Chapter 3

"Of course I can't do very much in the daytime, because they don't come out of their holes; but I work all night, and it would surprise you to know how many there are in the house, I don't kill off a tenth part of them, and they seem to think they have more rights here than I have.

"Why, it is only last week that I happened to look up on the broad shelf in the dining-room closet, and there were six mice, sitting around as bold as you please. Five ran for their lives the minute they saw me; but what do you think the other one did? Why, he sat on his tail with his paws behind him, and actually scolded because I had come around there.

"I really believe the foolish creature thought he could frighten me, for he kept right on scolding and sputtering until I got my paw on his neck, and of course that settled him. I left him a good deal worse off than Mrs. Lioness did Mr. Rat, when she wanted to play with him."

FATAL SPORT.

"That must be a new story," your Aunt Amy said, and Mrs. Mouser looked surprised as she replied:

"Well, well, I don't understand what all the animals around here have talked about! This is the third or fourth very old story that you haven't heard, and when I came in here to visit this afternoon, I had an idea that everything I might offer to tell, you had heard from some of the others."

"Suppose you tell me what Mrs. Lioness did to Mr. Rat?" your Aunt Amy suggested, and Mrs. Mouser began:

"Once upon a time--you can see from the beginning how old this story is--Mr. Rat ate his way into the place where they keep animals to show them off--a Zoological Garden, I believe Mr. Man calls it. Well, after Mr. Rat got in he found a Mrs. Lion who was all alone, and feeling as though she really needed company. She was just as kind to Mr. Rat as she could be, and asked him why he didn't make his home there with her.

"'I would like to,' Mr. Rat said, 'for you seem to be a very nice kind of a Mrs. Lion; but when Mr. Man, who owns this place, comes along, he will kill me if he can.'

"'I would like to see Mr. Man try to hurt any one who was visiting me!' Mrs. Lion said sharply, as she held up her paw. 'Do you see that? I could kill Mr. Man with it in a minute if I struck him.'

"As she spoke she laid her paw on Mr. Rat in play, just to show him what she could do, and the 'play' was so rough that the breath of life was squeezed out of Mr. Rat in a jiffy.

"Now you might have supposed that Mrs. Lion would feel badly because she had killed Mr. Rat without meaning to; but instead of that she said, looking at his body:

"'What a poor kind of a creature he must be, when he allows himself to be killed with what was no more than a love pat!'

"And a little mouse, who was sitting in a hole in the wall, having seen all that happened, squeaked with a nervous snicker:

"'A lion's sport is altogether too strenuous for such as us, and if Mr. Rat had been wise, he would have kept well outside the cage, fearing your play even more than your anger.'

"'It seems to me he was a wise little mouse,' your Aunt Amy said, and Mrs. Mouser replied with a sneer:

"He was a good deal like many others I know of, exceeding wise after they have seen the result of another's folly. But it seems to me that we are talking altogether too much about mice."

A CAT'S DREAM.

"I have been wanting to repeat to you what I call some very nice poetry, which Mr. Crow made about a dream of mine. It is really the best thing he ever wrote, and although I the same as promised not to ask you to listen to anything more of his, I am very anxious for you to hear it."

"Don't think that I object so severely to what Mr. Crow writes," your Aunt Amy replied. "I have heard a number of things he wrote which I thought were very good indeed."

Then Mrs. Mouser Cat repeated the following:

Kitty cat, kitty cat, asleep on the rug, With velvet paws beneath your head nice and snug, What are you dreaming of? What do you think When out slips your little tongue so soft and pink?

When you flick your ears, and your whiskers quiver so, And you give an eager cry like a whisper low; When your tail pats the rug so intent, and you seem Just ready for a spring, tell me what do you dream?

"Oh, I have a fairy-land I visit in my sleep, Where the mice don't expect me and are playing bo-peep; Down I pounce upon them, they are not so quick as I, And I smile as I regale myself upon a mouse pie;

"There are pantries where the pans of milk are brimming o'er, Where I lap the rich cream and spill no drop upon the floor; Loveliest custards, daintiest bits of fragrant cheese; And I help myself without a word as often as I please.

"Then I walk along the fences and I grandly wave my tail; My whiskers are so fierce all the other cats turn pale; When Pug and Towser eye me, suspiciously, I know, I give a spring upon them and off in fright they go.

"And in my pretty fairy-land no cruel boys appear; Only black eats and white cats, and purrs and mews to hear. And these are what my visions are, oh little mistress sweet; Sure any cat would need to smile asleep here at your feet."

"Now I really think that is good, Mrs. Mouser," and your Aunt Amy spoke no more than the truth. "I don't seriously object to Mr. Crow's nonsense verses; but at the same time I never really enjoy them."

BLOOD RELATIONS.

"Of course there's a difference in tastes," Mrs. Mouser said thoughtfully. "Some of the things which Bunny Rabbit thinks are good, I don't like at all, and perhaps he objects to what I believe is very fine. Now here is a story Mr. Crow has got about Mr. Man's boy Tommy. Mamma Speckle thinks there was nothing like it ever told. He says that Tommy Man, one night after he had been tucked up in his crib, was awakened by a strange, humming, buzzing sound close to his head, and when he got out the sand that the 'sand-man' had put in his eyes, he stared about him. There on the bottom of the bed was a fearful hobgoblin, so Tommy Man thought, with big round eyes, awfully long legs and wings, and a beak that looked like a trooper's sword.

"'Are you one of those angels that my mamma said took care of little boys at night?' asked Tommy Man, trembling.' 'Cause if you are I guess I can get along by myself all right; you needn't stay.'

"But the mosquito made a jab with his bill at the bed-clothes over Tommy's chin, and said, loudly:

"'Cousin-n-n-n-n, Cousin-n-n-n.'

"'Oh, you're a cousin, are you? I wonder which one?'

"'Z-z-i-m m-m,' answered the mosquito, buzzing about Tommy Man's head.

"'Zim? Oh, I guess you must be that soldier cousin of mother's by the looks of the sword you carry; his name was Jim.'

"'Cousin-n-n-n-n!' buzzed the mosquito sharply. 'Don't you know your own relations?'

"'You my relation?' Tommy asked in amazement. 'How do you make that out?'

"'Oh, easy. Relations are those who have the same blood in them, ain't they?'

"'Yes,' assented Tommy.

"'Well, you and I have the same blood. You had it, and now I've got it. I just tapped you, you know.'

"Tommy didn't know anything of the kind, and he was terribly frightened, so he just covered up his head, and trembled until Mr. Mosquito flew away."

"Those are what I call nonsense stories," your Aunt Amy said when Mrs. Mouser ceased speaking, and she replied quite sharply:

"Of course they are, and that is about all the animals on this farm know."

"I am certain you make a mistake, Mrs. Mouser Cat, for you have told me several this afternoon which teach a good lesson," your Aunt Amy said, and for a moment it seemed very much as if Mrs. Mouser was angry, but her face brightened an instant later, as she cried:

"I've got the very story for you, although it's about a mouse, and I don't really believe in talking of them so much, for it makes it appear as if they were of great importance, when all they are fit for is to furnish food for us cats.

"Once upon a time there was a miller who lived in his mill, and on a certain morning, when he was opening the sacks of grain, out hopped a little mouse.

"'Oh, wife, wife!' he cried as if he had seen some horrible animal. 'Bring me the butcher knife so that I can kill this mouse!'

"But the little mouse put her paws together and begged for her life. She promised to keep the mill free from mice if the miller would spare her life. Well, after a good deal of talk the miller agreed that she should be allowed to live in the mill, and for a whole month she kept her word so well that not even a mouse's tail was seen anywhere around the place. Then, one morning the miller heard a faint squeaking, and he cried out angrily:

"'What's this, Mrs. Mouse? You have forgotten your promise, and let in some of your friends.'

"No,' answered the little mouse, 'I have kept my promise. Those are my three babies, who were born last night,' and she led the way proudly to her nest, where the three squirming little mouse babies lay.

"'So this is the way you keep your word, is it?' the miller cried angrily. 'You promised to drive all other mice away from this mill, and here are three who have come to get their living from me!'

"Then he picked up the babies and threw them into the river. Oh, but the little mouse was angry! Yet she was only a mouse, and he was a man, so she said nothing; but after that, whenever she got a chance, she gnawed and gnawed and gnawed at the outer post of the mill, sometimes working the whole night long.

"Then came a big storm, and the river rose very high; the posts which were half gnawed through, broke, and the mill fell over into the river.

"'Save me! Save me!' shouted the miller as the swiftly-running current carried him down the stream.

"'I am sending you to find my lost babies,' squeaked the little mouse as she ran to and fro on the bank.

"There's a good lesson in that story, if you know how to find it," Mrs. Mouser said as she curled herself into a little ball near the fireplace, much as though she had come to an end of her story-telling; but just at that moment a mouse showed his nose in one corner of the room.

In an instant Mrs. Mouser Cat was on her feet looking as if she had never thought of such a thing as taking a nap, and in a very few seconds she had the mouse in her claws.

"I guess this breaks up my visit," she said, going toward the door. "I must give the kittens a chance to learn how a mouse should be caught, and it isn't likely I'll have time to come back here this afternoon."

Then Mrs. Mouser Cat disappeared through the half-opened door, and your Aunt Amy was left alone, wondering which, of all the animals on the farm, would be the next to provide her with an afternoon's entertainment.

THE END.