the
opening into the nest Nipper saw two red ants there
in the doorway. One of them Nipper knew
immediately to be one of the royal guard. The
other was larger and finer, and Nipper recognized
her as a queen.

The royal guard had hold of her and was
drawing her gently but firmly down into the nest

again. The queen was holding back, but she was

The Royal Guard and the Queen
not really struggling. Presently she saw the two

little slave ants with the beetle and then she
stopped short and looked at them. After a moment
she spoke. ‘You are slaves, aren’t you?” she
asked.

[ele]

The other slave stood staring at her in silence,
and it was Nipper who answered at length, “ Yes,
your majesty,” she said.

The queen ant looked at them pityingly. ‘“ And
I am a queen,” she said. Then she repeated, “1
am a queen. Do you envy me? I am scarcely
more free than you. I wished to go up into the
light and to see the sky and feel the free wind, but
my faithful subjects think it best that I should stay
down in the nest. Some harm might happen to
ime,”

“Would it please your majesty to come?”
asked the red ant respectfully.

“Oh, yes, I will come,” said the queen bitterly.
‘“Good-by, little slaves. Perhaps it is not the
hardest thing to be a slave, for you at least can
come and go at your work.”

Then she followed her guard down again into
the gallery. The two black ants stood watching
her until she was out of sight, and then Nipper said
pityingly: ‘ Poor thing! I think she looked very
sad.”

‘““Oh, yes,” responded Nipper’s companion, “and
I really think that she is more of a slave than
we. I have heard that the queens are kept as

gl

carefully guarded as though they were prisoners.
All they do is to lay eggs, and even those eggs are
taken from them and given to us to take care of.
The queens are not allowed to go out for fear some
harm might happen to them.”

“But how do you suppose the queen managed
to get this far?” asked Nipper.

“Oh, she must have escaped from her guard in
some way. But come! We must get on with this
beetle,” and the two little ants returned busily to
their work.

That was the second time in her life that Nipper
had seen a queen, but she was to see one a third
time under circumstances that were to change the
little ant's life in such a way as she had never
dreamed of.

It was a warm day. So very warm that the ants
were carrying all the larvae to a cooler room.

Nipper happened somehow or other to be busy
down in the nest that day.

The other ants were all so occupied that they
did not notice a sound that was coming nearer and
nearer ;—a low, deep throbbing on the ground
like the sound of many feet.

Nipper indeed heard it and paused a moment.

92
‘What is that?” she asked of one of her com-
rades.

‘“What do you mean ?”

“That sound we hear. That beating sound.”

“T hear nothing,” said her companion, ‘and if
you were attending to your work you wouldn’t have
time to be bothering about sounds, either.”

So reproved, Nipper turned to her work again,
but it was with a sense of fear weighing on her.

Nearer and nearer came the sound, louder and
louder. Now every one in the nest, slaves and
mistresses, workers, guards, and all, could hear it.

Nearer and nearer it came, and the ants looked
at each other in dismay. Louder and louder, and
now suddenly it was upon them. The roofs were
broken, the earth crushed down into the nest.
Terrified ants ran this way and that, trying to
escape. A whole drove of cattle was passing over
the place where the ants’ nest had been.

Even in their terror, however, the larve and
cocoons were not forgotten. Each little slave
seized one in her mouth before trying to escape
from the falling nest.

Many ants, slaves and mistresses, were buried in
the ruins of the nest that day.

93

Nipper was one of the ants who was fortunate
enough to escape. Carrying a cocoon in her
mouth she made her way in and out among the
trampling hoofs, until at last she found herself in
a place of safety at the edge of the road.

There she waited until the drove had passed, and
then, still trembling with fear, she made her way
back to the ruins of what had once been the beau-
tiful and comfortable nest. Already a few strag-
glers were beginning to return. Nearly all of the
black ants carried larve or cocoons in their
mouths.

In and out among the gathering crowd, waving
her antennz wildly, ran one of the royal guard;
the very one whom Nipper had seen drawing the
queen down into the nest again.

Wildly she ran about, sometimes bumping
against the other ants, sometimes running over
their backs.

“Oh the queen! the queen,” she wailed. “Oh
the queen! the queen!”

‘“Where is the queen?” asked Nipper, as the
red ant ran back and forth in an aimless manner.
But the red ant only repeated, ‘Oh the queen!

the queen !”

94

Slave as she was, Nipper caught the red ant and
held her. ‘ Where is the queen?” she cried again.

The red ant looked at her vaguely. ‘Oh I
don’t know,” she cried. ‘‘ She was in the nest, but
I don’t know where she is now.”

Without a word Nipper dropped the red ant and’
ran toward the opening into the ruined nest.

‘““Where are you going?” cried someone ; but
Nipper did not stop to answer. Somewhere down
in the nest she had no doubt the poor red queen
was still lying, deserted by all, and perhaps crushed
under some fallen earth.

Along one passage after another went the brave
Nipper. Sometimes the way was so blocked with
fallen earth that she had to stop to make her way
through it. Sometimes she had to go back and
find her way around by another passage.

At last beyond a heap of fallen earth she thought
she heard a faint moan. ‘ Your majesty, is that
you ?” cried Nipper.

There was no answer, only after a while another
moan, fainter than before.

Now Nipper flew like a little tiger. at the earth
that blocked her way. With teeth and legs she
worked at it until she made an opening.

95

Through this opening she slipped and found
herself in one of the royal rooms, and there before
her in asad plight lay the very queen for whom
she was searching. In sad plight indeed, for a
lump of earth had fallen on her, pinning her down
so that she could not move.

Nipper Rescuing the Queen.

Close by lay one of the royal guards crushed by
the fallen roof. Nipper saw in a moment that the
guard was quite dead. Then she set to work to
release the queen.

This was hard work for the little ant, tired as
she already was. But she went at the task bravely,
and soon had the joy of finding that the queen
was free. But her labors were not yet ended.
The queen was not able to walk, and so Nipper
took her upon her back. Staggering under the
weight, she made her way past the heaps of earth

and back to the mouth of the nest.

96

On and on she went, up and down until it
seemed as though she never would reach the end
of her journey. Then suddenly she saw the light
before her, and a moment after she was out in the
road again and among the frightened groups of
ants.

What joy arose when they saw Nipper come
staggering out with the rescued queen upon her
back! Immediately the two were surrounded by
a joyous crowd. The queen was lifted from Nip-
per’s back, food was given her and she was gently
stroked and rubbed.

When, at last the queen seemed herself again,
those around her turned to the faithful Nipper.
“And you, little ant; what reward can we give to
you?” they asked.

At that one said one thing and one another,
until they saw that the queen wished to speak.
Then all were silent.

The queen raised herself and looked around.
“My faithful subjects,” she said, ‘although to-day
you have me with you again, alittle while ago I was
lying prisoned among the ruins, and there I would
be still if it were not for this faithful little ant. I
now propose that as a reward for this service we

97

give her the thing that is sweetest to everyone.
Let her have her freedom.”

“Her freedom! Her freedom!” shouted all
the ants, both red and black. “Let Nipper be
free!”

But Nipper looked around at them sadly.

“ Alas, what good would my freedom do me?”
she asked. ‘I would be alone, and where could I
go? I know no other nest than this ?”

“You shall have companions to go with you,”
cried the ants. ‘Choose what slaves you will and
we will free them too, They shall go with you
and you can make yourselves a nest of your own.”

Then Nipper looked about her and chose a
dozen black ants to go with her as her helpers.
Among them, you may be sure, was the old ant
who had carried her when she was a cocoon, and the
one whom she had helped with the dead beetle.

The red ants also gave Nipper some cocoonsand
some ant larvae, that from one of them she might
raise a black queen to reign over the new nest.

So, carrying these cocoons and larvae carefully
in their mouths, the little band of black ants set
out, followed by the good wishes of those they left
behind.

Pyle’s Humble Friends.—y.

98

A short time afterward, not far from the red ants’
nest, which was now rebuilt, might have been seen
a large colony of black ants.

They lived there at peace with their red neighbors,
and however fiercely the red ants set out on their
slave-making expeditions that black colony was never
harmed or disturbed. It was the colony started
by the gallant Nipper and her little band of faith-
ful followers.

THE TAME BAT

Aumost every child is afraid of bats,—they flit
about so strangely and so silently through the night.
Sometimes they flit so close that one feels the air
from their leathery wings, but they never seem to
touch anything.

If you catch and examine a bat, you can see
what a cunning little creature it is. Its head is
like that of a tiny fox, with eyes like shining black
beads. Its teeth are small and white. Its body
is covered with fur as soft as silk, and its tiny hind
feet are beautifully finished off with little nails.

Even its leathery wings are as fine and lustrous
as satin.

99

One evening a bat had flown into a room. It
whirled about here and there so silently and so
swiftly that the eye could not follow it.

The girls who were in the room were frightened
and covered theirheads. They had heard that bats
sometimes catch their claws and wings in the hair,
and get so tangled up in it that it has to be cut off.
Many people believe this, although no one has
ever really seen it happen,

The brother of the girls had heard of this too,
but his hair was too short for him to feel afraid of
its happening to him. He took a tennis racket
and stood waiting for the bat to come near him.
When it did, he struck*at it.

He was sure he had hit it, because he had felt its
body against the wood of the racket, and it had given
asqueak. He thought he had knocked it across the
room. But though he looked and hunted he could
not find it.

At last he said that he must have struck it with-
out hurting it and it had probably gone out into
the night again. Then the girls uncovered their
heads and went on with their reading.

The afternoon of the next day the housemaid
was cleaning that same room. She lifted the por-

100

titre to shake it, and then dropped it and jumped
away with a shriek.

““What’s the matter?” asked the boy, who was
passing through the room with his cap on and the
racket in his hand.”

“Och, and I think it was a mouse,” said the
housemaid. .

‘“A mouse!” cried the boy, full of interest in a
moment, and he too lifted the portiére.

There in a corner of the door was the poor little
bat that he had struck the night before. He had
broken its wing with
his racket, and it had
been hiding about the

: . room ever since.

The Tame Bat The housemaid
begged him to kill the “ nasty thing,” as she called it.
But the boy said he wanted to see what it would do.

The little thing was almost blinded by the light,
but it opened its mouth and threatened him with
its tiny teeth. Then it hobbled a little farther
away, trying to use its broken wing.

“Tt must be hungry,” said the boy. ‘Don’t you
touch it, Mary, I’m going to get something and see
if it will eat.”

101

‘Indeed I wouldn't touch it for anything !” cried
Mary. ‘I’m afraid of the horrid thing.”

The boy ran away and presently came back with
some tiny bits of raw meat.

The poor little bat must have been almost starved,
for it ate greedily. When it seemed to have had
enough, and would eat no more, the boy got a
saucer of water and put it down before it, and the
bat lapped up the water thirstily,
using its tongue just as a dog
would.

The boy said he was going to
keep the bat for a pet and see if
he could tame it. He took a
starch box and covered the front
of it with mosquito netting. He

put a perch across it very much
like the perch in the bird-cage The Tame Bat
so that the bat could hang itself up, for that is
what bats like to do. They hang themselves up
by their little hind feet, with their heads down and .
their wings folded about them, and so they will
sleep all day.

The little bat, Flitters, as the boy named it,

seemed quite satisfied with this new home when it

102

was put in a dark place, and promptly hung itself
up and went to sleep.

The sisters of the boy were disgusted. They
said that if he wanted a pet he might get some-
thing better than a horrid bat. They were afraid
it might get out and crawl about the room, too.
But, in spite of all they said, the boy kept the bat
and set himself to taming it.

He fed it every evening. When he brought the
food he always called to the bat with a peculiar
whistle. Soon the bat knew this whistle and would
answer him when he called.

After awhile Flitters grew so tame that its master
let it out of the box. It would come when he called
it, even in the daytime, though then it moved very
slowly and uncertainly. It was hard for it to see in
the light.

After nightfall it would grow more lively.

All the family, even the girls, became used to
Flitters aftera time. They never could understand,
though, how the boy could bear to handle the bat
as he did, or to let it creep up his sleeve or hide in
his pockets. Sometimes the bat would hang itself
from his open hand, hooking its little feet over the
skin between his fingers.

103

The boy’s friends, lads like himself, were very
much interested in the bat and liked to feed it and
handle it. Sometimes they gave it flies and small
insects, sometimes fresh meat.

Very few of the ladies who came to the house
liked Flitters, however. They seemed to be afraid
of the little bat.

One daya friend of the boy’s mother came to the
house. She had called for a roll of papers that had
been promised her. No one being at home, she
told the maid she would look in the library and see
if it were there.

On the table lay aloose roll. ‘This must be the '
one,” said the lady. “I'll just see.” She picked it
up and as she did so out slid Flitters, falling upon
the table. The bat had been taking a quiet nap
inside the tube of papers where it was dark.

The lady screamed, she was so frightened, and
when the housemaid told her it was only a tame bat
she seemed quite angry that anyone should have
sucha pet. She did not know how cunning Flitters
could be.

The place Flitters liked best in the daytime was
the cloak closet. It was dark and still there, and
the bat found many fine places in which to nestle.

104

But after the girls had found it cuddled away
in their hats or coat-sleeves several times they were
careful to keep the door shut so that it could not
get in.

This was after Flitters’ wing had begun to heal,
and it could flutter about alittle. The wing healed
very quickly. The bone knit together and after a
while it was quite well, only a lump was left where
the bone had grown together.

When the bat was well and had begun to fly
about, you could seldom tell where it was. It would
generally come, however, when the boy called it.
It would fly circling about the room as it grew dusk,
close to the walls or ceiling. It would catch the
mosquitoes and other insects that it saw there.

Then the bat began to go out of doors and they
saw very little of it. Even when the boy called it,
it seldom came.

One day a little girl had come out from the city
with her mother, to spend the night at the boy’s
home. The children were sitting on the piazza
after supper and two or three bats flitted past.

The little girl looked up and said,

“Bat, bat,
Come under my hat
And ll give you a piece of bacon,”

105

‘“Wouldn’t it be just like a magician,” said the
boy, “if I could call a bat and make it come to
mer”

“Yes, it would,” said the little girl, “but you
couldn’t do it.” She had not been told about the
pet bat.

“Couldn't 1?” said the boy. “We'll see.”

He gave the peculiar whistle that he always
gave for Flitters. There was no answer.

Again he whistled, and then one of the bats flew
in under the porch.

He whistled a third time and the bat circled
about his head and finally lighted upon his shoulder,
folding its wings into the likeness of ungainly front
legs.

The little girl could not wonder enough. She
felt as though the boy were really a magician, and
was even a little afraid of him.

The boy took the bat in his hand and smoothed
and tickled it. Then he let it fly away, and after
a while he told her and her mother that it was his
pet bat, and all about it.

That was almost the last time he ever saw +t,
however. Either it was not with the bats which
he saw flitting about on other evenings, or it did

106

not care to answer to his call. No doubt the little
fellow preferred to flit through the air with creat-
ures of its own kind to living in a house, and being

made a pet of.

THE CAPTIVE ROBIN

I was hatched in the top of a tall maple tree.

The nest where I lived with my little brothers
and sisters was very soft and warm. Still softer
and warmer was my mother’s breast as she brooded
over us.

My father was a very handsome robin, as I re-
member him.
He was a good
father to us:
There were al-
ways worms
enough to fill our

hungry beaks.

Father Robin Feeding the Children

And how happy
we were up there in our nest among the leaves!
Sometimes the wind blew so hard that the tree
where we lived would bend far over. Then across
the side of the nest we could catch sight of a red

107

brick house with tall chimneys—of a lawn, and of a
shining river with hills beyond.

Then the wind would pass by, the tree would
straighten, and we could see nothing above the
circle of the nest but the green leaves with the sun
shining through them.

Every evening our father sat on the tiptop of a
tall tree just as the sun was setting. He looked
quite black against the pale sky. There he sang
and sang ;—sang so sweetly and clearly that all we
young ones were still and listened. Then home he
would come, to sleep on a branch close by, while
our mother brooded over us. Ah, those were
happy days; but they could not last.

We were all strong, stout robins) We grew
fast. Soon our mother told us that it was time
for us to learn to fly. That was not pleasant—that
learning to fly.

We got up on the edge of the nest. There we
sat, afraid to try. We were very, very high up in
the air, and our wings felt strange when we spread
them.

Flutter and Flap were very bold and strong.
They tried without much urging. The rest of us

‘were more timid.

108

I am ashamed to say I was so timid and fearful
about it that at last my mother had to go back of
me and push me off the nest. Then down I
went fluttering
and _ struggling.

“Spread your
wings,” cried my
parents — circling
about me. ‘“ Beat
the air. Ply!
Ply 1”

But down,
down I went into
the long grass.
My brothers and
sisters had guided

themselves to

/ trees that were

Ue lower than our

maple. There they sat balancing themselves
among the leaves.

“ Now it will be harder for you,” said my mother.

“Tt is harder to lift yourself out from the grass.

You had better just flutter along to those bushes

yonder before you try another flight.”

109

Suddenly my father gave a cry of alarm.

‘“Wait a moment ; something is the matter,” said
my mother, rising to join him.

I was left there alone in the long grass.

Both my parents began shrieking. Their cries
were of terror andanger. They shot past above me
like arrows, seeming to aim themselves at a place
in the grasses near by. And now I heard some-
thing stirring anda soft breathing just back of me.

I glanced fearfully around. There, glaring at me
through the grasses, were two great yellow eyes
set in a furry head, and back of this head a great
dark body.

I did not know what it was, but still I felt so ter-
rified that my heart seemed to stop beating. Then
with a bound the creature was upon me. I felt its
teeth. It lifted me and carried me in its mouth.
It was a cat.

My parents circled above us with pitiful cries,
but they could not help me.

I do not remember anything clearly for a while
after that. It is all dim as in a dream.

When I looked about me again I found I was
lying on some soft sand. Above me and on each

side were iron wires. I was in acage.

12 fe)

From what I learned afterwards my mistress
must have seen the cat carrying me, and saved me
from its teeth. She had saved me, but I was a
prisoner.

My mistress was very good and gentle with me.
Soon I learned to know her and not to be afraid of
her when she came near me. She fed me, she gave
me fresh water, and cleaned my cage every day.
Every day, too, she put achina dish filled with
water into my cage. In that I bathed. First I
would light upon the edge of the dish and dip my
bill in the water, fluttering my wings. Then down
I would hop, plash! into the water. I would dip
down and beat my wings so fast that the water
would fly round in a perfect shower. When I got
through, all the cage would be wet. The drops
would hang from the wires.

It made my mistress laugh. Then she would
wipe the cage dry while I preened my feathers and
rustled them into place.

Our room was at the very top of the house.
My mistress did the sewing for the household.
She was not one of the family.

Sometimes a little boy and girl came up to the
room to look at me. They called my mistress

III

Sally. She called them Miss May and Master
Donald.

One day Master Donald brought a hairy terrier
into the room with him. It barked at me and
frightened me so I beat myself against the bars.
My mistress made him take it out. At first he
would not, but she told him that this was her room
and her bird and that she would not have me
frightened. Then he was angry, too, and he did
not come any more.

One day, after my mistress had cleaned my cage,
she fastened back the door and so left the cage
open. I thought she had forgotten. I flew down
and looked out. Then I hopped outside.

She did not try to stop me. She was sitting
close by with some sewing. She laid her sewing
down and watched me.

I looked all about me, putting my head first on
one side and then on the other.

How strange it seemed to be outside the bars!
I could see from the window the sky and the tree
tops. That was where I belonged.

I spread my wings and fluttered toward the
light outside. But at the window I struck against
something. I saw nothing, but something was

1]2

there, hard and cold, between me and the freedom
outside. It was the window glass.

I beat myself against it until my mistress caught
me in her hands and put me back in my cage.
But after that she let me out of my cage every day
to fly about the room awhile.

Sometimes I used to light on the back of my
mistress’s rocking-chair. It was great fun swinging
backward and forward as she rocked.

Sometimes I went to her workbasket and
pecked at the things in it. There were little red
things that looked like strawberries, and flat cases,
and long pins with shiny, black heads. There
were spools, too, with thread wound around them.
Once I took the end of a thread in my beak and
pulled. I pulled it as far as I could, and then I
tried to fly away with it. There didn’t seem to be
any end to it, however. My mistress took the
thread from me and wound it all up again, and
tapped me with her thimble.

Back of the looking-glass on the bureau lived
another robin. He was a handsome bird. He
lived in a room exactly like the one I lived in, only
everything was turned the other way.

We used to look at each other. Every time I

113

moved he moved, too. I used to call to him, but
he never answered me. There was glass between
us and we could not reach each other.

Sometimes when I sat on the red pincushion and
pulled the pins
out, I would look
up and see that Ze
had been pulling
pins out of Azs red
pincushion in that
other room. He

always pulled out
just as many pins

as J did. Robin in Mischief
He was a funny bird. I never grew tired of
watching him through the glass, but I never got to

know him very well.

One day, while I was amusing myself on the
bureau, my mistress left the room. She closed the
door behind her, but I suppose she did not latch it.

Suddenly I saw the door in that other looking-
glass room open. In through the crack looked
two fierce, yellow eyes. A terrible, lank, black cat
came stealing in. It looked about the room. The

looking-glass robin did not seem to see it. He
Pyle’s Humble Friends.—8.

114

was watching the door of #zy room. I tried to call
to him, but I could not. I felt as frightened as
though the cat were after me.

Then I knew that the cat saw him. Stealthily
it crept nearer. Would he never turn and see it?

Suddenly some faint sound made me look be-
hind me. There was a cat in my room, and it was
at me—at me—that it glared.

I sat quite still. I tried to shriek, but my voice
died away in a pitiful peep. The door opened and
my mistress came in. Miss May was just back of
her.

‘Oh, the cat!” shrieked my mistress. “ He is
after my robin.” She ran at the cat to drive it
from the room.

“Don’t you dare to hurt my cat,” screamed Miss
May.

The charm the cat had thrown over me was
broken. I flew wildly to the window, beating my-
self against the glass. All was confusion.

At last the cat was turned out. Miss May fol-
lowed it saying that the cat should not be treated
so, and that her mamma didn’t like having that
nasty bird kept there at any rate.

Then my mistress took me in her hands and

115

kissed me. After that she put me back in my cage.
And now I was no longer allowed to fly about the
room except when my mistress was there.

Outside the window a stout nail had been driven
in the wall. There my cage sometimes was hung,
high, high up in the air. How sweet the air was!
How the wind
blew through the
trees near by!

One day a robin
lighted Di. a
branch of one of
the neighboring
trees. He sang
and sang. He
sang even more
sweetly than my
father had sung
from the top of the

poplar tree, and I Robin Singing
listened.

The next day he came again, and the next and
next.

Once he flew over and alighted on my cage.

“Who are you?” he asked.

116

‘‘T am a captive robin,” I said.

He stayed and talked to me awhile and then he
flew away. I felt very sad.

But he came again. Every day we talked to-
gether. I told him my story. I asked him if he
could tell me anything of my father and mother,
or of my little brothers and sisters, but he could
not. I never knew what became of them.

I did not care now for that other robin in the
looking-glass room. I did not care to sit on the
back of my mistress’s chair. When she let me out
I flew to the window and sat looking out and long-
ing to be free.

“ Are you sick, my little robin ?” asked my mis-
tress. But I could not tell her.

One day my robin friend came to my cage. “If
you were only free,” he said, “you should be my
mate.”

Then he told me how, before very long, he must
fly away. Thewinter was coming. That was why
the sky shone so and the leaves turned red. Very
soon the leaves would fall. Then he must go.

Now indeed I was sad. I pined to be free -—
to use my wings in the sky instead of in that
cramped little room with its one window.

117

My mistress bent above my cage one day. ‘My
poor little, dear little Robin,” she said. ‘You
were happy enough at first, but now if you wish to
go it is cruel to keep you here.”

She reached into the cage and caught me. She
pressed her lips against me. Then she opened
her hand.

I did not go to her chair or the bureau. I flew
to the window to
look out.

A soft cool air
was blowing in
from outside. It
Stirred the
curtain. I hop-
ped upon the

window sill. No

glass was there. Robin on the Nest
I spread my wings; then away and away I flew,
dipping and rising in my flight. I was free.

This spring we came back from the South, my
mate and I. Wecame back to the house where
my mistress looks from her little attic window.

Our nest is built in a tree close by. As I sit on

my nest I can see the window of her room.

118

Once I flew on to the well-known window sill.
My mistress was sitting inside.

“Oh, are you my robin ?” she cried.

She put down her sewing and came toward me.
She put out her hand, but I would not let her catch
me. I spread my wings and flew back to my babies
in the nest.

Every morning my dear mate sits on a branch
near the window and sings and sings for my mis-
tress. I hope she hears him, for his song is very

sweet.

FLORA AND HER CAT

Fora was not a little girl, She was a lioness.
She had never seen the great deserts nor the wild,
tangled jungles that her mother had known, for
Flora was born at the Zoédlogical Gardens, She
was the first little lioness that had ever been born
there, and the keepers of the animals made a great
pet of her, She was not kept shut up ina cage,
but was allowed to go free like a pet cat or dog.

Flora herself had a pet. This pet was acat that
had been brought to the Zoo to catch the mice

that were there.

119g

Flora grew so fond of this cat that she never was
happy when it was out of her sight. She carried
it about with her, holding it by the nape of its neck
as a cat does its kitten. If it tried to run away
she caught it by the tip of its tail and pulled it
back,

When she slept, she curled herself up around it
so that it could not get away.

One day Flora was sleeping very soundly. She
slept so soundly that she was not aroused when the
cat awoke from its nap, and stepping stealthily over
those great yellow paws went outside to take a
stroll,

Some time later Flora, too, awoke. Her cat
was gone. She looked around. There were a
number of wild rabbits at the Zoo. Just then one
of them ran past the door. °

Flora caught sight of it. It was going very fast.
She thought it was her cat running away from her.
Off she set in hot chase after bunny. People
screamed and ran as they saw Flora bounding
across the grounds.

Just as she was about to catch the rabbit it ran
down into its burrow. Flora snuffed and whined

at the hole in the ground.

120

A moment later, she saw her cat walking placidly
across the grass. It really was her cat this time.

Flora bounded after it, picked it up gently, and
carried it back with her. Then laying it down
between her paws she began to lick it with her
rough tongue, purring with delight. She had a
wonderful purr, it was so loud and deep.

As Flora grew larger the keepers were obliged
to shut her up inacage. It frightened the people
who came to the Zoo to see a great creature like
that at liberty.

Flora seemed unhappy at first, but she soon grew
used’to the cage, and was as contented as ever, for
she was allowed to have her cat with her.

Though the lioness was almost always gentle
with her pet, she used to tease it at times. One
thing she did was to walk up and down the cage
just back of the cat, putting one or the other of her
front paws on the tip of its tail, Puss would grow
so angry that it would turn round and spit and
scratch at the lioness. The lioness would stand
perfectly still with her head turned away, until puss
started off again. Then she would follow it again
placing her paws on the tip of its tail with the
greatest exactness,

121

The cat, in its turn, would play with Flora’s tail
as the lioness lay waving the end of it gently to and
fro. Puss would crouch down, its eyes gleaming
as they were fixed upon that moving tip. Thenthe
cat’s body would begin to sway from side to side,
and suddenly it would bound upon the tail, hold-

Flora and her Cat

ing it with all four paws, rolling over and over, and
biting as hard as it could.

The lioness would look around lazily at the cat
and try to wave the tail free. Sometimes the cat
would bite too hard, and then Flora would simply

lay one of those great, heavy paws on it, and pin

122

it down so that it was unable to move until the
lioness chose to release it.

One day Flora had a new plaything. It even
charmed her away from the cat for a few minutes,
A man who was visiting the Zoo put a toy balloon

Flora and the Balloon

into her cage. It was weighted down with a piece
of paper tied to a string, so that it only floated a
few inches above the ground.

Flora was lying with her cat between her paws
when the balloon was put into her cage. She
looked at it fora moment or so. Then she rose
and walked over toward it with half-sleepy curiosity.
She smelled it and then touched it with her paw.

Away went the balloon, to Flora’s surprise. She

followed it and touched it again. Away it floated.

123

Flora now began to look more wide awake. She
hurried after it and this time gave it a good, rous-
ing stroke with her mighty paw. Instead of being
hurt, the balloon bounded away as lightly as a
feather.

And now began a wild chase after the balloon.
Up and down and around the cage after it went
the lioness. At last she got it in a corner and
struck her paw down upon it. The balloon broke
with a loud report. Flora bounded as though she
had been shot, and retreated to the furthest corner
of the cage.

There she crouched for some time before she
gathered courage to go over and examine the
little, wrinkled piece of rubber which was all that
was left of the balloon. Afterthat Flora contented
herself with her cat for a plaything.

But a sad thing happened. The cat was killed
by a mowing-machine one day when it was out
for a stroll. Flora soon began to be very uneasy.
As time went on and the cat did not return, she
grew more and more anxious, pacing up and down
her cage with her head up and her tail waving.

Now and then she would stop and give a roar,
looking anxiously up or down the building to see

124

if the cat was coming in answer to her call. Then
she would pace up and down and stop to roar
again,

The next day her keeper, seeing how distressed
she was, and knowing that her pet had been killed,
thought that he would introduce another cat into
the cage in place of the lost one.

He went all the way home and brought back a
house cat with him. He put it into Flora’s cage.
The moment the lioness saw it she hurried over
toward it with the greatest delight; but the cat
was frightened, and jumped out of the cage.

It was put back in such a way that it could not
escape. Flora again went over to it, snuffed at
it, and then with a low growl struck it such a blow
that the cat was killed instantly.

They tried another cat, but she killed that too.

Then the keeper decided she must get over her
loneliness as best she could by herself. It was a
long time before Flora seemed quite happy again,
and she never had another pet.

125

THE TWO WORLDS

Down in the brook is a wonderful water world,—
a world that is separated from the world of air above
by what is called the surface film,

This surface film is thinner than anything you
canthink of. It is all over the water like a sheet of
fairy glass.

You cannot see the surface film, and you cannot
feel it, but it is there, all the same.

It is easy enough to break it. Drop a stone in
the brook or stir the water with your finger, arid the
surface film is broken and mixes with the other
water. Immediately, however, another surface film
forms to take its place. There it is again, like
fairy glass between that world and this. So the
two worlds are always apart.

There are some things, however, that can ie
backward and forward from one world to the other,—
from the world of air to the world of water and then
back again, as though they were magicians.

That is what the whirligig beetles can do.
Sometimes they go whirling and speeding about
on the surface film, as though they were skating,
and it bends under them like thin ice. Sometimes

126

they take a drop of air and swim down in the
water. There they walk about over the stones or
through the water-weed forests.

What wonderful things they see there: little
soft, brown lizards creeping about; crayfish, with
pop eyes and long feelers; fishes flitting through
the water, like birds through air; and herds of snails
feeding on the dead weeds or refuse.

Sometimes the whirligig beetles climb up a reed
or piece of grass andso out of the water. They stop
to rest a few minutes, and then they spread their
wings and fly away, but they never fly far. Soon
they come back again.

A dingy larva was clinging, with its six legs, to a
piece of water weed down in the water. It looked
up at the beetles as they skated about.

“How strange!” it sighed. ‘They can fly
about all day in that beautiful upper world if they
choose, and yet they always come back to the water.
If I could only fly, how happy I would be! I would
never come back.”

Close by there was another larva. It was differ-
ent from the first It was mouse-colored, and al-
most transparent, except for the spine down its
back. It was busily eating a water-snail. It held

127

the snail in two of its claws, somewhat as a squirrel
might hold a nut; then it caught the snail in its
jaws and pulled it out of the shell and ate it.

Some day the mouse-colored larva would change
into a goat beetle, but neither of the larve knew
that.

Now it dropped an empty snail shell and looked
over at its companion.

“ Well I don’t know,” it said, in answer to the
first one’s remark. ‘I’m thinking of going out
into the upper world myself soon. I’m not feeling
particularly delighted about it though. There are
worse places than this pond I can tell you.”

“Perhaps, perhaps,” said the first; “ but, oh! I
should like it up there, I know.”

The next day the mouse-colored larva left the
pond. It climbed over the pebbles and out upon
the bank of the brook.

The dun-colored larva looked after it longingly.
“Yes, there it goes,” it sighed. “If I could only
follow! But I know I should die up there.”

It felt very sad as it clung to the water weeds, or
moved slowly and sluggishly about through the fairy

forests below.
It was about a month afterward that the mouse-

128

colored larva came back to the brook again. You
would not have known it if you had seen it, for it
was no longer a larva. It had changed to a fine,
large beetle.

It swam about for awhile with the whirligig
beetles on top of the water. Then suddenly it
broke through the surface film and dived down to
the water weeds below. Thedun-colored larva was
still feeding there. It did not know the beetle as
its old friend, the mouse-colored larva, in a new form.

“‘So, here you are still,” said the beetle. “1
was just wondering about you, and I thought I’d
come down and see if you were here.”

“Wondering about me!” said the larva. “ How
could you wonder about me? You never saw me
before.”

“Never saw you before!” cried the beetle.
“Well, that’s a good joke. Though to be sure |
have changed since you saw me,” and it swelled it-
self with pride. “I’m that mouse-colored larva
that used to live down here and eat snails.”

The larva could hardly believe it.

“This was the way of it,” said the beetle. “ You
remember the day I left here?”

Yes, the larva remembered.

129

Then the beetle went on to say how all that day it
had been longing to get out of the water. But
even when it went at last, climbing up the bank and
into the air, it was not comfortable. It wanted to
get in the dark and sleep, so it burrowed down into
the damp earth beside the brook. There it curled
up and slept.

When it awoke, it felt as though its skin were too
tight for it. “Ugh! but that was a horrid feel-
ing,” said the beetle. ‘I wouldn’t like to feel it
again.”

However it stretched and stretched itself, and
presently, crack! its skin split right open. Then it
crawled out of its skin, but it felt very weak and
strange.

It stayed down in the dark there for quite a
while until it was strong again. When it crawled
out, behold, it was a fine, big beetle !

“Why, I can fly about now wherever I like,”
said the beetle, ‘but I don’t care about it. I'd
rather be down in the water. That upper world
they talk about is rather a poor place in my opinion.”

But the larva began to pant with eagerness.
“So you changed!” it cried. ‘‘ You changed into
a beetle. Oh, do you—do you suppose, that if |

Py.e’s Humble Friends,—g.

130

climbed up and dug into the ground I would change
into a beetle, too? Could I, also, fly about in the
upper world?”

The beetle shook its head. “I wouldn’t advise
you to try,” he said, “it isn’t every one who can do
as I have done.”

“Oh, but I wouldn’t be afraid to try,” cried the
larva. “I musttry. I would go through anything
to have wings and be able to fly like you.”

And now, in spite of all that the beetle could say,
the larva began to climb up toward the surface of
the water. It climbed slowly, and the beetle fol-
lowed it.

When it reached the edge of the brook the bee-
tle asked with much interest, “ Where do you think
you'll burrow ?”

“T don’t know. I don’t think I’ll burrow at all,”
said the larva. ‘Somehow, I don’t feel like bur-
rowing.”

“You don’t!” cried the beetle. “Why, how do
you expect to turn into a beetle if you don’t bur-
row?”

“‘T don’t know, but UT don’t think I’ll burrow. I
think I’ll just cling here to this plant and rest
awhile.”

131

The larva fastened itself to the plant, and the
beetle sat down beside it to talk. The beetle liked
to talk. It told the larva all over again about how
it had burrowed down
into the earth and
burst its skin.

The larva said very
little. It seemed to
feel dull.

“Why, how curious
you do look,” cried
the beetle suddenly.
“How your eyes
shine! They’re every
color,—blue and green
and red, Amd, oh
dear! I do believe
you're beginning to
split How do you
feel ir”

But the larva said

Dragonfly coming out of Larva

nothing. It, too, knew that something wonderful
was happening to it. It was swelling itself with
violent motions, The split in its back was length-

ening.

132

It was still clinging to the reed with its hooked
feet. With a violent effort it drew its upper part
back, and out of the shell, Then it rested per-
fectly quiet.

“Dead,” said the beetle, after watching it for
some time and seeing no motion. But the other
was not dead. It
was only recover-
ing its strength.

The beetle went
away after a while,
but the changed
larva still hung
there silent and
motionless. After
a time it slowly
drew the rest of its
body out of the
dried shell, and
crawled farther up
the reed.

It was a beautiful dragonfly. Its wings were

The Dragonfly

clear, but strengthened with delicate veins. Its
eyes shone with all the colors of the rainbow.
It still sat on the reed for some time, get-

133

ting stronger and stronger with every passing
moment.

The beetle, who had come back, stared with sur-

prise.
‘Why, is that you?” he asked.
* Yes, it ie,”

The beetle stirred its wings in surprise.

“And now what are you going to do?” it asked.

“What am I going todo? Why, fly about in
the beautiful air,—learn all the ways of this new won-
der world,—flit faster than the butterfly, lighter
than the bird.”

“And when will you be coming down into the
water world again?”

‘Never ; am free from all that now. Good-by,
beetle. Good-by and forever.”

The beetle stared after the glittering dragon-
fly as it dashed away, swift as an arrow, through
the clear air.

“Well I never!” it said. “At any rate it’s just
as I said. He didn’t turn into a beetle after all.”

Then the beetle went back to the pond and began
playing with the whirligigs.

134

THE PART RIDGES

One day Mr. Rollins came home from the field,
carrying his hat very carefully in his hands.

“Taura, come here,” he called to his little
daughter, ‘I have something for you.”

He set his hat softly down on the edge of the
porch, and when the little girl looked in it she saw
eight pear-shaped, yellowish eggs.

“What are they ?” she asked. “ Wheredid you
get them?”

“They are partridge eggs. I found them down
in the field near the wood. Would you like to
have them?”

“Yes. But what shall I do with them ?”

“Feel them. They’re still warm. How would
you like to put them under old Dorcas, the hen, and
raise a brood of little partridges ?”

“Oh yes, I’d like to do that. And will the little
partridges be really mine ?”

‘Yes, they shall all belong to you, and nobody
else. Come now and we’'llsee what Dorcas says to
the eggs.”

The eggs were carried to the chicken house,

135

and there Mr. Rollins put them in amIOnE Dorcas’s
own white ones.

The old hen looked at them curiously when
they were placed in her nest, but she made no
objections, settling down again as soon as she
was left alone, and cuddling all the eggs ‘alike
under her soft, warm feathers.

After a while the eggs hatched out,—the hen’s
eggs and partridge’s eggs at almost the same time.

The little partridges were brisker and less help-
less than the chickens. Old Dorcas looked at
them with pride. Still, she made no distinction,
scratching and clucking for all alike, and the little
partridges themselves seemed to know no difference.
They ran about with their little foster brothers and
sisters perfectly content, and at night they were all
sheltered together under the hen’s broad wings.

Laura was very proud of her little partridges.
The visitors who came were always invited out to
the chicken yard to see the little things. Laura
liked to feed them herself. She liked to see them
' pushing softly against each other in their eagerness
to get the corn meal she gave them, and she liked
to hear their eager pipings.

One day Dorcas wandered down into the field

136

that bordered the wood. Her brood was with her,
and now and then she stopped and scratched, calling
to them to come and get what she had found. The
little chickens and partridges followed her through
the sunny grass, peeping softly.

Presently Laura came down to the field to drive
them home.

She was quite close to them when suddenly
from the shadow of the wood sounded the call of a
partridge. The little ones raised their heads and
listened. Again it sounded, and then swiftly and
silently as tiny shadows all the little partridges ran
into the woods, slipping in among the bushes and
undergrowth, and so were lost to sight.

Laura hunted about for them, and called them,
and old Dorcas clucked loudly to them to come
back, but they were gone and the little girl thought
she would never see them again.

Some months after the partridges disappeared,
Laura and her mother were sitting on the porch,
when, with a loud whirr, something flew past them
and against the window so hard that a pane of glass
was splintered. They heard a thud of something
falling in the room beyond. Laura’s mother put
down her sewing and hurried into the house,

137

On the mantel a full-grown partridge was crouch-
ing. It must have been frightened indeed to have
flown in through the window like that. Perhaps
a fox or a hawk had been after it. It was badly
cut by the broken glass.

They took the wounded partridge and put it in
acage. They set the cage out on the porch in the
shadow of the vines.

The next day they heard another partridge
whistling to it. It was the wounded one’s mate.
All day it called

from some _hid-

ing-place among
the bushes.
The wounded
one answered
the call, but its

answers grew

The two Partridges

fainter and
fainter. They gave it food and water, but it had
been so badly cut that when they came to look at it
the next morning, it was dead. Another partridge
was on the porch close to the cage. When they
came out it flew away. It must have been the
mate that had been calling the day before.

138

Laura said she was sure that the dead partridge
was one of the little ones that Dorcas had hatched,
and that when it found itself in danger it had
remembered them, and had come back to them for
help.

She buried it in a box under the rosebushes
and put up a headstone. ‘“ That’s so its mate will
know where to find it,” she said, but the mate never

came to look.

LIMPETY

Ir seems a curious name for a cat,—Limpety;
I suppose they called me that because I was lame
and limped.

It happened—my getting lame I mean—when I
was quite a kitten. The way of it was that I
caught my foot in a rabbit trap when I was cross-
ing a field) Oh, how scared I was when I found
myself caught, and how I mewed and mewed!

After a while I heard some people coming,—
boys, and they had dogs with them. Then I tore
my foot loose and ran as fast as I could through
the tall grass, and so on into a thick wood. There
I climbed a tree.

139

The boys and dogs were after me. I could hear
them, but I crossed to another tree on a grapevine
and hid in a hollow.

I could hear them below me, the boys talking
and the dogs sniffing round, while I lay there trem-
bling, afraid to mew.

After a while they went away.

When I was sure they had quite gone, I climbed
down and went on my way, though my foot hurt
me dreadfully. It got well after a while, but I
have limped ever since.

But that is not where I meant to begin. I meant
to begin at the very beginning, when I was a tiny
kitten with my eyes not yet open.

I was born in a barn. My mother was a barn
cat, thin and ragged and wild of eye. She was not
a pretty cat, though she wasa kind enough mother
to us.

There were five of us kittens, and I suppose we
were not pretty either; that is, none of us but
Whitey. She was a plump, gentle, soft, little thing.
The rest of us were lean and haggard enough, even
as kittens.

We lived in a hollow of hay, high up in the hay-

mow. It was a pleasant place, soft and dark,

140

with swallows darting in and out overhead, and the
sound of the horses and chickens coming up to us
from the stable beneath,

I don’t suppose our mother found it as comforta-
ble a home as we did. She must have been
hungry often, for, though there were plenty of mice
and rats in the barn, there were several cats there,
too. Our mother was no longer young at that
time, and often and often she would come back to
the nest not having caught a mouse all day, because
some younger cat had been quicker than she in
pouncing on the prey.

However, we were young and thoughtless, and
that never troubled us. We lived there happily
enough, for awhile, as Isay. Then one day, just as
we were getting big enough to think of mousing
for ourselves, the farmer happened to come climbing
over the mow. Out of our nest we jumped in
haste and ran away, some one way and some
another.

“By George!” cried the farmer. “ Another lot
of kittens. This is getting to be toomuch. Here,
Tom, I wish you'd get a bag and catch these kittens
and carry them off.”

“Yes sir,” said Tom, “Wl do it.”

141

Presently he came up a ladder from the stable
below carrying an empty potato sack in his hand.
We were all hiding in different places. From back
of a beam where I was crouching I could see
Whitey cowering in one corner.

She was the first one caught. She did not
struggle, but only mewed dismally after she -was
shut in the bag.

Mouser followed.

I was the next one caught. I made a hard fight
for it, too. We were all, except Whitey, as fierce
and untamed as any wild animals.

When the man caught me I did not mew, but I.
turned on him tooth and nail, and bit into his finger
till my teeth touched the bone.

He swore, and tossed me from him into the bag
so hard that I was almost stunned for awhile.
And there I was. Fighting or biting would do no
good there.

In a little while my other brothers were forced
into the sack one after another, and the mouth of
the bag securely tied. After that we were left
lying there for some time.

We mewed aloud and called our mother, but
there was no answer.

142

After awhile we felt the bag being lifted from
the ground with us in it, and we were carried fora
distance. Then came the jar of the bag being
thrown down, and after that we felt a steady jolting
motion.

We had been put in a cart and were being driven
away from the barn.

On and on we went for miles and miles, and
then at last the jolting ceased, the sack was opened,
and we were emptied out over the side of the cart
into the road.

Then the cart drove on, the wheel almost pass-
ing over Whitey, and we were left there alone.

No house nor barn was in sight. As far back
as we could see stretched the yellow and rutty
road. In front there was still the road, but lead-
ing through a deep pine wood. We were in a
part of the world utterly unknown and strange to
us.

I have often wondered why, if the farmer wanted
to be rid of us, he did not drown us at once.
It would have been less cruel than to drop us in
that way beside the road, where we ran the risk
of starving, or of being torn to pieces by dogs, or
pelted and tormented by cruel boys.

143

I have had a sad life. I have known great
hardships, but nothing has ever seemed to me so
heartlessly cruel as the dropping of us helpless
kittens on that lonely road to live or die as might
happen.

I have often wondered what became of my
brothers and sisters, — whether they starved to
death, or whether they found a home where the
people were less hard of heart than that farmer;
but I have never seen any of them since that
day.

After we had recovered from the jar of being
thrown from the cart, we took counsel together as
to what we should do.

Mouser and Frisky said they were going to try
to find their way back to the old barn.

Whiskers, a gaunt, fierce kitten, struck off across
the fields by himself.

Whitey, who had always been fonder of me than
of any of the others, said that she would go where
I went.

I told her I intended to follow the cart, which
had gone on and had now disappeared in the dis-
tance. There seemed no use in going back, since
the farmer would not allow us to stay, but there

144

seemed to me more chance of finding a barn by
following the road than by taking to the field.
This plan suited Whitey as well as any other, so
bidding farewell to our brothers, we two started
bravely on our way together.
Birds flitted from bush to bush beside the road,

and in the pine woods I saw a squirrel running

Whitey eating the Mouse

like a red shadow along a branch overhead, but it
was hopeless to think of catching any of these.

Whitey complained that she was hungry, and I
myself was beginning to feel that it was long since
I had had anything to eat. So bidding Whitey
wait for me by the roadside, I crept stealthily past
the fence and through the long grass of the field.

On I went, now crouching and listening, now
stealing forward on velvet paws.

At last my hunt was rewarded. Before me,

145

busy over a bunch of tender grasses, was a plump
field mouse.

A bound, a faint squeak, and a moment after I
was hurrying back to Whitey with the mouse in
my teeth.

Whitey purred with joy as I laid it before her,
and immediately fell to, not stopping till the last
morsel of the mouse had been eaten, while I sat
looking on.

Not until she had quite finished did Whitey re-
member that I might be hungry, too.

‘““Oh dear!” she cried. ‘Here I have eaten it
all, and now there is nothing left for you. How

”

greedy I have been;” and the poor, tender little
thing looked ready to mew.

I told her it was no matter. Idd feel hungry
but I did not tell herso. I would have liked
to go back to the field to hunt for another mouse
for myself, but it was now growing late, and |
hoped that we were nearing some barn where we
might find shelter as well as food.

Just as the sun was setting and all the sky was in
a glow, we heard a horse trotting, and a light sound
of wheels. We drew to the side of the road and

crouched down among the grasses.
Pyle’s Humble Friends.—ro,

146

Presently we saw a horse and buggy. A man
was driving, and two children were on the seat
beside him, a boy and a girl.

When they were almost up to us, the boy cried,
‘Look at that rabbit.”

‘“Where ?” asked the little girl.

“Over there by the fence. Can't you see it ?”

The boy was pointing at Whitey.

“T see it,” said the man checking his horse.
“But it isn’ta rabbit. I believe it’sa kitten. Why,
there are two of them. Don’t you see that gray
one beside the clump of grass?”

“Kittens !” cried the little girl, ‘“ Oh, papa, do
you suppose they're wild kittens? Couldn’t you
* catch them ?”

“They couldn’t be wild kittens,” said her father.
‘““T suppose some one must have dropped them
here. There’s no house within a mile or so.”

“Oh, they're so cunning,” cried the child.
‘“Mayn’t I have them? Please, papa. Oh, please
get them for me.”

The little boy, too, begged his father to try to
catch us.

The man gave the reins to the boy to hold, and
jumped from the buggy.

147

“Brother,” whispered Whitey, “he’s coming to
catch us. What shall we do? Shall we run
away ?”

I looked sharply at the man. He had a good,
kind face. ‘Stay where you are, Whitey,” I said,
‘‘and let him catch you. You're a pretty, gentle,
little thing. They will be sure to give you a good
home if they take you.”

‘But won’t you wait, too?” asked Whitey, for
I had slunk further away beyond the fence.

‘“No, no; you are pretty and lovable, but who
would want an ugly, lean thing like me? Besides
there would be more chance of their keeping you
if there were only one instead of two.”

So Whitey crouched quite still and allowed the
man to touch her and pick her up. He carried her
back to the buggy and gave her into the hands of
the little girl.

I heard the child petting her and calling her
pretty names. I heard her begging her father to
allow her to keep the little ‘‘ Snowball,” as she
called Whitey, and her father said she might.
Then I heard both children asking him to catch
the other kitten too, but he refused. ‘“ No, no,”
he said. ‘One is quite enough. What would

148

your mother say if we came home with a whole
family of kittens? You'll be fortunate if she'll al-
low you to keep that one. Besides, the other is
an ugly, dirty-looking thing.”

Then he climbed into the buggy and they drove
away, taking my little sister with them.

Now I was quite alone in the world. For a lit-
tle while I lost heart. Why should I go on or
struggle any more? Why not lie down there
among the grasses and quietly wait for death to
come?

But soon I shook off this sadness and made up
my mind that the first thing to be done was to go
into the fields and try to find something that I
could eat, for I was growing faint with hunger.

It was at this time, while hunting about the fields,
that I got caught in the rabbit trap and was lamed
for life.

To take up my story from there ;

After I had climbed down from the tree as best
I could with my sore paw, I went across the fields
and back to the road.

I caught one or two crickets and a grasshopper

on the way, and these served to ease my hunger.
On I went, limping slowly, and just as the dusk

149

had settled down over the road I came to the
outskirts of a town.

People were sitting in the lighted doorways
talking together. Dogs barked, and a church bell
rang. Everybody seemed happy, comfortable, and
satisfied, except myself.

Seeing a dog coming down the street I took
shelter in a corner against a closed door of a shop.
Presently, worn out with hunger and weariness my
eyes closed and I fell into a deep sleep.

I was wakened by the opening of the door, and
at the same moment some one came out and
stumbled over me.

““What’s that?” said a man’s voice.

He stooped and put his hands on me. I was
too worn out to struggle orto tryto escape. I felt I
could bear anything rather than try to move at that

moment.
As the man felt my fur he made some exclama-
,tion, ‘‘ What is it, Ned?” asked a woman’s voice

from the house.

“T think it’s a kitten,” he answered. “I almost
fell over it.”

“A kitten! Bring it in and let’s see what it looks
like.”

150

The man lifted me quite gently and carried me
into a comfortable, well-lighted room. A plump,
little woman was clearing away the dishes from a
supper table.

She stopped with a meat plate in her hand, as
the man set me down on the floor.

“Oh, what an ugly kitten!” she cried. “1
want a cat, but I don’t want one like that. Ugh,
but it’s dirty! And lookat its paw! It makes me
sick. Do take it out.”

“Tt isn’t a beauty,” said the man. “ Here’s a
good chance to count how many ribs a cat has.”

“It does look perfectly starved,” the woman
said. “ Wait; I'll give it something to eat, and
then you can take it away.”

She poured out a generous saucerful of milk
and set it before me, and also gave me some scraps
of meat. I felt too sick to touch the meat, but
I drank all the milk and felt strengthened and
refreshed.

“There now, take it away,” said the woman;
“and for goodness’ sake, carry it far enough off
for it not to come back here.

The man took me up again and carried me
away through the night. At last he dropped me

151

in a half-empty ash barrel. There I settled down
on the soft ashes and slept until morning.

Those were wretched days that followed. I
learned how hard life can be for a homeless cat.
I learned what it was to be chased and stoned
by cruel boys; to have dogs run after one, and to
barely escape their teeth by slipping under an
alley gate ; to be scorned and starved and driven
from one place to another. Still, I managed to live.
I would find a bit to eat here and there, in the
street or in back yards.

Sometimes, as I hobbled along with my lame
foot, I would see through open windows and doors
other and happier cats than I,—sleek, well-fed Tab-
bies or Tommies. Sometimes children would be
playing with them. I longed to have a home too,
but who would give house room to a cat like me,—
ugly, lean, dirty, and lame?

After a while I came to be known in the alley
where IJ lived. The people there called me Lim-
pety. Sometimes they threw me a scrap of bread
or a bone, but no one would take me in.

At last came winter, hardest of all. Everything
was frozen. I do not like to think of that time

even now.

132

One day, when I had not had a morsel to eat, a
dog chased me out from behind an ash barrel where
I was hiding. Some boys were coming along the
street. When they saw me running, they gave a
cruel shout and started after me.

I knew then that it was a race for life that I was
running. On and on I went, the boys after me.

I left the alley and, in my haste, turned corner

The Flight of Limpety

after corner, until I reached a part of the city
where I had never been before. Here the houses
were quite fine and large.

It was morning, and there were few people in
the street. In front of one of the houses a nurse
was pushing a child up and down in a wheeled chair.

It was in the corner of the steps leading up to

this house that I took shelter and turned at last

153

to face my enemies. Worn out by hunger, I could
go no further. I felt that the end was near.

“Oh, nurse! nurse!” screamed the little boy in
the chair. “Oh, they’re going to kill that cat !
Oh, don’t let them hurt it. It’s Zame/”

It was the first word of mercy I had heard for
months, The nurse left the chair and went over
to the crowd of boys.

The child in the chair was wringing his hands
and almost crying.

I do not know just what happened after that. I
was dulled and hardly conscious. I think the nurse
gave the boys some money. Then there was
some talk that was ended by the nurse picking me up
as though she were afraid to touch me. A man
servant came out from the house and carried the
little boy in, while the woman followed with me.
How warm and beautiful and soft it was in the
room where they carried us!

A lady rose to meet us as we came in. “Oh
what a hideous cat !" she exclaimed. ‘“ Don’t bring
that in here, nurse.”

“Oh yes, mamma; it must come in,” cried the
child. ‘Don’t you see? It’s lame like me.”

The lady paused for a moment looking at the

154

child with eyes that were very sad. Then she said
very gently, “ But, Arthur dear, it is such a dirty
cat. Wewwill keep it if you wish, but let it be taken
down to the kitchen.”

But no, the little boy would not have that either.
He wanted me there in the room with him. He
seemed to like me.

I suppose it was for the reason the child
had spoken of—that we were both lame—that he
loved me so, for he was lame, too, as I could see
now.

And so I had a home at last and not only a
home, but a master so kind and loving that I don’t
believe any cat ever had such a one before.

What games we used to have together! Asa
kitten I had never played much, .except just at first
in the barn with my brothers and sisters. After
that I was too lonely, and wretched, and hungry.
I don’t think my little master had ever played
much, either.

But now he and I would play together by the
hour with a bit of paper and a string. How he
would laugh, throwing his little head back on the
cushion! Sometimes he laughed so hard that his
mother would say, ‘ Not too much, Arthur; not

155

too much. Stop your play for a while now, and I|
will read to you.”

Then the paper and string would be put away.
He would call me to him, and I would snuggle
against him, soft and warm, and purr and purr.

He loved my purring. He would have me
sleep on his bed
at night and
sometimes he
would waken in
the night and
reaching down
would pull me
soitly by the

ears. “Come,

wake up, dear

Limpety and his Master

Liiipete. she
would say. “I can’t sleep. Purr, to me, purr.”

Then I would stretch myself, and purr and purr
until the lids fell over the blue eyes and the soft
breathing told me that he was asleep.

Sometimes he was sad. Then he would put his
hand on my fur and smooth me softly. “ Poor
old Limpety. We're both lame, aren’t we?” he

would say. ‘‘ Poor little cat.”

156

But generally he was very happy.

I am growing old—very old—now ; little Arthur
is still littlke Arthur and always will be. But we
neither of us care so much for play as we used to.
He loves me just as dearly as ever, though.

Often we will sit for hours at the open window,
I purring gently, he with his book open before
him, and his eyes fixed on the blue sky and the
clouds above the houses opposite.

I wonder what he is thinking about.

I think a good deal myself. I think of the old
days in the barn. I think of my mother and my
gentle little sister, of the hard days after I left
them, and that our new cook doesn’t thicken the
chicken gravy as well as the other one did, and

then I flick my ear.
Oftenest I thank my lucky stars that I was a

poor,lame, stray cat, since my very lameness brought

me such a home and such a master as I have now.

THE OPOSSUM FAMILY

Motuer Opossum had chosen a curious place

for her home. It was an old, unused barrel in
the corner of a shipyard. There she lived very
quietly for nobody knows how long, in spite of the
noise and clangor all about.

She came out only at night, and then the ship
yard was deserted. Everything lay as silent anc
lonely as in the deep forest. More silent, indeed,
for in the woods there would have been the rustling
of the leaves. Here there was nothing but the
footsteps of the night watchmen sounding now and
then through the stillness,

At first Mother ’Possum was very timid and
watchful, but after awhile, as nothing happened to
frighten her, she grew bolder. She would come
out and wander off on quite long journeys in search
of food. She was always careful, however, to be
at home before the daylight came, or the workmen

were back at their toil.

158

But one night I think that Mother’Possum must
have gone farther than ever before; or perhaps
she was late in starting out. In any case, it was
broad daylight when she reached the shipyard and
hastened along among the timbers, still quite a
distance from the barrel.

Patrick, one of the laborers, was driving a mule
across the yard. The mule was walking along,
half asleep, his head low, his ears wagging. After
him, on the narrow track, rumbled a truck filled
with iron castings. Suddenly the mule started
and stopped, his ears pricking up. Directly in
front of him, crossing the very track, was the
strangest looking creature he had ever seen. It
was as large as a cat, but it wasn’t a cat. Its tail
was like a rat’s, but it wasn’t arat. It was alto-
gether strange and unexpected.

In a moment Jim, the quietest of mules, had
whirled round in the harness and was madly trying
to climb on the truck and out of danger. At least
that was what Patrick said.

By the time he had Jim quieted down and in
place again, the opossum had disappeared.

“T’ll find her, though, if she’s anywhere about
the place,” said Patrick. And so he did, that very

159

evening, after a search of nearly an hour. He
found her at home in the barrel in the neglected
corner, and there with her were nine little opos-
sums—her babies.

Tiny little things those babies were. So small
that they could all get into the soft, warm pouch
that “Mother ’Possum has just under her stomach,

Little Opossums and their Mother

In this way she could carry them about with her
where she chose, and feel sure that they were safe.
Patrick stared and wondered, while Mother
‘Possum opened her mouth and threatened him if
he should dare to touch her or her babies.
Then Patrick put a board over the barrel so that
the opossum could not escape, and weighted it

160 ,

down with rocks, ‘ T’ll jest keep you in there and
maybe I can sell you,” said Patrick.

Sure enough the next day he found a darky
who would be glad to buy the opossum from him,
The darky was so pleased at the thought of the
feast which the possum would make, served up at
dinner with roasted sweet potatoes and onions, that
he grinned like an ogre.

While Patrick and he were still bargaining, one
of the young clerks in the office happened to over-
hear them. ‘An opossum and young ones!” he
cried, “Why, I'll buy them, Pat. I’ve always
wanted to see if opossums are really untamable.
The natural histories say they are.”

So Mother ’Possum was saved from the pot or
oven, for that time, at least. Instead, she and her
babies were taken to the young clerk’s room and
made at home in a fine, big cage.

But it seemed for a while as though Mother ’Pos-
sum meant to starve herself to death. She would
not eat anything. Milk, raw eggs, raw meat, and
chicken were offered to her, but she would not
touch them.

One morning her master had nothing for her
but condensed milk that he had for his coffee.

161

More as a joke than anything else, he offered her
some of this and found that she ate it greedily.

The next thing she condescended to eat was a
piece of rhubarb pie; then some hard-boiled eggs.
These things seemed to complete the list of what
she would eat, until her owner shot a sparrow and
put it in her cage, and she finished it,—feathers,
bones, beak and all.

After this she was fed almost entirely on spar-
rows, and soon she began to get fat again, for she
had grown very thin after she was first shut in her
cage.

But, though Mother ’Possum grew fat and
hearty, her owner could never tame her. Even the
little ones were always as wild as when they had
first been lifted from the barrel, and whenever
any one came near, they would open their mouths
threateningly.

They were too little and young, really, to be
able to bite, and the young man often took them
out and handled them, though they never grew
used to this. He would amuse himself by stretch-
ing a piece of rope across the room and hanging
all nine of the little possums along it in a row by
their tails. He would twist their little tails about

Pyle’s Humble Friends.—11,

162

the rope and leave them there, head downwards,
and there they would swing.

When they were first hung up they would try to
climb up their own tails and get hold of the rope.
Sometimes they succeeded in doing this, and some-
times they didn’t. If they didn’t, they would soon
give up struggling, and instead would begin clasp-
ing and unclasping their little forefeet despairingly.
All their feet were shaped curiously like hands.

They were stupid little things, not at all like
raccoons, which are as intelligent and mischievous
as monkeys, and their owner soon found they were
not of much value as pets. However, after having
fed them and kept them in his room for some
weeks he could not bear the thought of turning
them loose where they would be iike!y to be killed
and eaten. Besides, it did not seem right to set
them free near any houses, for opessums are fond
of eating chickens and eggs, and he feared the
neighboring poultry might suffer.

So one day the young clerk hired a horse and
wagon, fastened Mother ’Possum and her family in
a good stout bag, and drove away with them.

He drove for miles and miles, far down a
swampy neck of land where no one lived. There

163

in the depth of a wood, he stopped the horse,
lifted out the bag, untied the fastening, and
gently shook Mother ’Possum and her brood out
upon the ground.

For a little while they stood as though dazed by
their long ride, or perhaps not believing freedom
was really offered to them; but, at last, first one
and then another crept away through the under-
brush, going faster and faster as they felt them-
selves getting out of reach,

When the last one had disappeared, the young
man got into the wagon, and drove slowly back
the way he had come,—back to his room, where
the empty cage awaited him, and the rope that
would never again be clasped by the little ’possums’
tails as they swung there in a row.

POLLY

PauLINa was a parrot. Paulina was her name,
but she was always called Polly.

Paulina’s mistress had had a great many parrots,
but they had all died. Then Polly was sent to her.

Polly was a beautiful bird. She was of a soft,
gray color, all except her tail; that was red—a

164

red so brilliant that it seemed to burn in the sun
like a bunch of geraniums.

“ The bird is beautiful,” said the lady, ‘‘ but what
a pity to sendit to me. My parrots all die.”

“Tf you want it to live,” said a friend, “don’t
give it any water.”

“Not give it any water!” said the lady. “1
never heard of such a thing.”

“All your parrots die. That’s because you give
them water. If you want this one to live, don’t
give it any.”

Polly’s mistress followed this advice. The par-
rot did not seem to suffer for want of water.
From year’s end to year’s end it did not have any,
and it lived and throve.

The mistress bathed the parrot herself. She
put it in the bathtub, and rubbed it with soap and
water. This always made the parrot furious. It
would shriek with rage. She had to be very care-
ful then to hold it so it could not bite her.

Except when it was being bathed, the parrot was
very fond of its mistress,

It would call to her at the top of its voice when
she was out of the room. When she came in, the par-
rot would talk to her with soft little throat notes, put-

165

ting its head down against the bars of the cage and
ruffling up its feathers. It wanted her to scratch
its head.

Polly was very jealous of a canary whose cage
hung in the same room.

If the mistress spoke to the canary, the parrot
would shake the bars of the cage, biting them with
its hard beak and screaming.

This screaming was very harsh and unpleasant.
To break Polly of this habit, the mistress would
cover the cage with a black cloth whenever it began.

Then from under cover, the parrot could be
heard talking to itself. ‘Poor Polly. Want to
go to bed, Polly? Want to go to bed? Poor
Polly, want to go bed?” Then, with sudden
energy, “Vo, xo, No! Poor Polly !”

Bobby, the canary, was a fine singer. As long
as no one was in the room, Polly would sit listen-
ing to the song very quietly. The mistress could
see the parrot through the crack of the door, sit-
ting silently on its perch. It would turn its head
first on one side and then on the other, and click
its beak approvingly. The moment any one came
in, however, Polly would try to drown out the

canary’s song by talking or screaming.

166

One day a very sad thing happened. A cat got
into the room where the
cages of the two birds
hung. Whenthe mistress
came in to feed them,noth-
ing was left of poor Bobby
but two or three yellow

feathers scattered about.

The wires of the cage

Polly

were bent apart where the
cat had reached through. It had eaten Bobby.
The parrot was sitting very quietly and thought-
fully on its perch. As its mistress came in, Polly
said in a hoarse voice, “ Poor Bobby! Poor Bobby!
Bobby want his head scratched ?”
After Bobby was gone,
Polly did not scream so
much.
There was a little dog
named Gyp that lived in
the house.

Polly learned to imitate

the whistle that called

Gyp

Gyp to go fora walk. A
dozen times a day Polly would whistle for him, and

167

a dozen times a day Gyp would start up and come
rushing in all ready for a walk.

The moment he came in Polly would be per-
fectly silent. Gyp would look all around the room
and then run out into the hall.

As soon as he had gone, Polly would whistle
again. Back would come the little dog, trembling
with eagerness.

Then Polly would whistle again, going into peals
of harsh laughter. Gyp, finding he had been
fooled, would leap up at the cage, barking and
snapping his teeth with helpless rage, but he never
seemed to learn any better. The next time the
parrot called, he would come running in just as
before.

The parrot was very accomplished. At one time
it had belonged to a concert singer. It could sing
“Coming through the Rye,” “ Alice Ben Bolt,”
and three other songs. Beside these it sang a
negro hymn that began:

“ Nobody knows de trouble I see, Lord ;
Nobody knows de trouble I see.”

They said that at one time an old negro woman
had had charge of Polly. The parrot used to sit on

168

the back of her chair while she rocked and sang
this hymn over and over.

The parrot would only sing this in one way. It
had to be shut up in ashawl or towel, or something
of the kind, and swung about. For a while it
would be perfectly quiet. Then, as it swung, it
would begin to sing this hymn. It would sing it
as long as the swinging continued.

Polly sang and talked so well that a friend of
her mistress asked if she might not send her parrot
over to visit Polly for a while. She hoped that
this other parrot, whose name was Punch, might
learn something from Polly.

For a while after Punch came, Polly was perfectly
silent. She was observing him.

Punch knew two sentences. He could say,
“ Punch wants a cracker,” and ‘ Scratch Punch’s
head.” He also knew part of a song called
“Pretty Polly Hopkins.”

He sang this song in a very curious way. He
would sing a few notes and then skip to quite
another part of the song like this:

“Pretty, pretty Polly Hop—
do, how d’ye—

169

—the better Tom—Tompkins
—seeing of you,”

Poily listened to this attentively.

At last one day when Punch was singing it, she
burst into a peal of laughter. Punch stopped as if
abashed. Then
Polly spoke for
the first time since
Punch had come.
“Sing, Punch, ;
sing,” she — said.
*Poot Punch,
sing.”

After a while
Punch began to
sing again. Then
Polly burst into
peal after peal of

harsh laughter. mets — Punch, Sing”

It was very amusing to watch the two parrots.
Again and again Polly would ask Punch to sing.
Then, as soon as he did so, she would begin to
laugh, and Punch would stop singing and look
sulky.

One lovely spring afternoon, the parrots’ cages

170

were put out in the trees, that they might enjoy
the soft air and the sunlight. Polly's mistress
went for a drive and the parrots were forgotten.

In the chill of the late afternoon, as the mistress
came home, she heard a doleful voice from above,
“Poor Polly. Want to go to bed, Polly? Want
to go to bed?”

The parrots were taken in, and they must have
been glad to get back into the warmth of the
house.

After Punch was sent back to his home Polly
drooped fora while. She seemed to miss him. She
would call, “ Punch! Punch! Punch!” at the top
of her voice and then turn her head to one side
and listen.

One day as her mistress was coming home from
a walk, she saw a group of boys and men about a
tree. One boy was climbing it.

‘What's the matter ?” she asked.

“It’s a parrot, ma’am,” said one of the men. “I
don’t know where it came from.”

At that moment a familiar, hoarse voice in the
tree called, ‘“‘ Punch! Punch! Poor Polly!”

“Why that’s my parrot,” cried the lady.

She went nearer and looked up into the tree,

171

She saw a glint of scarlet among the leaves.
‘Polly, Polly!” she called. ‘Come, Polly.”

The parrot only flapped its wings as if to fly.

“Pll give a dollar to any one who'll get that par-
rot for me,” said the lady.

One of the boys crawled slowly out on the limb
where the parrot sat. He put out his hand.
“Poor Polly!” said the parrot, and away it flew.
The boys tried to follow it, but they lost sight of
it after a while.

The mistress never knew how Polly had escaped,
—whether some one had left the cage door un-
fastened, or whether the parrot had learned to
unhook it for itself. But she never saw her pet
again, though she advertised and offered a reward.
She never had another parrot. She said she was
too unlucky with them.

THE PET LAMB

A psiizzarp had been raging all -night long.
The air was white with flakes of snow; the wind
howled across the fields; in some places it heaped

172

the snow higher than a man’s head; in other places
it swept the ground almost bare.

One of the places where the ground was almost
clear was over at the sheepcote, a sort of loosely-
built shed, where the sheep could take shelter in
cold or stormy weather.

There they were huddled now. Their thick
wool kept them warm; but with them were a num-
ber of little, new born lambs, so small and tender
that they would die in the cold unless some help .came
to them soon. One of them seemed dead already.

‘““Baa-a-a!” cried the mother sheep, but the
lamb did not stir, nor try to rise from the ground
where it lay.

Help was near, however. Very soon after day-
light, two men came to the sheepcote. One was
Mr. Brown, who owned the farm where the sheep-
cote was; the other was a farm servant.

“Only just in time, William,” said Mr. Brown.
“Some of these would have been dead in a little
while.”

They put the lambs in two great sacks which
they had with them, and carried them away. The
mother sheep bleated after them.

The helpless lambs were carried across the

173

fields, through a garden, now bleak and snowy,
and into the large, warm kitchen of the farmhouse.

There Nelly, Mr. Brown’s daughter, was ready
for them. She had some milk warming on the
stove. The lambs were taken from the sack.
They were too chilled and weak to stand. Nelly
mixed some whiskey with the warm milk, and then
she and her father
poured it down the
lambs’ throats by spoon-
fuls Those that
seemed weakest were
attended to first.

Soon all the lambs
began to revive; even
the very little one that
had seemed dead,
though they had to

work a long time over it.

The Pet Lamb

The weather was so bitterly cold that Mr.
Brown was afraid the lambs would die if they were
taken out again, even as far as the barn, so for
several days they were kept in the kitchen, A
bed of hay was made for them in one corner, and
fenced about with chairs, so that they could not

174

get out. Several times a day they were fed with
a gruel made of corn meal, water and milk.

At the end of four or five days the weather was
so much milder that the lambs were taken back
to their mothers. Only one was still kept at the
farmhouse,—the little one that had almost died.
It was so puny and weak that Nelly said she was
going to keep it, and try to bring it up by hand.

She was so successful that Tiny, as she named
the lamb, lived and throve. Soon he was the pet
of the whole family. He trotted upstairs and
downstairs, wherever he chose to go, and even into
the cellar.

In the cellar the old mother cat hada family
of kittens. There was nothing the lamb liked
better than to get into the box with those kittens.
There he would snuggle up to the mother cat, and
lie quietly for an hour at a time.

After a while when Tiny was turned out of
doors, he made friends with the two dogs, Jock and
Dandy.

Jock was Tiny’s particular playmate. They had
regular games together. The lamb would leap
from the ground, and then butt at Jock. Jock
would pretend to be very much frightened, and

175

run around the house with Tiny in pursuit. Then
suddenly, he would turn with a bark and chase
the lamb, which would run in its turn.

Sometimes pigs got into the yard, and the dogs
were sent to drive them out. Tiny ran with them,
just as though he were a dog, too. He could not
bark, but he put down his head and butted at the
pigs, scaring them almost as much as the dogs did.

When Tiny grew to be a big sheep he was sent
down to the pasture with the rest of the flock;
but he had lived at the house with people and
dogs for so long that he would have nothing to
do with sheep; he did not even know his mother,
nor did she know him. He kept quite away from
the others, over in a corner by himself, and baa-ed
plaintively.

When Nelly came down to the sheep pasture to
see how he was getting on, he rushed to her. He
nuzzled his nose in her hand, and was so delighted
to see her that she took down the bars and let him
come out.

He followed her home very quietly, keeping so
close to her that her skirts brushed against him all
the way.

Before Tiny had been sent to the sheep pas-

176

ture he had been a greedy and impatient sheep,
but after he came home again he was very quiet
and well behaved. He no longer acted like a
spoiled child. He did not beg and fret at the
kitchen door for milk, but grazed about the lawn
very quietly and humbly. It seemed as though he
meant to show
how good and
grateful he would
be if only he were
allowed to stay
where people
were, instead of
being sent down
,. among all those
: strange and un-

known sheep.

The Pet Lamb

Tiny was gentle
and familiar with all the family, but the only one
he seemed really to love was Nelly.

He used to wait at the door for her in the
morning, and then follow her about like a dog.
He enjoyed going for a walk with her more than
anything else, particularly if the dogs went too.

He would not go for a walk with any other mem-

177

bers of the family. He would follow them to the
gate, but not a step further. There he would
stand, looking wistfully after them as they went
down the road, the dogs barking and leaping
about. Then he would go back to the house, push
open a door, and go upstairs and downstairs until
he found Nelly. Once sure that she was in the
house, he was content to graze about the lawn by
himself.

But as Tiny grew older he began to show a very
bad temper. First, he grew cross toward stran-
gers; then he chased the dogs if they came near
him. At last, even the children grew afraid of
him; that was after one of them had tried to pat
his head, and he had butted her over. With Nelly
only was he still gentle and affectionate,

“He's getting to be a perfect nuisance,” said
Mr. Brown. ‘“ We'll have to keep him down at
the pasture with the others.”

““Oh, but he’s so unhappy there,” pleaded Nelly.
“Please don’t send him away. He wouldn’t be
cross if the children would keep away from him.”

So Tiny was allowed to stay near the house a
little longer.

Then Nelly went away for a visit. When she

Pyle’s Humble Friends.—12.

178

came home she was so busy at first, telling of all
she had seen and hearing the home news, that she
did not think of Tiny. When she remembered him,
she went to the door and looked about.

‘“Where’s Tiny ?” she asked.

Then her father told her that after she had left,
the old sheep had grown so very cross that they
could not stand him any longer. He had been
sent away with some other sheep, and she would
not see him again.

“Poor, poor, old Tiny!” said Nelly, but in her

heart she was not very sorry.

WHAT BECAME OF THE KITTENS

BLACKIE was a very uncommon cat. She was
so intelligent that sometimes it seemed as though
she must understand what was said to her.

She could climb like a squirrel. One day Alice
saw her in the very top of the Lombardy poplar,
the highest tree on the place. There she was,
swinging about in the wind like a black spot
among the leaves.

Blackie was a fine mouser. She was also an

179

enemy to all strange dogs. She would not allow
one in the yard if she were there. She would fly
at him and drive him out, whatever his size. If
she happened to be looking out of the window and
saw a strange dog outside, she would arch her back
and spit, and it almost seemed as though she would
jump through the glass to get at him.

She once jumped through a window pane to get
at a bird that had lighted on the sill outside, but she
was so cut by the glass that it taught her a lesson.

Blackie never liked to be stroked or petted as
most cats do. Sometimes when she was very
sleepy she would allow herself to be smoothed for
a few moments, and then suddenly she would give
a growl, her yellow eyes would open wide and she
would leap to her feet and spring away out of reach.

When she had kittens she was gentler. She was
always a very good mother and very proud of her
young ones.

One time she had four kittens, all just alike and
all black like herself, with scarcely a white hair on
them. She had made a nest in the garret back of
an old trunk, and there she hid them. They were
several days old before any one found them, so
cleverly had Blackie tucked them away.

180

‘We can’t keep them all,” said Mrs. Robbins.
“ The cook will take one and Maria another, but
two of them will have to be drowned.”

Charley was the one who was to do the drown-
ing. His father promised to give him fifty cents
when it was done. The boy waited until Blackie
had left the kittens alone one day, and then he
went up to the garret and carried two of them away.
He took them back of the woodshed.

“Charley, did you get rid of those kittens to-
day ?” his father asked that evening.

“Yes, sir. I drowned them this morning.”

From that very day Blackie seemed to hate
Charley. She would not let him come near her.
Once he was going to the garret for something, but
she met him on the steps. Her tailed swelled.
She glared and spit and growled, so that he was
actually afraid she would fly at him.

Charley could not understand it. He had not
done anything to her, and she had always seemed
to like him before. The only thing he could
think of was that she might have seen him drown-
ing her kittens, and hated him on that account;
but that was hard to believe.

The two kittens that were left grew and throve,

181

and after a while they were large enough to come
downstairs. Blackie was very proud of the notice
they received from the family, and would sit wav-
ing her tail softly, and blinking with content, while
Alice played
with them or
petted them.
One day when
Blackie and her
kittens were in
the library,
Charley went
past the garret
steps. Some
sound made him
look up. There,
to his amaze-
ment, were two
strange black
kittens playing
at the head of

Charley and the Kittens

the stairs.
When they saw him they stopped piaying, and
silently vanished, like shadows, through the attic

door.

182

Charley went upstairs and looked about. No
living thing was to be seen. He moved the trunks
about, and presently from behind one of them the
two kittens darted out and ran to another hiding
place. They were just about as big as the kittens
downstairs, and looked just like them, only they
were very wild.

Charley ran downstairs and told his mother, and
she and Alice came up and looked. When the
boy scared the kittens out from where they were
hiding, Mrs. Robbins could hardly believe her eyes.

They never did find out the secret of how those
two kittens got there. The only explanation they
could think of was that the kittens Charley had
tried to drown had been saved in some way, and
that Blackie must have found them and carried
them up to her nest again.

When Alice took some milk up to them, Blackie
followed her and they seemed to know the old cat.

After that Alice fed the kittens every day.
They grew tamer before long, and after awhile
good homes were found for all of them, but Charley
said he would never again try to kill any of Blackie’s
kittens.

GRAYWINGS

“Quank! Quank!” cried a wild goose. It
was a cry of alarm.

A whole flock of wild geese were feeding in
among the marshes. Five of the flock were acting
as sentries. It was their duty to watch for danger
while the rest of the flock fed. It was one of these
sentries that had given the cry of warning.

At the sound, the flock rose from among
the reeds with a great flapping and beating of
wings, but the cry had come too late. As they
rose in their flight there were loud reports from
two guns. Bang—bang! and bang—bang!

Three geese fell from the flock. They had been
shot.

Two were dead. They fell as heavy as stones,
turning over and over as they came down. The
other fell flapping and struggling. It was only
wounded. It was still alive when the hunters
found it, later on, among the reeds. One wing
trailed at its side, useless and blood-stained. The
bone had been broken,

The hunters did not kill it. One of them said

184

he would take it home alive and give it to his boy
and girl as a pet.

The boy and girl were very much interested in
the wild goose, when the man took it to them,
though the little girl almost cried to see its broken
wing. However, her father told her that he would
set the bone and
bandage the
wing and that it
would be well
before long. He
told her that if
the bones of
wild fowls are
broken they

heal of them-

selves if the
Cray wings-wonnaéd , fowls are in free-
dom, but if they are caged, the bones have to be
set.
The children named their goose Graywings, and
a fine large cage was built for it.
The goose seemed sad and lonely. It pined in
its cage and would hardly ever cat. Perhaps it

was pining for its mate.

185

One day the father of the children came home
very much pleased. He said he had bought a
present for them. He had not brought it with
him, and he would not tell them what it was.

That afternoon the present came home in a
wooden box with slats across the front. It was a

wild goose which he had bought from a man who

&VW VV \ yw wf
( {
AA ‘

Graywings and the Stranger.
had trapped it. The children’s father said he had
bought it as a mate for Graywings.

The little boy and girl were delighted. They
thought how happy Graywings would be to have a
companion. They could hardly wait to take it
out and put it in the cage with her.

But whatadisappointment! Graywings did not
seem to like the stranger at all. If it came near
her, she threatened it with her open beak. She

186

would not let it eat with her, and she drove it into
a corner, where it stood terrified and unhappy,
almost afraid to move.

They left the new goose there for several days,
but Graywings would not make friends with it.
Then it seemed so very unhappy that they took it
out and sent it back to where it had come from.

The autumn passed and winter came. The
flocks of wild geese had long ago flown southward
in long V’s, quacking as they went. Everything
was frozen as hard as stone. Even the crows
could hardly find enough to keep themselves alive.

It was at this time that the uncle of the children
caught a wild goose. It was hiding in a littlé hol-
low near the stretch of reeds where Graywings had
been shot. The goose was very thin and weak, for
it was almost starved.

The uncle brought it to the house where the
children lived. He and their father wondered
very much how the goose came to be left behind
when all its companions flew south. It was not in-
jured in any way, and it must have been a fine,
strong goose before it became nearly starved.

They warmed the goose and gave it food and
water. When the goose seemed somewhat re-

187

vived, the uncle said: ‘Suppose we keep it out
in the cage with that other wild goose you have.”

“Oh, no,” said the little girl, “ Graywings will
peck it, and this poor goose is so weak and starved.”

“Well, let’s try it, and see what she'll do,” said
the uncle. So the goose was taken out and put in
the cage with Graywings.

What was the surprise of the boy and girl to see
Graywings come up to the poor, weak stranger,
and greet it with the greatest joy. Thenew goose
seemed glad to see Graywings, too.

Then the children’s father guessed how it must
be. The starving goose must have been Gray-
wings’ mate. After she was shot her mate must
have left the flock, letting it fly on southward
without him, while he lingered near the place
where she had fallen.

If the uncle had not found the goose, it would
soon have starved to death.

All winter the two geese lived very happily to-
gether in the cage. Then when spring came, and
they grew restless and beat their wings as though
they longed to fly, the father said it was a shame
to keep them imprisoned there any longer.

So one beautiful day, when the wind blew from

188

the south, and the maple trees were green with
winged seeds, the children rather sadly opened the
door of the cage and set the wild geese free.

And that was the best ending to the story, the
father said.

THE PLYING- SOCUIRREL

One of the branches of Mr. Whiting’s great
poplar tree had died, and Mr. Whiting told Tim,
the hired man, to saw it off.

Billy Whiting and his cousin Joe followed Tim
out on the lawn and watched him climb the tree,
settle himself among the branches, and begin to
saw.

Billy and Joe were about the same age, but Billy
was the taller by almost half a head. He was
rather a fat boy, and something of a bully. Ever
since his cousin Joe had come to visit him, he had
been teasing and daring him. “ Ho,” he would
say, “you can’t do what 7 do”; or, “You'd be
afraid, but /’7 not”; or, “you daren’t do it, but 7
can,”

Now as they stood watching Tim up in the tree,
sawing away, Billy began boasting again: ‘You

189

ought to see me climb. You couldn’t climb up
there and saw that limb, could you ?”

“T don’t know,” said Joe doubtfully.

“’Course you couldn't; I could though. Yes,
sir, I’d just climb up there as easy as anything and
saw that limb off. I wouldn't be afraid.”

Suddenly from the shaking branch a flying
squirrel came sailing down directly at Billy. It
must have been too badly frightened to know where
it was going.

When Billy saw the thing skimming down at him,
he was so terrified that he spread his arms out and
fell flat on his back on the ground, howling.

The flying squirrel scarcely touched him and was
gone ina moment, but the boy still lay there, cry-
ing so loudly that his mother came out on the
piazza.

“What's the matter, Billy ?” she asked.

Tim up in the tree had seen it all, and he laughed
so hard that he had to stop sawing.

When Joe told his aunt what had happened, she
looked provoked, and called to her son to get up
and be quiet. Billy stopped crying and got up,
looking rather silly, and for the rest of the day he

was less boastful.

190

By the time Tim had sawed the branch through,
it was beginning to rain and the boys had to go into
the house. All that afternoon the rain fell, but when,
toward evening the weather cleared, Billy and Joe
took off their shoes and stockings and ran out of
doors. How wet and cool the grass was!

Joe was stand-
ing under the
poplar tree when
he felt something
soft crawling over
his bare foot. He
looked down and
there was a little
baby flying squir-
rel, There must

have been a nest

Joe and the Flying Squirrel up in the tree, and

this little squirrel had probably fallen out of it.

The boy stooped and picked it up. It was too
small and chilled to try to getaway. He covered
it up in his hands with a cry of delight and ran
toward the house.

“What have you got? What have you got?”
cried Billy running after him.

Ig!

“Tt’s a flying squirrel; a young flying squirrel,”
Joe answered, almost crying with excitement.

He ran to his aunt, followed by Billy. ‘Aunt
Lucy, look! look! It’s a young squirrel ; oh, may
Ikeep it? I found it on the lawn.”

Aunt Lucy peeped into the hollow of his hands.
“Why, so it is,” she said: ‘“a little squirrel.”

She was almost as much interested as the boys.
She said that of course Joe might keep it, and she
would get a box for him to put it in.

Billy complained, and said that he ought to have
the squirrel—it was on his father’s lawn and came
out of his father’s tree; but his mother said she
was surprised at him—that of course it belonged
to Joe, since he had found it.

She got a box for Joe and gave him something
soft to put in it,so that the little squirrel might
have a comfortable nest. She also gave him some
wire netting to put over the top of the box, that
the little animal might not get away.

Joe fed it and then put it in the box, and he and
Billy watched it and played with it until supper time.

While they went to supper, the box was left on
a bench on the porch. They could see it through
the open door as they sat at the table.

192

Suddenly Mrs. Whiting said softly, ‘Look,
boys, there’s the mother squirrel.”

There she was, sure enough, on top of the
wire netting. She had come in search of her little
one.

“TLet’s try to catch her,” said Billy. He stole
very softly toward the porch, The mother squirrel
waited until he reached the door, and then she was
gone like a flash, and she did not come back.

When Joe went home a few days later he took
his squirrel with him, It had become perfectly
tame. His mother thought it was one of the pret-
tiest little pets she had ever seen.

As it grew older, Joe carried it about with him
in his pocket or in the breast of his blouse. It
liked the blouse best. It would curl up and sleep
there, warm and snug. Then when it awoke it
would run up and peep out over his collar, with its
tiny pretty head and beady eyes. How soft and
furry it felt against Joe’s neck !

One time he took it to school with him and when
it climbed down his sleeve, it tickled so that, before
he knew, he laughed out loud.

‘Joseph, was that you ?” asked the teacher.

“Yes, ma’am,” answered Joe, very much fright-

193

ened, and, hastily slipping the squirrel into his
pocket, he put his hand over it so that it could not
get out.

“Come here, Joseph,” said the teacher. Then,
as he mounted the platform, she asked, ‘What
have you in your pocket ?”

Joe was afraid to tell her. He only looked at
her in silence.

The teacher put her hand in his pocket. When
she felt something warm and furry and alive, she
gave a little cry. Then the squirrel peeped out.

“Joseph, you horrid boy, what Zave you in your
pocket ?” the teacher cried, rising from her chair.

‘“Tt’s my flying squirrel.”

All the scholars began to laugh, and the teacher
could not help smiling a little herself, but Joe
looked ready to cry.

“You shouldn’t have brought it,” she said.
“School is no place for pets. You'll have to shut
it up in ‘your desk now until you go home, and
never bring it here again.”

Joe was glad to get off soeasily. He shut Dicky
(that was the squirrel’s name) inside his desk and
began to study, but the little animal was not con-

tent to be left there in the hard, cold desk alone ;
Pyle’s Humble Friends.—13.

194

it rattled about among the things, and began to
gnaw the wood. At last the teacher had to tell
Joe to take the squirrel home and then come back
for his lessons,

Flying squirrels cannot really fly. Between
their front and hind legs, on either side, there is a
skin or membrane that spreads out in such a way
as to make them very broad and light. When
they spread their feet and leap, they seem to soar,
and can go for a long distance, but it is really
only a leap and must always be from a higher to a
lower place.

Dicky had a pretty little cage for a home, but
he very seldom cared to stay in it. He liked bet-
ter to roam about the house. He would run up
the curtains, or get on top of the pictures and
bookcases. From these places he would come fly-
ing down, often startling people by lighting on their
heads or shoulders.

One time Joe’s grandfather came to pay them a
visit. Hewas an old man, and his head was very
bald.

Once when grandfather was sitting quietly
reading the evening paper, Dicky came soaring
down from the top of the library door. He had

105

meant to light on grandfather’s head, but when he
touched it, it was so smooth and shiny that Dicky
found nothing to cling to. Away he slid over the
old gentleman’s head and down his forehead,
knocking off his eyeglasses as he went.

“Well, well!” cried grandfather.

Joe was in the room, and he could not help
laughing until the,

tears stood in his
eyes.

His grandfather
tried to look angry,
but he could not
keep serious any
better than Joe, and
so they both laughed
and laughed to-

gether.

It seemed after
this as thou gh Grandpa and the Flying Squirrel
Dicky could not keep away from grandfather’s
head. Again and again he would come soaring
down to it from some high place, but he always
slipped off.

“Really I'll have to keepa handkerchief over

196

my head,” said the old gentleman. But Joe’s
mother said the squirrel must be shut in its cage.
It was getting to be too troublesome.

So Dicky was kept a prisoner until grandfather
went away. After that he was allowed to run
free again,

Joe used to bring nuts home to the squirrel and
hide them about the room. He liked to see Dicky
hunt them out. As soon as the squirrel found one,
he would race away with it to some high place.
Then he would sit up and eat it, holding it daintily
in his fore paws as though they were little hands.

One of Dicky’s great amusements was getting
into the empty water pitcher in the guest chamber
and racing round and round in it after his tail.
Round and round and round he would go. Then
he would stop to listen, and with a bound would
be at the top of the pitcher, holding himself up by
curling his little paws over the edge so that he
could look out. If everything was quiet, he would
drop back into the pitcher and begin chasing his
tail again.

This habit of playing in the pitcher was almost
the cause of Dicky’s death.

One day Joe’s mother had come to the guest

197

chamber for something, and she thought she heard
an odd little noise from the washstand. She went
over and looked in the pitcher. The maid had
partly filled it with water that morning and there,
still swimming desperately, but almost exhausted,
was the poor little squirrel. She was just in time
to save him. He must have come for his usual
play, and jumped into the pitcher without looking
to see whether it was empty or not.

Dicky’s life, though a happy one, was not very
long. Perhaps he had too many nuts. Perhaps it
is not healthy for squirrels to be petted so much
or to sleep in little boy’s pockets.

One day Dicky seemed very subdued ; he would
not eat, and he spent his time lying stretched out
flat on top of the library bookcase, out of reach,

The next morning he was still lying there. Joe
called him, but he did not stir, and when the boy
climbed up and touched him, he found the little
thing quite stiff and cold. Dicky’s short life was
ended,

ATTRACTIVE FAIRY TALES

NIXON -ROULET’S JAPANESE FOLK STORIES
AND FAIRY TALES . .. . . . = 4ocents

HIS is intended for supplementary reading in the
fourth and fifth years. It is a collection of thirty-

four popular stories from the mythology and folk-lore
of Japan, few of which have ever before been told in English.
They are here retold ina simple and pleasing manner, which
is well adapted to interest children in the strange and un-
familiar fairy tales of the Land of the Rising Sun. A note-
worthy feature of the book is that each story is illustrated
by a full-page picture drawn by a Japanese artist, lending a
peculiar charm to the volume, and distinguishing it as some-
thing new in school book literature.

DAVIS AND CHOW LEUNG’S CHINESE FABLES
AND FOLK STORIES. . . . . . 40 cents

has hitherto been an accepted belief that Chinese

literature does not possess the fable, and, con-
sequently, the examples given in this book, which are
familiar to the children of China, are of special interest.
In retelling these delightful stories of Chinese home and
school life, the authors have been most successful in presery-
ing their original color and charm. The tales show the differ-
ent phases of Oriental character and habits of thought, and
will help toward a better understanding and appreciation of
Chinese character. The illustrations are from drawings by
native artists.

N DAPTED for the third and fourth years of school. It

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY

(19)

BROOKS’S READERS

By STRATTON D. BROOKS, Superintendent
of Schools, Boston, Mass.

FIVE BOOK SERIES EIGHT BOOK SERIES
First Year... . . 0.25 Fie Year 2 « « 2 tas 25
Second Year . . . . 435 Second Year 2. « + Bs
Third Year. . . ey Xo) Third Year, . 2 2. 40

Fourth and Fifth Years + 450 Fourth Year . . . . ) .40
Sixth, Seventh, and Fifth Vear is. 2. a a age
Eighth Yeas . . . .60 Sixth Year. . . . . 40
Seventh Year. . . . .40

Eighth Year . . 1 1) 40

HESE readers form a good all-round basal series, suit-

able for use in any school; but they will appeal to

teachers particularly, because of their very easy gradation.
Both in thought and expression, the books are so carefully
graded that each selection is but slightly more difficult than
the preceding one, and there is no real gap anywhere.
4] Although a wide variety of reading matter is provided,
good literature, embodying child interests, has been considered
of fundamental importance. Lessons of a similar nature are
grouped together, and topics relating to kindred subjects recur
somewhat regularly. All are designed to quicken the child’s
observation, and increase his appreciation.
{| By the use of this series, the child will be taught to read in
such a manner as will appeal to his interests, and at the same time
he will be made acquainted with the masterpieces of many fa-
mous writers. He will gain a knowledge of many subjects, and
acquire pure and attractive ideals of life andconduct. His imagi-
nation will be cultivated by pleasing tales of fancy, and he will
also be taught a love of country, and given glimpses into the
life of other lands.
4] The books are very attractive in mechanical appearance,
and contain a large number of original illustrations, besides
reproductions of many celebrated paintings.

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY

Gr)

BIGCks’s GHOAM PION
SPHELLING BOOK

By WARREN E. HICKS, Assistant Superintendent of
Schools, Cleveland, Ohio

Complete, $0.25 Part One, $0.18 Part Two, $0.18

HIS book embodies the method that enabled the pupils

in the Cleveland schools after two years to win the Na-

tional Education Association Spelling Contest of 1908.
“| By this method a spelling lesson of ten words is given each
day from the spoken vocabulary of the pupil. Of these ten
words two are selected for intensive study, and in the spelling
book are made prominent in both position and type at the head
of each day’s lessons, these two words being followed by the
remaining eight words in smaller type. Systematic review is
provided throughout the book. Each of the ten prominent
words taught intensively in a week is listed as a subordinate
word in the next two weeks; included in a written spelling
contest at the end of eight weeks; again in the annual contest
at the end of the year; and again asa subordinate word in the
following year’s work;—used five times in all within two
years.
4] The Champion Spelling Book consists of a series of lessons
arranged as above for six school years, from the third to the
eighth, inclusive. It presents about 1,200 words each year,
and teaches 312 of them with especial clearness and intensity.
Tt also includes occasional supplementary exercises which serve
as aids in teaching sounds, vowels, homonyms, rules of spell-
ing, abbreviated forms, suffixes, prefixes, the use of hyphens,
plurals, dictation work, and word building. The words have
been selected from lists, supplied by grade teachers of Cleve-
land schools, of words ordinarily misspelled by the pupils of
their respective grades.

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY

(36) s

STEADMANS’ WRITING

Muscular Movement

.
8 Pads—one for each year—each containing 40 sheets, 80 pages, or 314
times as much as the ordinary copybook. Price, each, 15 cents.

TEADMANS’ Graded Lessons in Writing train the
child to maintain a truly healthful position, and to use
the large muscles of the upper arm and shoulder as the

motive power in writing. As the ability to write automatic-
ally is acquired, a correct sitting habit is inculcated; stoop-
ing over the desk, cramping the lung space, bringing the eyes
so close to the paper that they are permanently injured, be-
come impossible. The child is no longer subjected to the
harmful tendencies of former days.

G| This system teaches the child to write a good, characteristic
hand that will remain with him through life. The course is
presented in eight pads. Each pad is a complete cycle,
covering the work for an entire year, and containing forty
sheets, eighty pages, three and one-third times as much as
a copybook. Each page presents a central idea, around
which the lesson is constructed. ‘The drills constitute a ser-
ies of graded, specialized, physical culture exercises. These
exercises are so devised and arranged that the pupils are led,
by easy gradations, from the simplest forms and letters to the
more complex. Each drill is based upon the movement re-
quired to form the letter or letters under consideration during
that particular writing lesson,

4| The work is simplicity itself. It teaches an easy, graceful
style of free handwriting with full play for the writer’s indi-
viduality. It requires no extra exercise books, no teacher’s
manual, no blank pads, and no additional paper. Any teacher
can teach it with ease without further assistance, and any
child will find no difficulty in performing it successfully, and
in acquiring a handwriting that is legible, rapid, and automatic.

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY

Go

RODDY’S GEOGRAPHIES

By JUSTIN RODDY, M.S., Department of Geography,
First Pennsylvania State Normal School, Millersville, Pa.

Elementary Geography . $0.50 Complete Geography . . $1.00

HIS <*information’’ series meets a distinct demand for

new geographies which are thoroughly up to date, and

adapted for general use, rather than for a particular use
in a highly specialized and organized ideal system. While
not too technical and scientific, it includes sufficient physio-
graphic information for the needs of most teachers.
{| An adequate amount of material is included in each book
to meet the requirements of those grades for which it is designed.
This matter is presented so simply that the pupil can readily
understand it, and so logically that it can easily be taugh. by

_ the average teacher.

4 The simplicity of the older methods of teaching this subject
is combined with just so much of the modern scientific methods
of presentation as is thoroughly adapted to elementary grades.
Only enough physiography is included to develop the funda-
mental relations of geography, and to animate and freshen the
study, without overloading it in this direction.
4 The physical maps of the grand divisions are drawn to the
same scale, thus enabling the pupil to form correct concepts
of the relative size of countries. The political and more de-
tailed maps are not mere skeletons, giving only the names
which are required by the text, but are full enough to serve
all ordinary purposes for reference. In addition, they show
the principal railroads and canals, the head of navigation on
all important rivers, and the standard divisions of time.
{| The illustrations are new and fresh, reproduced mostly
from photographs collected from all parts of the world.
Formal map studies or questions accompany each map, direct-
ing attention to the most important features.

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY

(110)

WEBSTER’S DICTIONARIES

The Only Genuine School Editions

HESE Dictionaries are the acknowledged authority
throughout the English speaking world, and constitute
acomplete and carefully graded series, The spelling
and punctuation in all leading schoolbooks are based on them.

WEBSTER’S PRIMARY SCHOOL DICTION-
soe ce = #848

Caneataing over 20,000 on oad meanlage, with over
400 illustrations.

WEBSTER’S COMMON SCHOOL DICTION-
(ot) ee ee os tas, <a FOZ
Gonvsning over aisyaBe Sri aa stenided with over
500 illustrations.

WEBSTER’S HIGH SCHOOL DICTIONARY, §0.98

Containing about 37,000 words and definitions, and an
appendix giving a pronouncing vocabulary of Biblical,
Classical, Mythological, Historical, and Geographical proper
names, with over 800 illustrations.

WEBSTER’S ACADEMIC DICTIONARY
Cloth, $1.50; Indexed . . . . . 1 . $1.80
Half Calf, $2.75; Indexed. . . . 2 . 3.00
Abridged directly from the International Dictionary, and
giving the orthography, pronunciations, definitions, and
synonyms of about 60,000 words in common use, with an
appendix containing various useful tables, with over 800
illustrations.

SPECIAL EDITIONS

Webster’s Countinghouse oe ae Sheep,
Indexed . . oo% ew P2400

Webster’s Handy Dictionary . s 2 a ee aS

Webster’s Pocket Dictionary, . . . . . 157
The same. Roan, Flexible , . , . .69
The same. Roan, Tucks. . . . . .78
The same. Morocco, Indexed . . , .90

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY

(104)

UNITED STATES HISTORIES

By JOHN BACH McMASTER, Professor of Americais
History, University of Pennsylvania

Primary History, $0.60 School History, $1.00 Brief History, $1.00

HESE standard histories are remarkable for their

freshness and vigor, their authoritative statements,

and their impartial treatment. ‘They give a well-
proportioned and interesting narrative of the chief events
in our history, and are not loaded down with extended
and unnecessary bibliographies. The illustrations are his-
torically authentic, and show, besides well-known scenes
and incidents, the implements and dress characteristic of the
various periods. The maps are clear and full, and well
executed.

4] The PRIMARY HISTORY is simply and interestingly
written, with no long or involved sentences. Although brief,
it touches upon all matters of real importance to schools in
the founding and building of our country, but copies beyond
the understanding of children are omitted. The summaries
at the end of the chapters, besides serving to emphasize the
chief events, are valuable for review.

4 In the SCHOOL HISTORY by far the larger part of
the book has been devoted to the history of the United States
since 1783. From the beginning the attention of the student
is directed to causes and results rather than to isolated events.
Special prominence is given to the social and economic
development of the country.

| In the BRIEF HISTORY nearly one-half the book
is devoted to the colonial period. The text proper, while
brief, is complete in itself; and footnotes ’in smaller type
permit of a more comprehensive course if desired. Short
summaries, and suggestions for collateral reading, are provided.

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY

(116)

APPLIED PHYSIOLOGIES

By FRANK OVERTON, A.M., M.D., late House
Surgeon to the City Hospital, New York City

Primary Physiology . . . $0.30 Intermediate Physiology $0.50
Aavanced Physiology . . fo.80

VERTON’S APPLIED PHYSIOLOGIES form a
series of text-books for primary, grammar, and high
schools, which departs radically from the old-time

methods pursued in the teaching of physiology. These books
combine the latest results of study and research in biological,
medical, and chemical science with the’ best methods of
teaching.

4] The fundamental principle throughout this series is the
study of the cells where the essential functions of the body
are carried on. Consequently, the study of anatomy and
physiology is here made the study of the cells from the most
elementary structure in organic life to their highest and most
complex form in the human body.

{| This treatment of the cell principle, and its development
in its relation to life, the employment of laboratory methods,
the numerous original and effective illustrations, the clearness of
the author’s style, the wealth of new physiological facts, and the
logical arrangement and gradation of the subject-matter, give
these books a strength and individuality peculiarly their own.
{| The effects of alcohol and other stimulants and narcotics
are treated in each book sensibly,.and with sufficient fullness.
But while this important form of intemperance is singled out,
it is borne in mind that the breaking of any of nature’s laws
is also a form of intemperance, and that the whole study of
applied physiology is to encourage a more healthful and a
more self-denying mode of life.

“| In the preparation of this series the needs of the various
school grades have been fully ‘considered. Each book is well
suited to the pupils for whom it is designed.

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY

(er)

JAMES OTITE*S
COLONIAL SERIES

Calvert of Maryland Richard of Jamestown
Mary of Plymouth Ruth of Boston
Peter of New Amsterdam Stephen of Philadelphia

Price, each, 35 cents. For years 3-5

ON’T you remember the ‘*Toby Tyler’’ stories,
which appeared some years ago in ‘‘ Harper’s Young
People’’? And don’t you remember how impatiently

boys and girls looked forward to the next issue merely be-
cause of those tales? Stories like those mean something to
children and make an impression.

4| Here are six new stories by the same author, James Otis,
the first he has ever written for schools. They are just as fas-
cinating as his earlier ones, ‘They are stories and yet they
are histories. Their viewpoint is entirely original, the story
of each settlement being told by one of the children living in the
colony. For this reason only such incidents as a child might
notice, or learn by hearsay, are introduced—but all such in-
cidents are, as far as possible, historical facts and together they
present a delighttully graphic and comprehensive description
of the daily life of the early colonists.

“| The style in which the children tell the stories reads as
charmingly as that of a fairy tale, and abounds in quaint hu-
mor and in wholesome, old-fashioned philosophy.

4 Each book is profusely illustrated with pen and ink draw-
ings that not only add to its artistic attractiveness, but will be
found a genuine aid to the child’s imagination in reproducing
for him realistic glimpses into a home-life of long ago.

{| There is no better way for your pupils to learn about the
beginning of our country. The books are just as well suited
to libraries and home use. Write us about them.

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY

(25)

SUPPLEMENTARY READING

HO CO CD DNDN OOD COO CD DHOWW COP IUNN ADHD HP AKDAHAHPWH VYwWwW Of DA

FAMOUS STORIES AND LITERATURE

{| This giading, which is simply suggestive, represents the
earliest years in which these books can be read to advantage.
YEAR

Arnold’s Sohrab and Rustum . $0.20
Baldwin’ s Fifty Famous Stories Retold . A38)
Golden Fleece +50
Nine Choice Poems #25
Old Greek Stories 45
Old Stories of the East 45
Robinson Crusoe for Children 35
Thirty More Famous Stories Retold +50
Bradish’s Old Norse Stories P 45
Clarke’s Arabian Nights 69
Story of Troy 60
Story of Ulysses . 60
Story of Aeneas . 45
Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe (Stephens) . 50
Dickens’s Child’s OliverT wist and David Copperfield (Severance), +40
Story of Little Nell ese . +50
Tale of Two Cities (Kirk) : 50
Twelve Christmas Stories (Gordon) . 50
Franklin’s Autobiography . . 8 Ag
Guerber’s Myths of Greece and Rome 7 1.50
Myths of Northern Lands. . 1.50
Legends of the Middle Ages . 1.50
Hall’s Homeric Stories . are 40
Irving’s Sketch Book, Selections 20
Tales of a Traveler . 50
Johnson’s Waste Not, Want Not Stories 50
Kupfer’s Lives and Stories Worth Remembering . 45
Lambs’ Tales from Shakespeare. Comedies (Rolfe) 50
Tales from Shakespeare. Tragedies (Rolfe) . 50
Macaulay’s Lays of Ancient Rome ies a 56
Scott’s Ivanhoe . . : 5 +50
Kenilworth (Norris) .50
Lady of the Lake (Gateway) .40
Quentin Durward (Norris) .50
Talisman (Dewey) . .50
Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar 20
Merchant of Venice 20
As You Like It. 20
Smythe’s Reynard the Fox 30

(20)

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY

LATEST A

DDITIONS

SERIES OF ECLECTIC READINGS FOR CHILDREN
PUBLISHED BY AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY

For Youngest Readers
+ $0.35

Baldwin’s Second Fairy Reader

Another Fairy Reader . F +35
Farmer’s Nature Myths of Many
Eands: ee a weg “45

—6 to 8 Years of Age

Lucia’s Stories of American Discov-
erers for Little Americans .

Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels Retold
(Baldwin)... . 2 we

For Children of 9 to 11 Years of Age

Baldwin’s American Book of
Golden Deeds. . . . . . $0.50
Stories ofthe King . . 2... 50

Schwartz’s Famous Picture:

For Children of 12

Cooper’s Adventures of Deerslayer
(Haight) ....

$0.35
Last of the Mohicans (Haight) .

+35

Davis & Chow-Leung’s Chinese

Fables and Folk Stories . .
Johnson’s Story of Two Boys . .
sof Children . . $0.40

to 14 Years of Age

Keffer’s Nature Studies on the
Farm... . se .
Nixon-Roulet’s Japanese Folk

Adventures of Pathfinder (Haight) .35

Stories and Fairy Tales.

$0.40

35

$o.40

$0.40

.40