Ant ventures

By Blanche Elizabeth Wade

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Title: Ant ventures

Author: Blanche Elizabeth Wade

Illustrator: Harrison Cady

Release date: June 23, 2025 [eBook #76365]

Language: English

Original publication: Chicago: Rand McNally & Company, 1924

Credits: Alan, Susan E. and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ANT VENTURES ***





                             ANT VENTURES




                             ANT VENTURES

                                 _By_
                        BLANCHE ELIZABETH WADE
                _Author of “The Island of Make-Believe”
                        and “The Magic Stone”_

                             _Pictures by_
                             HARRISON CADY

                            [Illustration]


                        RAND MᶜNALLY & COMPANY
                         CHICAGO      NEW YORK




                         _Copyright, 1924, by_
                        RAND MᶜNALLY & COMPANY

                [Illustration: THE RAND-MᶜNALLY PRESS]

                           Made in U. S. A.




THE CONTENTS


                                            PAGE

  AROUND THE WORLD FOR A CHANGE                7

  AT THE ANGLEWORM’S DOORWAY                  17

  ON THE PLEASURE BOAT                        31

  A VENTURE IN POLITENESS                     44

  AT THE WILD-ROSE TEA HOUSE                  54

  A VENTURE IN PLEASURE                       66

  THE BAND CONCERT                            78

  KEEPING DOWN LUMPS                          86

  AT MOLESWORTH HALL                          98

  A VENTURE WITH A PASS                      107

  AN ANT VENTURE IN GOING UP                 115

  EXPLORING A TREE                           125

  A VENTURE OF MOTTOES                       136

  A VENTURE IN QUESTIONS                     146

  AT THE HOLLOW-LOG INN                      156

  THE WOODCHUCK’S DREAM                      164

  A VENTURE WITH NEW FRIENDS                 175

  AT CLOVER LODGE                            188

  WHAT THE YELLOWBIRD SAID                   195

  THE TWO TRICKS                             205

  THE ANT VENTURE OF THE CAT-TAIL            215

  THE ANT VENTURE OF THE DRAGON
  FLY’S TRICK                                223

  THE ANT VENTURE OF A HAPPY MEETING         230

  THE ANT VENTURE OF AN EMBROIDERED
  MOTTO                                      237

[Illustration: _The Ant looked, and there sat a Beetle on the same
leaf_]




ANT VENTURES

AROUND THE WORLD FOR A CHANGE


Once upon a time there was an Ant sitting on a leaf to think. He was
tired of working, and his mother had sent him out to hunt for a little
green Worm to stow away in the larder, but he did not want to do even
that.

“I never saw such a stupid world!” he said aloud. “All there is to do
is to carry out the earth all day long, or else go hunting for the
family’s food, and I am tired of it all!”

“Ho!” said a voice near him. “All you want is a change. You think you
have seen the world, but I will give you something that will cure
you. I know your mother well, so you take her this prescription I am
writing. Give it to her with my compliments and tell her I said that it
is all you need to make you the happiest Ant in the whole wide world.”

The Ant looked, and there sat a Beetle on the same leaf. He had on
large, horn-rimmed spectacles, and was writing busily on a physician’s
prescription pad. Any one could see he was a doctor. He handed the
prescription to the Ant, took off the big spectacles, and said, “Now
run along to your mother, and show her this at once.”

The Ant took the prescription, thanked the Beetle, and ran down the
stem of the leaf to the ground and back to Ant-Hill Manor, where he
lived. He could not read a word of the prescription himself, for
whoever could read a physician’s prescription, anyway? No one but the
doctor himself and the druggist, I am sure. But at the top of the
paper the Ant could read plainly:

ALEXANDER BEETLE BUG, M. D.

“That must mean Alexander Beetle Bug, Meadow Doctor,” thought the Ant.

Well, sir, when he walked into the main doorway of Ant-Hill Manor and
showed the paper to his mother, he found that some one besides doctors
and druggists could read prescriptions, for she understood every sign
scrawled upon the paper. Dr. Bug had been an old schoolmate of hers,
and this was a secret code they had used when they wanted to write
notes in school. She had to laugh like everything.

“All right,” said she. “Here is the best advice I ever had. My old
friend Dr. Bug says you need a change. So go put up your wheelbarrow,
which is lying where you left it when you would not work this morning,
and close the tool-house door carefully when you come out. By that time
I shall have your things ready for you. You may start today.”

Off went the Ant to do as he was told. When he came back, there stood
his mother with his best hat in one of her hands, his Sunday suit in
another of them, his toothbrush, comb, wash cloth, and soap in a little
case in another hand, his best Sunday shoes and stockings in another,
and a basket of lunch in another.

“Change your things right away,” said she, “for the sooner you begin
your trip, the better.”

[Illustration: _She gave him his little case, his lunch basket, and his
hat and kissed him good-by_]

He washed himself and put on his best clothes. When he was ready, she
gave him his little case, his lunch basket, and his hat and kissed him
good-by. He thought she did not seem very sorry about his going, and
that was queer, for never before had he been away from her overnight.
He did not say anything, though, but put on his nice straw hat with
his initials inside--_A. A._ for _Anthony Ant_--and down the steps of
Ant-Hill Manor he went while all the other Ants waved their feelers
at him. Not one of them cried a tear. He even imagined his mother was
smiling as though it were all a joke.

Anyway, he had nothing to do now except to go wherever he wanted to, so
he decided to keep to the right and go all the way around the field.
That would be going around the whole world, he thought. Off he went,
over grass and under grass; up stalks and down stalks; into holes and
out of holes; around stones and over stones; across stem bridges and
across twig bridges; part way on the rail fence; part way on a log; up
a stump and across the stump and down the stump; until he was tired
from going such a long stretch at a time, and he sat down to rest and
to eat a little of his lunch. He was glad his mother had put so much
into the basket, for he was hungry. He took off his best hat, hung it
on a short weed near by, and leaned his head against a stout stem. Then
he opened the basket and took out some of the lunch.

There were dainty sandwiches made of sliced, cold-boiled caterpillar,
some delicious pieces of Butterflies’ wings, and other sandwiches
of thinly sliced dried Cricket. In one corner of the basket was a
small pot of his favorite meadow-flower honey. There were poppy-seed
biscuits too, some clover-sugar cookies, and a huge piece of cold roast
Grasshopper which would last him for several meals.

[Illustration: _The hat was the best thing the Field Mouse had tasted
in a long time_]

The Ant felt much refreshed after his rest and the lunch. He packed
what was left of the food back in the basket and reached for his hat.
Ho! but no hat was there! He looked and looked under the weed where he
had hung it, and everywhere about the place, and all at once he spied
a Field Mouse eating the last of its pretty ribbon hatband. It was too
late to save even the band of the hat, and all the Field Mouse would
say when the Ant spoke about the matter was that the hat was the best
thing he had tasted in a long time. Then off he went to hunt for more
best hats to eat, maybe.

Well, to take a trip around the world, and not have a hat to wear, was
sad for the Ant, but unless he went home and gave up the trip he would
have to go bareheaded. As he was too proud to give up, bareheaded he
went, and he tramped all the afternoon, meeting many strange people he
never had seen near Ant-Hill Manor. There were Bugs large and small;
Bugs that were fierce and Bugs that were kind; strange little Insects;
Worms of many different colors; Flies, Moths, and Butterflies of all
the old kinds and new kinds too. They were all as happy as could be,
and hardly would speak to him, they were so busy. The Ant tried to talk
to several of them, but they would not stop their work to listen. They
were making their homes, or taking care of them, or hunting for their
suppers. He was the only traveler in the world, he thought.

That night he was more tired than he ever had been on his hardest day
of work. He ate an early supper and was almost too tired to open the
jar of his favorite honey. He ate a clover-sugar cooky and nearly fell
asleep over it, and then went to bed under a dry leaf, after carefully
hiding all his things, for he remembered what had happened to his hat.




AT THE ANGLEWORM’S DOORWAY


It was a good thing Anthony Ant had not been hungry the night before,
for the next morning he was hungrier than ever he had been at home, and
he did just wish he had some of the cereal he had found fault with at
home the morning before.

[Illustration: _He tied a soft, green leaf under his chin with a narrow
grass blade_]

But he ate more of the sandwiches and a large piece of the cold roast
Grasshopper, and took a drink of water from a little brook near the
spot where he had slept. He tried to think plain cold water for
breakfast was exactly as good as hot cocoa, which he always had at
Ant-Hill Manor in an old-fashioned cup his Grandmother had given him.
In fancy letters on one side it said, “For a Good Child.” Then he set
off with the remainder of his food packed in the basket, which was much
lighter by this time. His shoes felt pretty tight, but he never had
worn them for such long tramps as that of the day before. He made up
his mind he would not go so far all at once again, as he had plenty of
time, and at noon he would take all his shoes off and rest all his feet
for an hour.

It was a hot morning and the sun beat down on the Ant’s bare head, so
he picked a soft, green leaf, put it on his head, and tied it under his
chin with a narrow grass blade. That was much better, and he almost
sang one of the nursery rimes he had heard played on his phonograph at
home. If his feet had not been so large for his shoes, he was sure he
would have sung it, words and all.

[Illustration: _A large Bird flew out of a tree and pounced down to
catch him_]

He did not feel like singing a little later, for all at once something
happened which nearly put an end to him. A large Bird flew out of a
tree and pounced down to catch him, and he had barely time to jump into
an Angleworm’s open doorway to save his life. He dropped his little
case with his dressing things in it, but managed to hang on to his
lunch basket. The Bird was a Flicker, and Flickers are so fond of Ants
to eat that it does not matter who the Ant is so long as he is an Ant.
Even if he was Anthony Ant of Ant-Hill Manor, he would have been eaten
just as quickly if the Flicker could have caught him.

The Ant trembled so that all his knees shook, but he kept as still as
he could otherwise, and did not move until long after the Bird had
flown away. Then once more he had to move so suddenly that this time he
almost lost his lunch basket.

The thing that frightened him was an Angleworm. Mrs. Angleworm wanted
to know what he meant by blocking up her doorway like that. He tried to
explain, but all she would say was, “Go away, sir! Go away at once!
I do not wish to buy any books at all, nor sewing-machine needles,
nor Mexican drawn work, nor soap, nor flavoring extracts, nor silver
polish, nor aluminum ware, nor jewelry, nor teas and coffees, nor hand
embroidery, nor doormats, nor rugs, nor clocks, nor perfumery, and I
do not want to subscribe to _The Angleworms’ Home Journal_, nor to
_The Underground Gentleman_, nor to _The Earth’s Work_, nor to _The
Flower-Bed Magazine_, nor to _The Literary Hashed News_, nor to _Little
Angleworms’ Companion_, so go away, sir! Go away, this minute!”

Oh, my, but the Ant was scared! She had thought him an agent of some
kind when she saw the basket in his middle right hand. He opened his
mouth to try to explain the whole matter to her, but she would not let
him speak.

“Go away, I tell you!” said she. “I don’t want my piano tuned, and
there’s nothing wrong with the electric lights, and you can’t come in
to show me how any vacuum cleaner works, nor a washing machine, either!
Go away!”

Out tumbled the poor Ant, and off he stumbled toward the right. He took
one backward glance to see if she were following him, and he saw that
she had found his little dressing case and was opening it. He hurried
back, as scared as he was, for he could not let her have that.

When she saw him again, she said, “Yes, I know! You are an agent, just
as I thought! This case proves it! You are trying to sell soap and
tooth paste and combs and brushes, and all that sort of thing. I won’t
have one of them, so take your old sample case away from here at once!”
And she threw it at him with such good aim that it nearly hit him on
the head.

Poor Anthony Ant! All his things packed so neatly by his mother were
spilled all over the ground, and while he hurried as fast as he could
to pick them up she scolded and scolded as he never had been scolded
before.

At last he was out of hearing of her sharp tongue, and, out of breath,
he sat down under a large stone to rest. He felt sure he was safe at
last, for the stone was like a ledge, and came out over his head, so
no Bird could see him. The ground was smooth and hard, so no Angleworm
could be living there, he thought. He untied his green leaf hat, and
then pulled off all his best shoes, for his feet were so sore and tired
he could not tell which of all the pairs hurt the worst. The shoes he
placed all in a row.

By looking at the shadows the sun cast out beyond the stone, he could
tell that it was time for dinner. At home there was always a fine,
hearty dinner, hot and nourishing, as Mrs. Ant knew well that those
who worked hard at such labor as made the muscles exercise needed
good, hearty food. But no fine, hearty dinner, hot and nourishing,
waited ready for him to eat now. He had only what was left in his
lunch basket, and I can tell you that, when he opened the cover and
saw how the lunch had gotten mixed up from being all joggled by his
hard running, it did not look very appetizing. No, sir-ee! As he tried
to scrape the honey back into his jar from which the cover had been
shaken, he almost cried, for the honey was full of crumbs from the
sandwiches, and the sandwiches looked like old scraps to be thrown away
instead of eaten. The filling had all come out, and the clover-sugar
cookies were damp and sticky, and the big piece of cold roast
Grasshopper might have been almost anything but food from the looks of
it. Besides, sand had gotten into the things, and everything he tried
to eat was gritty.

There was one good thing about the Ant, anyway. He did not give up,
even with aching feet and gritty food to discourage him. He ate what he
could and thought that pretty soon, after a rest, he would steal out to
see if he could find a juicy berry anywhere. That would refresh him and
perhaps make him forget the gritty food he had been forced to eat.

“I think I’ll leave my shoes where they are,” thought he. “They will be
safe here, I am sure. It will rest me to go barefoot a bit.”

So he left his row of shoes and also his stockings, but he took along
his little case and his basket, for he thought he might find a place
to bathe himself, and he might even find a little food to put into his
basket. But he did not throw away a bit of the gritty food, for he did
not know when he could find any good thing to eat, and he might need
even the unappetizing mix-up in his basket before he found anything.

It was rather hard stepping out barefooted at first, for even when he
was working at home he had good, stout shoes always, as the Ants of
Ant-Hill Manor were different from most Ants to be seen anywhere, as
you may have guessed by this time. Also, it was harder to walk, as his
feet had been made tender by the long tramp in his best shoes, which
were new. But he took a slow gait, and by and by he came to the brook
again. He dipped all his feet into the water, and he took a fine bath
too, and dried himself in the warm sunshine on a big stone. It made him
feel like another Ant, he was so rested. He sat there a long time. Then
he began to hunt about for a juicy berry, and for whatever else there
might be that Ants like to eat when they are not at home where they can
have things put on to the table for them and don’t have to wonder where
their meals are to come from.

Across the brook, which was narrow here, he spied a bush that had
berries on it, although the season for berries was nearly over. Perhaps
you think a little thing like an Ant cannot get across even a narrow
brook, but he can. And so could this Ant, for, though he never had
taken so long a trip before, yet he knew somehow the many tricks of
getting across a brook. He stood on the big stone nearest the edge of
the water until a piece of leaf floated down near him. Then he jumped
upon the floating leaf and stayed on it until it sailed as far as he
wished it to take him. Then, as it bobbed against a stone, he crawled
off to that stone out in the stream, and found a narrow bridge of
grass root that had lodged near the stone. This bridge took him within
jumping distance of another stone, and that stone made him nearer the
middle of the brook. There he found a dead branch of tree in the water,
and this helped him all the way over to the other side, as it reached
from the middle of the stream to the opposite bank.

He was more than glad when, after a long tramp over and under and
around things, he came to the berry bush. Up it he went to the very
first berry he could see, and took a good taste of the juice. It
surely made him fairly glow with happiness once more, for in every
creature there is a glow of happiness, whether you believe it or not,
even though sometimes the glow of happiness is covered up by his own
doings or wrong thoughts. Anyway, for the first time since leaving
Ant-Hill Manor, Anthony Ant felt a glow of happiness. He sat for a
long time on the stem of the berry, and looked all about him while he
rested, and kept tasting the sweet juice of the very ripe berry. What
a wise doctor his mother’s old friend was, to be sure! The Ant decided
not to go home too soon, but to keep right on taking that good Dr.
Alexander Beetle Bug’s prescription and let the others do the work of
Ant-Hill Manor.




ON THE PLEASURE BOAT


Anthony Ant’s glow of happiness cheered him for some time, and then he
happened to think he had to go back across the brook again after his
shoes. He had left his basket and dressing case on the other side too.
If he had only known about the berry bush sooner, he would have brought
everything over in the first place and saved himself a lot of work.
Sitting and thinking about the matter would not do any good, so he took
one more taste of a good berry and down he started.

He met many large black Ants going up and down the bush to the berries
and back to their homes. But they gave him no more than a passing
glance, as they were not out seeing the world, but carrying food to
their homes. Those going home had bits of dried berries, sweet to the
taste though not juicy, and every Ant attended to his work as hard as
possible.

It was not an easy trip back to the brook even after the refreshing
berry juice. The Ant had to wait some time after going back over the
dead branch to the stone, and over the stone to another stone where the
grass bridge was, before he could find anything floating near enough to
jump upon for a ferryboat.

At last along came a thin piece of wood. He gave a jump and landed upon
it all right, and was settling down to watch for a stone nearer shore,
and a chance to get to it, when down on to the wood fluttered a leaf
from a tree. On the leaf was a Caterpillar as fuzzy as he could be, but
fussy.

[Illustration: _“I don’t like Ants on my pleasure boat,” said the
Caterpillar. “Get off!”_]

“I don’t like Ants on my pleasure boat,” said he. “Get off!”

“O sir, but I can’t!” cried the Ant, much frightened. “I did not know
this was your boat. I was just trying to cross the brook and jumped
on to the first thing that came near enough to my stone where I was
waiting. If I should get off now, I should be drowned!”

“You are a careless person,” said Mr. Caterpillar. “You should have
looked first before jumping.”

“But nobody was on the boat then,” answered the Ant.

“It does not make any difference,” said the Caterpillar. “You might
have known that I might board it at any time. However, you may stay
until there is a chance for you to get off.”

“Oh, thank you!” exclaimed the Ant. “I’ll be very quiet and not rock
the boat a bit.”

The fussy old Caterpillar walked up and down his pleasure boat all the
time. When he came to one end, he raised his head and, moving it back
and forth, looked all about him. Then he turned around and crawled to
the other end and did the same thing, He kept this up until all at once
the boat bumped against the shore itself, for they had drifted in.

“Well,” said he, “here’s land at last. I may as well get off here as
anywhere. You go first, and I’ll see how you manage.”

The Ant was glad to be upon land once more, and lost no time in jumping
to the stone from the bobbing bit of wood the Caterpillar called a
pleasure boat. The Caterpillar was so fussy that he would not hurry
off, but stood talking about his work to be done. The pleasure boat was
only a fancy of his, and was really not his, but he was on his way to
put himself into the best place he could find for a long sleep till
time to be a Butterfly. Traveling was not pleasure for him, but part
of his life work. Whether he liked traveling or not, he had to tramp
on and on and on, ever so far, before taking that long sleep of his
which would be the last of him as a Caterpillar. When he woke from a
beautiful, splendiferous dream that would last for a long time, he
hoped to find himself a lovely Butterfly.

“I have traveled so long on my feet,” he told the Ant, “that I thought
I’d make part of my journey a water trip. That is why I am on this
pleasure boat.”

“What makes the boat yours?” asked Anthony Ant, for, now that he was
safe on the shore, he was not afraid to ask the Caterpillar a question
or two.

“Why,” replied the fussy Caterpillar, “it’s mine because I took it, of
course!”

“Oh, but I took it first,” said the Ant. “I was already aboard when
you dropped down on to the deck with your leaf from the tree. If just
taking a boat makes it belong to you, it is more mine than yours, for I
had already taken it, you know.”

“Never mind,” the fuzzy, fussy Caterpillar answered. “The boat is mine
now, and I will not quarrel with you. It is wrong to quarrel, anyway,
and it is very bad for any one to quarrel before going to sleep. It
will spoil the best dream, and I do not intend to spoil the long,
lovely one I am going to have. He who goes to bed quarreling and cross
gets up ill-tempered and unhappy, and maybe it would spoil my chances
of having beautiful colors as a Butterfly. I have chosen purple and
gold, and I should like to have wings with fancy scallops on the edges
too. So I shall not quarrel one word with you, for if I do I may
wake up just a common old everyday sort of Moth, and that would be
disgraceful. I should simply crawl away under a leaf and die of shame,
I know. So, when I say the boat is mine, do not dispute me! If you
do, you will be sorry, for when your long sleep comes your dream will
be a bad one, and you will find when you wake up that you are not a
beautiful Butterfly at all, but a horrid, plain, mean little Moth Fly,
probably.”

“Oh,” said Anthony, “but you see, I am not going to be a Butterfly
anyway. I don’t want to be a Butterfly!”

“What!” shouted the Caterpillar, so surprised that he nearly stood up
on his tail. “Don’t want to be a Butterfly! I never heard of such a
thing in my life! You must be a very bad young person, indeed! Why,
sir, the thing is the worst I ever heard! Mercy, me! Not want to be a
Butterfly! Oh, my, my!”

“Oh, but Ants do not turn into Butterflies!” explained Anthony, for, as
young as he was, he knew that he never would be anything but an Ant if
he lived ever so long.

“Don’t tell me that!” cried the fuzzy, fussy Caterpillar. “The thing is
unbelievable! Besides, did I not meet you on your long travel? There,
sir, that proves you are soon going to take your long sleep and wake
up a Butterfly, unless you have spoiled your chances by telling such a
wrong story as that! Perhaps you will say you have not been eating all
you can hold, up to this time, on purpose to get ready for the long
sleep when there will be no chance to eat.”

“No,” answered the Ant, “I have not been eating all I can hold at all,
for my food has about given out, and I have been across the stream to
refresh myself with the juice of the berries on a large bush. I could
eat a lot more food if I could get it.”

“Oh, well,” said the Caterpillar, “that is because you are young, you
see. I was hungry all the time till I grew to my full size. By the
time you are as large as I am, you will have had all you want to eat.
You see, you have made a mistake. Here you are taking the long journey
before you have eaten the proper amount. My dear young sir, you have
gotten the matter twisted. You are living your life the wrong side
around. You are beginning with the traveling, when you should have
begun with the eating and kept at it till you had grown as large as you
could. It is a lucky thing you happened to find yourself on my pleasure
boat, for if you had not met me you would just go on doing everything
the wrong way around. Oh, my, my! You might even have tried to begin
being a Butterfly without first falling asleep. Only fancy! Now go
right away this minute till you find a tender young bush, and don’t you
stop eating that bush till you are my size. Then do your traveling,
and you will be ready for the long dream time, and wake up a beautiful
Butterfly almost as handsome as I shall be. Run along, now!”

“But aren’t you going to land here, too? You said so,” said the Ant,
“and you told me to land first so you could see how I did it. Even
if I cannot do as you advise me, because no Ant ever turned into a
Butterfly, yet I shall be glad to help you get off to this stone if you
want me to hang on to the boat to steady it.”

“Certainly not!” declared the fussy, fuzzy Caterpillar. “I have decided
to travel a little farther. I shall not land here at all. I am afraid
I should quarrel with you after all if I did. Push me off! I cannot
have my chances of becoming a beautiful purple and gold Butterfly, with
fancy scallops on the edges of my wings, spoiled by landing. Push me
off!”

The Ant pushed as well as he could, but it was really the fuzzy, fussy
Caterpillar putting his whole weight on the other side of the boat that
started it down the stream again. The last that Anthony Ant saw of him
he was walking up and down the deck as fussily as ever as the current
swept him out of sight around a large stone.

[Illustration: _“Push me off!” said the fussy, fuzzy Caterpillar_]




A VENTURE IN POLITENESS


After there was no more to see of the fussy, fuzzy Caterpillar’s fur
coat, the Ant sat a moment to think at the edge of the water, for the
words of the Caterpillar had given him much to think about. For one
thing, he made up his mind that any one might be too fussy altogether
about things, as when the Caterpillar talked so much about who owned
the boat, and would not sit or stand still while he talked, but walked
up and down the boat in that tiresome way. He had learned that, since
Caterpillars did not seem to know about Ants, perhaps Ants did not know
all there was to know about Caterpillars, so maybe it was wrong for him
to call the Caterpillar fussy. Maybe fussiness was just part of being a
Caterpillar.

Ho! but there was another thing he had learned, and that was that it
was wrong to quarrel, and especially to quarrel the last thing before
going to sleep! Of course his mother often had told him that, and there
were times when he had been punished hard for quarreling with his
brothers and sisters. But, if even fussy, fuzzy old Caterpillars said
it was wrong to quarrel, it must be a thing of truth. Otherwise, fussy,
fuzzy old Caterpillars would not have bothered about it.

It did not hurt Anthony Ant to do a little thinking like that, for it
was not often that he thought of anything but fun, when he was not
carting out loads of earth or hunting for food for the family’s larder.
But after a bit he began to think of his rows of shoes waiting for him.
Then he must find the spot where he had left his basket and little
case.

After tramping a little way upstream, he remembered the spot where he
had left them was a little farther down instead. You know, Ants often
walk along exactly as though they knew where they were going, and then
change their minds and are not so sure after all that was the right
way, and back they go and maybe start a dozen different ways before
they choose the one they had in mind. Anthony Ant found the right spot
before he had made more than two tries at it, and there were his things
all right. But, sir, what do you think? Why, a Ladybug and a small
Spider, Size Two were helping themselves to the things in his lunch
basket, if you please!

Anthony Ant was about to shout, “Here, you stop that! That is my
basket,” when he suddenly thought of the fussy, fuzzy Caterpillar and
how horrid it sounded when the Caterpillar tried to say he owned the
boat. And all at once the Ant became more polite than he ever had been
at home when he did not like the way things were going.

“I beg your pardon,” said he, “but do you know I left my lunch basket
and little dressing case here when I went across the brook after berry
juice? So I have come back to get them, if you do not mind.”

Well, sir, you should have seen what happened! Why, the Ladybug and the
small Spider, Size Two were so surprised at the politeness, they backed
off and sat down and just stared at Anthony. It was some time before
either spoke, and then the Ladybug found her voice.

“It is quite true that I am a Ladybug,” said she, “and so it is not
unusual for me to be spoken to politely by gentlemen, but in all my
life I never have been spoken to so pleasantly by any one. It is all
the more to be wondered at when you find me meddling with what does
not belong to me, too. Most Bugs of any kind would have scolded me or
boxed my ears or at least hollered at me to get out, but you are a real
gentleman if ever there was one!”

“Yes,” said the small Spider, Size Two. “Most Bugs would have eaten me
up or bitten me or something. I never was so kindly spoken to before
when I was poking about other people’s property. You must have been to
college, I should say. I have heard that by the time one goes through
school and college one has fine manners, and yours are the finest I
have seen around here.”

Oh, my! How proud Anthony Ant was, to be sure! He was so glad he had
remembered about the Caterpillar before he said the bad words.

“No,” he answered, “I have not been to college at all. I am on a trip
around the world, so I am not going to college this year, I am sure.”

“Well,” said the Ladybug, “seeing the world also gives one fine
manners, but it depends upon how you go about it, of course. If it is
not well managed, it makes some people most disagreeable, and they come
back home so rude you would not want to know them.”

“How fine a fellow you must be,” exclaimed the small Spider, Size Two,
“to go all around the world in order to get good manners! It must be
much harder than going through college.”

Now, Anthony Ant was honest, whatever he wasn’t, and he had to hang his
head, for we know very well why he was taking the trip around the world.

So he said, “Oh, I beg your pardon, but you are both mistaken, for
I haven’t good manners at all. I was cross when I left home, and I
wouldn’t work when my mother asked me to, nor go hunting for things for
our family to eat. So Dr. Beetle Bug told my mother I needed a change,
and they both have sent me off on this trip.”

“Dr. Beetle Bug, did you say?” asked the Ladybug. “Do you mean Dr.
Alexander Beetle Bug?”

“Yes,” said Anthony Ant. “Do you know him?”

“Oh, yes, indeed!” she replied, laughing.

“So do I,” put in the small Spider, Size Two, “and he is one of the
most famous doctors in the world. It pays to follow his advice, and
when I see him next time I’ll tell him I met you and that you are
better already.”

“Tell me,” said the Ladybug, “is this the best lunch you can find? It
looks so queer to me. I did not know that Ants ate such strange food.”

“Oh, that is because it has been all joggled up,” explained the Ant,
and he told how he had run so hard and fast from the Angleworm.

“It was really and truly a most delicious lunch when Mother put it
up for me, and all the sandwiches were wrapped up carefully in waxed
paper. But now, dear me, what a mess they are in! And sand has gotten
into all the food, but I did not dare to throw it away. It is not
easy to find food sometimes. All I have had since eating some of the
joggled-up lunch is the berry juice from the berries over the brook. I
am going after my shoes and stockings, which I left under a big stone
near here. Then I shall take all my things across the brook to the bush
and gather some of the dried berries that still are sweet. They will
last me till I can find something more nourishing.”

“Why,” said the Ladybug, “I can tell you something that will help you
right out of your trouble. Not far from that berry bush is the finest
restaurant you ever saw. It is called the Wild-Rose Tea House, and it
is of the sort where you go around and help yourself to what you like
best, and pay as you go away.”

“It sounds tempting,” said the Ant, “but, you see, Mother did not give
me any money, and I have to live on what I can get myself.”

Then up spoke the small Spider, Size Two. “Ho!” cried he. “I have
a plan. Let us all go there and have a party. It happens to be my
birthday, and I invite you to come to my birthday party. Run along and
get your shoes and stockings, Mr. Ant, and we’ll wait for you here.
Then we’ll all go over the brook to the Wild-Rose Tea House.”

Well, Anthony felt ashamed to accept the invitation, but they both
begged so hard that at last he said he would. Then he hurried after his
shoes and stockings.




AT THE WILD-ROSE TEA HOUSE


When Anthony Ant had come back with his shoes and stockings, he first
washed himself carefully at the brook, and combed his hair, and brushed
his teeth with the nice Marsh-Mint Dental Cream his mother had put into
his case for him. The Ladybug and the small Spider, Size Two sat near
by watching him and praising the pretty and the nice-smelling toilet
articles his mother had put in for him. The Ladybug wrote down the name
of his soap in her notebook so she could get some at the first large
field drug store she came to. The soap was called Meadow-Scent Soap.
The paper it was wrapped in said the soap was the best for the skin and
made a good lather even in the coldest and hardest spring water.

“I am more than ever sure, Mr. Ant,” said she, “that if you had not
told me you never had been to college I never should have known it.
Any one with such good manners as yours, and also such fancy toilet
articles, could easily make any one think he had been through the most
noted college in the world.”

“You are most kind,” said the Ant. “I can see now that it paid when
Mother made me take pains with my washing and dressing, though I used
to cry so hard when she was teaching me, and I hated to have my ears
washed and squealed like a good fellow.”

“Or a bad fellow, maybe you meant,” suggested the small Spider, Size
Two.

“You are right,” the Ant answered. “But I am taking a lot of pains now,
for since you have invited me to your birthday party I must look as
clean as I can.”

At last his last shoe was on and tied neatly, and he had flicked the
dust from the shoes as well as he could with a little tuft of grass he
used as a whisk broom, and off the party started. The small Spider,
Size Two asked to be allowed to carry the lunch basket for luck. The
Ant let him do it, as the small Spider, Size Two really seemed to want
to. The three soon found a good place to wait for some floating thing
coming downstream they might use for a boat.

It was not long before a fine large piece of wood--a clean flat chip
from a tree--came sailing down. It was white and freshly cut from some
tree a woodcutter was chopping down in the woods somewhere.

“Oh!” cried the Ladybug. “What a lovely excursion boat! The decks must
have been newly scrubbed and the whole thing painted white on purpose
for our birthday celebration. It is going to stop, too. See, it is
coming straight to the shore right here!”

Sure enough! Any one could see that. It came as though by a sort of
magic trick, for the fresh chip sailed as straight toward them as
though it had been alive and they had called to it. In fact, Anthony
Ant had called to it in his excitement, “Hey, there! Chip, ahoy!”

Even in his excitement he had thought it more suitable to say, “_Chip_,
ahoy!” than “_Ship_, ahoy!” you see.

The current brought it to the shore in this quiet pool, though the
chip was so large that the end of it still reached the edge of the
current and the little boat bobbled a bit--if there _is_ such a word as
_bobble_, and if there isn’t there ought to be, for that is what the
boat did anyway. Before the Ant could help the Ladybug aboard politely,
as he intended to do, she had flown aboard herself, so eager was she
to try that snowy-white deck. So the Ant and the small Spider, Size
Two tossed the little dressing case and the lunch box on to the boat
and then made quick jumps themselves. They were not a second too soon,
either, for the current was coaxing the little chip back again to do
more than just bobble idly at the edge of the pool. Off it went to the
center of the brook as the current told it to, and the fun really began.

“I wish we could sail all day like this,” said the Ladybug with a deep
sigh. “It is the best boat I ever have tried, and I have tried a great
many different kinds. It smells so nice too, the wood is so sweet. And
to be on the water a day like this is a dream of happiness.”

[Illustration: _“I wish we could sail all day like this,” said the
Ladybug_]

“Well,” said the small Spider, Size Two, “why can’t we come aboard it
again, and sail downstream after the party? I almost feel it in my
bones that this boat will wait for us till then, and the things I feel
in my bones always come true. Even in the matter of the making of a new
web house, I go by the feeling in my bones. When I start to plan the
house, if the feeling in my bones tells me the place I have chosen for
the house is not the right one, I never build there. I start another
house; and if the feeling in my bones tells me I am right, I know I am,
and I just build the house right off. The feeling in my bones never has
failed to tell me the truth. So, as it now tells me we can take this
trip after the party, I believe we can.”

The Ladybug clapped her wings up and down for joy at that, and Anthony
Ant felt that Dr. Alexander Beetle Bug knew how to write prescriptions.
There surely could not be anything better for any one than a change.

Well, sir, the next stop of the chip came sooner than they expected.
A little sudden breeze from the side sent them up against a huge
water-soaked log that must have lain in the brook for years. The
current, acting with the breeze at the same time, made the chip dart
suddenly up back of this log where the water was so still that the
little boat did not bobble at all, but lay quiet on the surface close
to the log.

“There, sir!” exclaimed the small Spider, Size Two. “The feeling in my
bones must be true, for the boat is safe enough in this harbor for one
while. There’s no danger of anything but a strong breeze from this side
taking it away again, and as the wind is the other way we have nothing
to worry about.”

They crawled up the log to the top. The Ladybug could have flown across
the brook as well as not, of course, instead of having to wait for a
boat to help her part way over. But often she chose to travel as the
Bugs that cannot fly travel; and, as she was making this trip with
these two that could not fly, she stayed with them.

It was a long trip to the Wild-Rose Tea House from that landing
place, but they made it in short time. Soon they were seated, as cosy
as you please, about a green leaf table with an extra leaf put in so
they would not be crowded, and they had the daintiest birthday-special
luncheon, as it was called, served to them by the Rosebug waiter. The
dishes were shaped like wild roses, and there was a bit of rose flavor
in nearly all the food that was served. Sandwiches of rose petals were
cut into rose shape. Instead of lettuce, rose leaves were used shredded
into ribbons, and the salad, made of wild berries and woods small
fruits, was arranged on the leaf ribbons. When the ice cream came, it
was found to be pink and in the form of roses. Even the Ladybug, who
had been there before, had to say, “Oh!” it was so delicious. There was
a birthday cake too, with candles of pink, and the candles gave out
rose scent while burning. This was no common cafeteria meal.

[Illustration: _It was a long trip to the Wild-Rose Tea House_]

Then came a surprise Ant Venture for the Ant. At a sign from the
small Spider, Size Two, the waiter placed Anthony’s lunch basket
before Anthony and raised the cover. Inside, in the most delicate pink
Japanese napkins of rose pattern, was enough of each thing served at
the Wild-Rose Tea House to last Anthony for several meals. A card tied
to the handle with pink ribbon said:

  FOR A PERFECT GENTLEMAN
  WITH THE COMPLIMENTS OF
  DOT-TY LADYBUG
  AND
  WEB-STER SPIDER

Oh, my, my, my! Such a glow went all through Anthony Ant that he felt
as pink as the pinkest rose that ever blossomed on that bush. And to
think that all this joy had come to him because he had not said the
cross words he nearly said when he found these friends meddling with
his basket! Why, he was beginning to have a feeling in his bones, too,
and the feeling in his bones told him that all that Mother Antoinette
Ant ever had told him about being kind and calm and speaking gently was
perfectly true!

[Illustration: _Oh, my, my, my! Such a glow went through Anthony Ant_]




A VENTURE IN PLEASURE


The Ant noticed that before they left the Wild-Rose Tea House the
Ladybug and the small Spider, Size Two, after a talk aside with the
waiter, each had a confectioner’s box to carry. He thought probably
they had bought some of the wild-rose fancy cakes to take home to their
families. But he was so busy thinking how to say “Thank you” to them
for their present to him, and for the party too, that he thought no
more about the boxes, and they all went back down the bush to the place
where the log would bring them to the boat once more.

They spied the white chip gleaming against the dark water below them,
as safe as possible. It did not take them many minutes to get aboard
and to stow their parcels in a space in the middle where no bobbling
would jubble them off into the water. _Jubble_ is a most uncommon word
too, and means what would happen if the boat should bobble so hard that
the things would be thrown off into the water. Then they sat down to
wait, as there was nothing else to do. They all three tried to poke the
boat away from the log by pushing against the log as hard as they could
with their hands all at once. But, in spite of all the hands they had
among the three of them, there was not strength enough, with all of
them pushing, to send the boat out into the free water.

“The wind will change sooner or later,” said the small Spider, Size
Two. “That is one thing always true about wind--it has to change sooner
or later. Sometimes it is sooner and sometimes it is later. This may
be one of the later times, but there is nothing easier to do than
waiting. While we are waiting we can plan about how far we can go and
how long we can stay.”

“If we have to start late, we cannot stay long nor go far,” said the
Ladybug, “for there will be the journey back to take, except for you,
Mr. Ant. You won’t have to go back, of course, since you are traveling
around the world. All you will have to do will be to land when we do,
and keep on going to the right. But we have families who need us, so we
have to go back.”

“That is so,” the Ant answered, and already he felt sorry to think that
the trip with these friends could not go right on. If only they would
go around the world with him! He teased them to say they would, but
they said that, as much as they would like to travel with him, they
must not. Besides, they added, they were not in need of a change, as
they were so happy at home with their families that the families were
quite all the change they needed.

“Anyway, we can have a happy time all the afternoon,” said the Ladybug,
“for our families will not need us till night. Never think about the
saying good-by part of a pleasure until the good-by part of it comes,
is my motto.”

“That is a fine motto,” said the small Spider, Size Two. “I wish I had
it embroidered and framed to hang over the mantelpiece in every house I
build.”

“Some day I shall be glad to embroider it for you,” said the Ladybug.

“Oh, and will you embroider one for me, too?” asked the Ant eagerly.
“I am sure Mother would be so pleased, for she says things that sound
like that. I’ll ask her to invite you to pay us a long visit when I get
back, if you will. You’d love Ant-Hill Manor, I know!”

“But you don’t love it, do you?” said the Ladybug. “You were so eager
to leave it, you see.”

“Well,” replied the Ant, looking much ashamed of himself, “to tell you
the truth, I think it was the work I wanted to leave more than it was
the home.”

“Well, the change will show you a grand mistake in that way of
thinking,” the Ladybug told him, “but I shall be glad to embroider the
motto for you if you really care to have it.”

“Oh, thank you!” cried the Ant. “Give me your address, and when I come
back from my trip I shall be glad to call for it some day, and bring
you the invitation to our home at the same time.”

“It is Knot-Hole Barkalow,” said the Ladybug, “and it is in the knot
hole of the big elm tree nearest the place you found us. My house is
really a small bungalow, but it fitted the house better to call it
a _barkalow_. You come up the tree and tap seven times, and I shall
know who it is. In case you get no answer, you will know I am out on a
little marketing trip or doing errands that have to be done, so walk in
and make yourself at home till I come back.”

“Thank you,” said the Ant, and wrote the address in his notebook.

And then, oh me, oh my! There was a frightful splash in the water near
them, and the little boat bobbled so hard that not only their baggage
but they themselves were nearly jubbled into the brook.

“What was that?” cried Anthony Ant, much scared.

“It must have been an earthquake!” said the Ladybug.

“More like a waterquake, I should say!” gasped the small Spider, Size
Two, who had swallowed some of the water that splashed into his face.

[Illustration: _There was a frightful splash in the water near them_]

“Oh, now I know what it was!” cried the Ladybug. “It was only a
Bullfrog jumping from the log. This must be his diving pool. Oh, but
look! We are sailing at last!”

So they were, and in that plunge Mr. Bullfrog had done them a good turn
rather than a bad overturn! The boat was floating out into the brook
again, and the voyage downstream had begun. Gently sailed the boat.
Though it still bobbled a little from its shaking, it bobbed evenly
and was in no danger of giving its passengers an unhappy jubbling at
present.

It was the happiest trip on the water ever taken in the whole world,
so they all thought. Sometimes the little boat would stick for a few
minutes where something stopped it in its course. Then it would get
free from the stone or whatever blocked the way, and downstream it
would go again. There were many things to see by the way on each side,
and the small Spider, Size Two and the Ladybug explained to Anthony all
the things he did not know.

The boat stopped at a small island of stones and gravel in the middle
of the brook late in the afternoon, and there they thought it best
to end the trip. They carried the parcels to the island and left the
little boat to itself. It might go on once more, or stay as long as it
liked. They would not need it any more, they thought, and they explored
the little island for an hour. Then it was that the Ant found out what
was in the boxes the others had brought.

As they sat under the shade of a thick weed, the Ladybug opened her box
and took out a rose-patterned paper tablecloth and spread it on the
clean stones. Then came afternoon tea from both boxes--even a small
tea-house stove to boil water for the tea in the tiny tea-kettle. They
would not let the Ant open his lunch basket at all. That is why they
had brought the things themselves for the picnic--so he could save all
his, which he would need on his trip. If you never have eaten wild-rose
tea cakes, you have missed cakes worth while. There were pink candies,
rose-mint flavored and shaped like roses, and such dainty sandwiches
you never saw, nor I, either!

After the tea it was time for the Ladybug and the small Spider, Size
Two to go home. Anthony went to see them off, and there was the little
white boat that looked so tempting to take once more.

“Well, we might as well take it,” decided the Ladybug. “Mr. Ant can
come too, for, when it once starts, it may bump us against something
from which we can crawl to a stone nearer shore. He can stay on and
sail farther, for there is a bend in the brook that will take him a
long distance toward the right, and he can get off when the brook bends
back again.”

It was as though the whole thing had been planned to give the three the
best surprise yet. Almost as soon as they were aboard, with Anthony’s
baggage too, the boat started down again, and suddenly a sharp turn
about a rock made the current send the boat in a slanting push across
to a bowlder so near the shore they could easily reach it from such a
fine landing place.

They all made the jump from the boat safely, and waved their feelers
and hands after the boat, for they could see it was not going to wait
for the Ant this time. He would not have that boat ride down the bend
after all. He did not care, for he had his things all with him and
could cross some way later. He had intended merely to land with them on
the bowlder and watch them as they landed, then go back to the boat;
but, as it had floated away, he did not care. They clambered to the
top of the bowlder to see how the shore looked, and all at once they
saw a large sign which said:

  WONDERFUL INSECT BAND CONCERT
  HERE TONIGHT
  FREE
  COME AND BRING YOUR FRIENDS




THE BAND CONCERT


“Oh, my!” cried the small Spider, Size Two. “We ought to hear that! It
was advertised in last night’s paper, and I am sure it will be fine.
Ever hear a band concert, Mr. Ant?”

“Never!” replied the Ant. “Mother never would take me, but sent me to
bed too early to hear any concert of any kind.”

“Oh,” said the Ladybug, “we must hear it!”

“What about the home folks?” asked the small Spider, Size Two.

“I’ll tell you what,” said she. “Go to the nearest telephone booth and
call up your wife and tell her. She will let my family know too, for
she is the best neighbor I have, and we’ll get back before so very
late.”

Ah! but there was no telephone on the grounds, so the small Spider,
Size Two sent a wireless message instead, and the matter was arranged.

As the dark came slowly, a Bat and all his cousins appeared from the
woods somewhere or other and flew gayly about in the air, they were
so excited about the concert. And the Fireflies began to bring out
their little lanterns and try them on the dark corners here and there
to see about the flash workings, and they began their dance about the
place. The Crickets were vibrating their wing cases, and all sorts of
insects that are more or less still all day were trying their violins,
and flutes, and zippers, and zingers, and zoomers, and buzzoons, and
drummerinos, and all the funny instruments only night insects know how
to play. It was all very exciting. The three friends took hold of hands
and sat on a small bench made of bark. They did not speak a loud
word, it was so beautiful. There was a large crowd, for everybody from
all the places around came.

[Illustration: _The Fireflies began to bring out their little lanterns_]

“Which is your favorite sound?” whispered the Ladybug to the Ant.

“Why, I think it is the quiet, soothing sound those pale green insects
with the wings you can see through are making,” he answered.

“Ah!” said she. “Those are the so-called August Croakers. They are a
sort of Tree Cricket, and they sing every evening as soon as the dusk
is near enough. They will not stop till the frost puts an end to their
song.”

“They are my favorite too,” said the small Spider, Size Two. “Those
loud, zippy things that make such a lot of exciting noise with their
funny jiggerettes are all right for a little while to liven things up
a bit, but for a steady, all-around, satisfying sound, give me the
August Croakers every time.”

As some of the concert was sure to last most of the night, the Ladybug
and the small Spider, Size Two thought they would better not stay after
the Fireflies had finished the most lively part of their dance. They
said good-by to the Ant and slipped away in the dark before he could
thank them again for the great kindness they had shown him. All at once
it was as though the night had shut him in with a smothering feeling of
unhappiness. He was alone!

Anthony Ant went back to the dark bench and sat there alone trying
to think what to do next. If the August Croakers had not been there
with their comforting sounds, and the Crickets with their cheerful
trills, he would have cried, he was sure. He watched the Fireflies and
the Bats, and tried to follow the tune the loud, zippy insects were
playing. It must be a sort of Hungarian gypsy dance, he thought, for he
had heard that Hungarian music played by gypsies was of the wild, queer
kind.

All at once Anthony Ant thought of his home and nice soft bed. He was
tired from so much happiness all day and so much loneliness suddenly,
and how he wished he could walk into the doorway of Ant-Hill Manor and
find himself in his own snug corner where the Night could not hurt
him! It seemed all at once, you see, as though the Night was something
that would catch and hurt him. Anyway, he knew it would not do to sit
on that bench all night. How he wished his friends had asked him to go
with them! To be safe in Knot-Hole Barkalow with the Ladybug family
or in some snug place with the small Spider, Size Two family, would
be better than to be alone in a strange place. The other insects were
going to their homes, and the place was getting more lonely every
minute. There were fewer lights from the Firefly lanterns, and the
Crickets were not so cheerful as at first, for even they were getting
sleepy.

Anthony Ant left the bench and stole through the many shadows to the
bank of the brook again. To hear its murmur was a little more cheerful,
for he had heard it all day while sailing with his friends and
traveling near it.

As he walked along the edge he came to the great bowlder where they had
landed. He climbed to the top to see if in the dark there was anything
to be seen. The pale moon was shining faintly over the water, and as he
stood upon the top of the bowlder he saw a sight that made him a wee
bit happy. The boat he thought gone forever was stuck near the shore
farther down. If he could walk down the shore a little distance, he
could get aboard. Maybe it would not seem so lonely on the white chip
where he had been so happy. So he wearily climbed down the bowlder
and, with his lunch basket and dressing case, crawled slowly along the
shore until he came to the boat, and glad was he to find he could get
on deck easily. This he did, and while the chip swung gently in some
weeds without bobbling at all, he fell asleep and forgot how lonely he
was and how afraid he was of the Night. He even had one pleasant little
dream about the birthday party at the Wild-Rose Tea House!




KEEPING DOWN LUMPS


If Anthony Ant had thought the day before that Dr. Alexander Beetle Bug
knew how to write a prescription that was good for something, the same
prescription did not seem so joyful when he wakened early next morning.
He found that the chip was bobbling horribly and that if he had not
used his dressing case for a pillow, and tied his lunch basket to his
belt, probably both would have been jubbled into the brook in the
night. He sat up in a hurry and discovered that he must have drifted
far away from the place he had boarded the chip the night before.

There was nothing on either shore that looked the least like anything
he had seen the day before. My, but he was scared!

“Oh, where am I?” he thought. “I must have gone ’way past the bend
of the brook and halfway down to the other end of the world! This is
awful! I’d better get off right away!”

Oh, but he couldn’t get off right away! The current was too swift, and
there was no chance to jump to anything near the boat. He had to hang
on as hard as ever was, and sail away whether he wanted to or not.
He was hungry too, for he had not tasted anything since the picnic
afternoon tea of the day before, but with the bobbling of the boat he
could not even open his lunch basket. There was nothing to do but to
wait until something happened.

The something which happened did it so quickly that Anthony Ant did not
know what it was. All he knew was that he was sore from head to foot
from a big bump he got when something dashed the chip against a large
stone near the middle of the brook. The boat itself had had its last
trip for a long time, as any one could tell by looking at it. It stood
on its side against the stone, and a mass of weeds and grass that had
floated down after it now wedged it in so it could not get out unless a
most out-of-the-way thing should let it out of its prison.

The Ant had his things with him, anyway, and that was something. Maybe
his mother had guessed that his journey would not all be easy and that
there might be bumps and scratches and bruises, for mothers know all
about those things always. So in his dressing case he found salve in a
tiny jar, and something to put on bumps, and a small roll of bandages,
and even a little bottle of liniment for lameness.

A big lump that nearly made him cry seemed to get into his throat when
he thought about Mother Ant so far away in that cosy Ant-Hill Manor.
Whenever he was hurt, she had such a cuddly way of taking him into
her lap and rocking him in the big rocking-chair, and saying, “Poor
little Anthony! Did he hurt himself on the bad stones? There, there,
there! Don’t cry now, Mother’s petkins! It will be all well soon. Let
Mother kiss it. There, there! See the pretty pictures of all the little
Antlets in the nice picture book Mother will show him. Here’s a little
Antlet that got hurt just like you. Such a naughty little Antlet that
ran away from his dear mother and brothers and sisters once upon a
time, and fell down a terrible hill, and bumped both his knees on his
frontest legs, and tore his best clothes! Oh, my, my! Look at him, and
see how he is crying! And here he is in another picture, trying to get
home to dear Mother, and here she is coming after him and picking him
up, and here--”

But Anthony Ant had to stop that minute thinking about all that, for it
made that lump so big that the tears were all ready to tumble down from
the tear places in his eyes. How the whole family would laugh at him if
he let cuddly thoughts turn him into a baby and send him back home like
a silly coward! He would stick to the doctor’s prescription whatever
happened, for even his mother, who never had let him go off alone
before, had smiled at the prescription and had helped him get ready to
go.

Sometimes something from a lunch basket is the very best thing to keep
down a lump in the throat, for often things seem much worse when the
stomach is empty. Anthony Ant, therefore, put salve and bandages and
liniment on his worst hurts, and then sat down on the flat part of the
great stone and opened his lunch basket.

Another lump almost came up into his throat at sight of the pink
Japanese napkins and dainty things, for it made him think of those kind
friends he might never see again. But he took a sandwich right away.
The minute he had swallowed a mouthful both the lumps had gone, and by
the time he had eaten the things suitable for a whole breakfast he was
as cheerful as any Ant could have been far away from home. He found
that the lunch basket had been wiped clean from any grit, and the jar
that had held the honey his mother had put in was washed clean and
filled with a rich cheese made from goodness-knows-what, for it was a
secret dainty of the Wild-Rose Tea House and was not given away to
everyone.

After breakfast Anthony felt better. He even whistled a little tune,
called “All on a Sunny Morning.” He made up his mind to several
sensible things. One was that he would not travel too hard and fast
that day. Another was that he would try to find something to eat before
his lunch basket was empty. Another was that he would not let anything
make him forget to keep both his lunch basket and his dressing case
with him where they would be safe. The last thing was that he would
make the Ladybug and the small Spider, Size Two proud they had met him,
by really always being as polite as he had seemed to them to be, for
well he knew that he was not always so kind and mannerly.

The next thing was to cross to the right bank of the brook, and this
was not easy. The water was swift and deep, and he must wait for
something to float down.

Many odd bits of floating things passed him, but at last came a round
bit of branch broken from some tree, and it stuck in the narrow channel
between the big stone and the next one. It was so unsteady, though,
that Anthony Ant strapped both his lunch basket and his dressing case
to his belt before crossing the wobbly bridge, and he nearly fell off
three times before the trip across was made. There was a shallow place
beyond this next stone, and he found he could get around it and over
the shallowest parts of it on stones and gravel that partly choked the
brook there. One more deep place stood between him and the bank, and
then a willow branch bobbed in the breeze and brushed the stone upon
which he stood. The next time it bobbed down he took firm hold of it
and pulled himself up. The remainder of the journey was easy, for there
is nothing easier for a smooth pathway for Ants than willow branches,
and on this fine floorway Anthony Ant climbed into the tree and down
its trunk to the ground.

[Illustration: _He nearly fell off three times before the trip across
was made_]

Another cheerful thing happened then, for he spied a bush near the
willow tree. On the bush a number of large black Ants were trying to
take home a large Bug they had killed. Maybe you never heard of it, but
there is a law among Ants that any Bug, whoever kills it, belongs to
as many Ants as can get any of it. So Anthony Ant felt he had as much
right to some of the Bug as they had, and he boldly marched up to get a
piece.

It was such a good Bug that none of the black Ants wanted to lose a
morsel of it, and they boxed Anthony Ant’s ears and bit at him and
said things to him that no polite Ant would say whether he were a
black Ant or a red one. But Anthony was brave and spry in spite of his
bruises, and he skipped in between the Ants and dodged their cuffings
so well that he managed to pull off a large piece of Bug--enough for
several meals. Without waiting to hear any of their rude remarks, he
ran with it down the bush and hid behind a rock, where he rested and
took the time to break the Bug into pieces of a size to fit into his
basket. It gave him a comfortable feeling to know that his lunch basket
once more was as heavy as it had been when he first left home.

There was no woods on this side of the brook in this spot, but an
open field of short grass. It would be a good change from dark thick
trees, he thought, and much more cheerful, and after lunch he started
off toward the right, and left the brook behind him. He might meet
adventures in the middle of the field, he thought.

Long before he reached the middle of the field, however, an Ant Venture
happened, for as he pressed forward through a dense part of the grass
he came suddenly upon a large hole--a vast cave it seemed to him--and
over the cave was a sign which said:

  MOLESWORTH DEEP MINING COMPANY,
  LIMITED




AT MOLESWORTH HALL


Anthony Ant sat down on a small pebble to think about that sign and
what it might mean. Was it a sort of side-show cave in there, or was
it a real mine that went down into the black, dark earth farther than
any Ants ever had dug? Whichever it was, it was a strange thing to come
across here in the field. He thought he would wait and see if there
were any signs of life about the place.

There were! The signs of life came all too soon. Something pushed him
off the pebble so suddenly that he did not know what it was. It was
large and soft and dark. He knew that much about how it first seemed.
In a second he was standing on all his feet and looking to see what the
thing was.

“What’s the matter? Were you looking for a job?” came a deep, soft
voice.

“No, sir,” replied Anthony Ant, looking up at what the voice seemed to
come from. Before him was a velvety creature like a mouse, maybe, all
but its head and nose and eyes, and sort of different about its feet.
“I was just thinking about that sign and what it might mean.”

“I’ll tell you that free of charge,” said the voice. “There you see one
of the most wonderful mines in the whole world. I live there, and I
helped make it, so I ought to know.”

“What do you get out of it?” asked Anthony Ant, for he had seen
pictures in the books at home about mines and had heard how gold, and
iron, and coal, and that sort of thing came out of them.

“Why,” answered the voice, “I get a home out of it. What more should
you want, I’d like to know? If you mean what do I bring out of it, I
bring out or push out the earth. I am teaching the little ones how to
do it now, so they can be smart when they grow up. They are quick to
learn and know so much that I have just put up that sign.”

“But if it is not a real mine where you get metals or minerals to sell,
why should you need a sign?” asked the Ant.

“Well,” said the soft, deep voice, “it looks stylish, I think. I don’t
know of any other reason.”

“But you haven’t any eyes, have you?” questioned the Ant. “I can’t see
any, at least not from here. So how do you know it looks stylish?”

Then the little creature put his head down near Anthony Ant, and showed
him such bright little eyes where they did not show much that the
brightness made Anthony blink.

[Illustration: _“I am a Mole,” said a soft, deep voice_]

“I am a Mole,” said that soft, deep voice, “and I am not so blind as
the world thinks. I never could have made so fine a place as Molesworth
Hall if I had been really blind, you know. Now, could I?”

“I should be better able to answer that question if I had seen your
home inside, but all I’ve seen is the entrance,” replied the Ant.

“That’s so,” said the Mole.

“But,” asked Anthony, “what do you have the word ‘LIMITED’ on your sign
for?”

“It seems to be the style with some big advertisers in the newspapers,”
answered the Mole. “That’s the only reason, for when you come right
down to the matter there is nothing limited about my home. I could make
my halls as big as I chose if I wanted to work long enough. I could
tunnel across the whole field if I wished, but ‘LIMITED’ looks stylish
and grand on a sign, I think.”

“But were you expecting others to dig in your mines?” asked Anthony.
“You asked me if I was looking for a job, you know.”

“Of course I did,” said Mr. Mole. “Everyone worth while has a job of
some sort, and you looked worth while. But you were sitting doing
nothing when I found you, so I thought you were out of luck and had
lost your job, whatever it was. Though you are pretty small, I could
give you something to do to earn your supper at least.”

“But I have my supper in my lunch basket,” said Anthony.

“Let me see it,” demanded Mr. Mole. So the Ant opened his basket.

“Now, look here,” said the Mole, “there isn’t a thing in here that
won’t keep all right for tomorrow. So keep it for tomorrow if you are
wise, and just buck up--as they say in the newspapers I find blown
into this field sometimes--buck up, I say, and be a man, and do a
few hours’ work for me, and earn your supper. Save that lunch for the
tomorrow that may find you hard up for food that is not always to be
had for the wishing.”

“Very well,” agreed the Ant, “and thank you. What is the work?”

“We are running a short gallery through a little section of Molesworth
Hall,” said Mr. Mole, “and, though you are small and cannot carry much
at a time, the short gallery is near the entrance and you won’t have
far to tramp. You look like a good digger, and the earth is soft. Even
if you won’t be much of a help to me, I’m glad to offer you a good
supper for what you carry out before then.”

“All right,” said the Ant, and followed the Mole into the cave.

Inside, he met Mrs. Mole and the little Moles, and they were kind to
him and showed him the wonderful passageways of Molesworth Hall. Then
they scurried off to their work, and the Ant began to labor where he
was taken by Mr. Mole.

Now Anthony Ant was too battered and sore to feel much like working. He
felt lame all over, and the bumps and bruises were pretty bad. But it
would never do to let Mr. Mole think him somebody not worth while, so
he never rested once from the time he started. Mr. Mole, who, unknown
to Anthony Ant, was watching him all the time from around the corner of
the main passage, and who had guessed that the Ant had run away from a
good home for some foolish reason, had to smile to see how plucky the
little chap was.

It was a pretty weary Ant that took out his last load that night and
then washed up outside the cave. The dew was already on the grass, and
the cool wetness of it felt good when he washed his face and all his
hands. When he was clean enough to suit himself, he went in and found
Mr. and Mrs. Mole and the little Moles eating supper. They helped him
to bits of roots Mrs. Mole had prepared some way or other, and a sip
of herb tea rested him a lot. They told him he was welcome to stay
all night too, but he thanked them and said he thought he would go a
little farther on his way. So they went to the door with him and said
good night in their soft, deep voices, and wished him luck, and the
last they saw of him, he was looking back and waving. The last he saw
of them, they made a happy, contented family picture as they all stood
together in the doorway of the MOLESWORTH DEEP-MINING COMPANY, LIMITED.




A VENTURE WITH A PASS


Poor, tired Anthony Ant did not get so far away from Molesworth Hall
that night as he thought he would before stopping to sleep, and when he
finally did stop he had a most terrible night.

At first he walked as far as he thought he ought to for the time, and
looked about for a something or other that might make a good bed.
There was a fine little clump of sweet fern, and he thought he would
tuck himself up in one of the fragrant leaves of it where he ought to
rest happily and safely all night. He unstrapped his dressing case and
lunch basket and hunted up his toothbrush, and with the dew and his
Marsh-Mint Dental Cream he brushed his teeth as carefully as though
his mother were there to see him. You know that any Ant that never
forgets to brush his teeth with dew and Marsh-Mint Dental Cream night
and morning will not have to go to the dentist for many a day. He had
learned it was always safer to hang on to his things, so he took good
care to have them where he could grab the handles of basket and case in
a hurry. Then he climbed into a dry leaf of sweet fern near the ground.

Now, in the field there was a fine band concert going on. All the
zoomers, and the buzzoons, and the zippers, and the drummerinos, and
flutes, and zingers, and violins, and the other instruments were going
hard and fast. Such a grand lullaby you never heard before, and the
moonlight was enough to make any Fairy that ever lived in a fairy ring
want to get out there and dance to the music. Anthony Ant thought he
was going to have a fine sleep, and was just closing his eyes for the
next to the last blink before really dropping to sleep, when something
moved near him and made him grab his things and run away trembling for
all he was worth. Maybe it was not a thing that would hurt him at all,
but he thought it was and he would not look back to see what the thing
was that moved.

Then he crawled under a dry leaf on the ground. He had slept safely
enough under dry leaves before, and now his heart stopped beating so
hard. He was about to sleep after all, when some night creature of
the field stepped on the edge of the leaf and pinched poor Anthony so
hard he had to squeal in spite of himself. The creature passed on, but
Anthony Ant got out from under that leaf as fast as ever he could.

After standing as long as he could on his tired feet, he sat down on a
tiny stick and leaned back against the stem of a weed. Anything might
come along and step on him, and that very instant he had to dodge, for
a Bat swooped down too near the ground in his mad fluttering in the
air, knocked the stem of the weed flat with his big wing, and scared
the Ant more than ever.

Shaking with fright, the Ant hid under the edge of a big stone and did
not dare to move. If he were only at home now in Ant-Hill Manor where
always there was a little night-light burning in an outer gallery so
that little Ants that woke up in the night were not frightened when
they saw the light, but knew they were safe at home all right! The
moonlight was bright, to be sure, but out here in the big world it was
too bright, and too blue-iferous, if you know what that word means.
This blue-iferousness made such awful shadows of things that might
catch you if they saw you. He was too scared now ever to sleep that
night, he knew.

So he huddled himself into a forlorn little ball near the outer edge of
the stone, for he did not know what might be back under it, and there
he stayed, and listened to every horrible, creepy sound, and watched
every scary, moving shadow until all at once a nice smooth voice said,
“Why, you poor little thing! What is the matter?”

The Ant saw that what he had thought was a goblin shadow, or something
more than just plain awful and horrible Night, was one of those
soothing August Croakers he had heard at the band concert near the
brook. The pale green insect was resting awhile on a grass stalk.

“O sir,” answered Anthony Ant, “the Night is a terrible thing! I am so
scared my teeth just won’t keep from clattering together. Hear them?”

“Oh, yes, I hear them all right,” said the August Croaker. “I have
been listening for some time till I could be sure what made the funny
noise. Then I found it was your teeth. Now, look here! There never was
anything more wonderful than Night in all the world, and never will be.
It can’t hurt you a bit, but because nobody who is as afraid as you
are, ever can be reasoned into thinking so, I will give you a pass to
keep in sight wherever you go.”

“What is that?” asked Anthony.

“Here it is,” said the August Croaker, holding out a slip of grass
blade with queer marks on it. “A pass is something that you show and it
takes you in free at a show. Now Night is a wonderful show. This is a
pass to carry with you, and it will take you safely through any hour
of the Night without letting a thing hurt you. It makes you go free of
scares, you see. So long as you keep it in plain sight, you are all
right. Try it.”

“Oh, thank you!” cried Anthony Ant, as he fastened the pass under the
strap of his dressing case. And the minute the pass was in place he
felt as brave as a large Lion, Size Eighty-one.

“Now,” said the August Croaker, “lie right down where you are. Even
if there should be a whole menagerie behind you in the shadows of
the stone, not a thing can hurt you. The words on the pass will see
to that. Go to sleep now while I sing you my best lullaby on the G
string.” And he began a soft “G,G,G,G,G,G,G,” with a sort of trill in
it, that was most soothing.

“What are the words on the pass?” asked Anthony Ant sleepily.

“They are written in Japanese style, sort of,” said the August Croaker.
“That is, you have to read them up and down instead of across, and they
say:

  +--------------------------+
  |  T      A      T      F  |
  |  H      N      H      R  |
  |  I      T      R      E  |
  |  S      H      O      E  |
  |         O      U         |
  |  I      N      G      F  |
  |  S      Y      H      R  |
  |                       O  |
  |  T      A      A      M  |
  |  O      N      N         |
  |         T      Y      H  |
  |  P                    A  |
  |  A             N      R  |
  |  S             I      M  |
  |  S             G         |
  |                H         |
  |                T         |
  +--------------------------+




AN ANT VENTURE IN GOING UP


“Oh, my, but what a lovely dream I had!” cried the Ant the next morning
as he woke up bright and early. He thought he was still talking to the
August Croaker, but found he was alone after all, as the August Croaker
had gone off to take his sleep because he was on night duty, you see,
every night.

There was the pass, anyway, Anthony Ant saw as he gathered his things
together and came out from under the stone. He took his morning bath in
dewdrops, and, smelling sweet from the scent of the Marsh-Mint Dental
Cream and the Meadow-Scent Soap, he perched himself on a low grass
blade and ate some of the luncheon in his basket. As he intended taking
a long tramp on his way that morning, he even ate a small piece of the
Bug he had run away with, for, though at home he did not eat meat for
breakfast, he knew that for a long, hard tramp there was nothing like
meat to give one strength.

Then, when all ready for the march, he looked at the sun to be sure
he was starting in the right pathway, and off he went over a blade
and under a blade; over a stone and across a plain space; and under a
stick; and up a weed; and down a branch of the weed to another weed;
and on to a daisy and down the daisy; and along a leaf to the tip;
and over to a clover stem; and up the clover stem; and over to a high
grass; and along the high grass to a bush; and down the bush to the
ground; and along the ground to a rock; and up the rock and over the
rock and down the rock; and across a dandelion; and up a burdock; and
on to a big bowlder and over the big bowlder and down the big bowlder;
and up a high goldenrod to the top; and over to another goldenrod top;
and down that goldenrod stem to the ground; and along the ground to
a berry bush. My, but that was a long tramp to take without a rest
between times!

As long a tramp as that was, he was not too tired to climb the bush
when all at once he saw a berry above his head, high up ever so far.
Up he went hard and fast, for nothing would taste so good that very
minute as some berry juice, he thought. So up the bush went Anthony Ant
of Ant-Hill Manor until he came to the branch that had the berry on
it--and, oh me, oh my! Sometimes things are better than they seem to
be, just as sometimes things are not so bad as they look. Why! Not only
was there one berry on that branch, but under some leaves, hidden from
his first glance, were more berries--just loads of them--and they were
even more juicy than the berry he went up the bush to get!

Well, sir, Anthony Ant danced a jig of joy on a leaf before he
tasted a berry at all. Then he sat down--where do you think?--not
near a berry--no, sir-ee!--but on it, for the berry was a large, fat
blackberry with plenty of room on top for more than one Ant. He was the
only one there, so all the room was his. All he had to do was to sit
there on the firm, smooth, warm berry heated from the sun to the very
core, and bite into one of the pulpy balls that covered the seeds of
the berry. So up he climbed to the top of the berry, and, for fear he
might lose his things, he strapped them to his belt instead of setting
them down anywhere. A lucky thing it was, for no sooner had he begun
to bite into the berry, and to think how lovely that juice was, than
all at once something pounced down to the bush while he had his nose to
the berry and could not look up so well. The next thing he knew, he was
being carried through the air at a great rate--berry and all--until he
was plumped down upon the wide branch of a great tree ever so far away
from the berry bush.

If the Ant had been scared by such a harmless thing as Night, he was
about twenty million more times scared now that this thing had happened
to him. Besides, whatever it was that had carried him to the tree had
so nipped into the berry that the juice had spattered all over poor
Anthony Ant, and he was sticky from head to foot. However, he stayed
perfectly still without moving the fraction of an inch. He was afraid
the thing that had carried him there would eat him if he so much as
wiggled a feeler.

[Illustration: _The Robin was wondering what to do about Anthony Ant_]

After what seemed to him a long time he opened one eye he had closed,
and there he saw a large Robin looking at him. Now, Robins like Worms,
but they do not care for Ants, and the Robin was wondering what to do
about Anthony Ant. Just now berry was the taste he was after, and here
was Mr. Ant in the way.

Anthony Ant saw that look in the Robin’s eye, so he knew it was time to
move. As fast as he could, he jumped off the berry and ran back under a
piece of loose bark on the tree where he was safe from Robins, anyway.

The Robin was now at work on the berry. He pecked it and poked it on
that broad flat part of the big branch, and he ate seeds, and all the
large pieces of berry he pulled off. But some of the berry slid into
a knot hole, and Mr. Robin did not get the whole berry after all. He
soon flew away--perhaps back to that same bush where the berry grew and
where he hoped to find another.

When Anthony Ant had waited in his safe place a long time and found
that the Robin did not come back to the branch, it seemed all right to
come out of the bark hiding place for a look at the world from that
spot.

Oh, but he was far, far away from the ground now! Even high bushes did
not make him dizzy, but this high tree almost did. He shut his eyes a
second and then took another look. This time he could keep them open
without feeling shivers up and down his spine, so he sat down to think.
First of all, though, before he could make any plans, he had to get
the sticky juice off, and it seemed to Anthony Ant that he never had
done so much scrubbing in his life. A lucky thing it was for him that
he had strapped his things on good and tight, for he was glad enough
now to have all the things in his little case. As well as he could
without any water, he scraped and rubbed and polished himself as he had
been taught, and as his wash cloth was still rather wet from the last
washing he had taken that morning he managed very well indeed.

There were little drops of juice the Robin had spattered where he poked
at the berry. These Anthony Ant drank up right away, and then thought
of the knot hole where the remainder of the berry had rolled. He ran
to look, and, sure enough, there it was! The Robin’s bill could not
possibly have reached it, but nothing was easier than for Anthony Ant
to go into the hole after the berry, so into the hole he went.

He tugged and he pulled, and he pulled and he tugged, and by and by he
had the berry--all that was left of it--out on the flat part of the
branch where he could eat it comfortably. Ho! After all, this was not
so bad. It was lovely up in the tree, and almost as good as a picnic
to be sitting there with nothing to do but to smell the nice air that
mixed with the sweet scent of the berry juice. If only the Ladybug and
the small Spider, Size Two could be there also! He opened his lunch
basket and took out a piece of plain bread--plain all but its shape,
for it was cut in a wild-rose shape. This he dipped into the berry
juice and ate it in peace--that is, he ate in peace for awhile, but
not for long, for as he glanced along the branch he saw two great eyes
looking at him from what looked like a mountain of fur!




EXPLORING A TREE


It is no wonder that poor Anthony Ant thought this world was just
nothing but one scare after another. He seemed always to be grabbing at
his things to save them and running off somewhere. Now he clutched at
his basket and case and dashed under that loose piece of bark so fast
that he dropped a sandwich. But he was thankful to get away after any
fashion.

The great mountain of fur came slowly along the branch, and as the Ant
watched he saw the mountain of fur had an enormous brushlike tail. Then
he knew the thing was a Squirrel, and, however bad a Squirrel might be,
it did not eat Ants, anyway. But it had feet and might step on Anthony,
so the Ant kept under cover to see what happened.

[Illustration: _The Squirrel did not speak_]

The Squirrel did not speak, but went along the branch and gave a jump
to another branch so far away that the Ant held his breath, thinking
the Squirrel surely must have fallen. But not at all! Mr. Squirrel was
safe and sound over on the other side of the tree before you could say
his name, almost.

Then the Ant tried coming out once more, and this time he ate the
sandwich he had dropped and a little more of the berry. Then he thought
it might be a long time before he found another berry bush again, so he
left the remainder of the berry to dry in the sun, since dried berries
can be easily packed to carry, and there is no danger of juice getting
over the other things in the basket. The taste is sweet for a long time
too.

Anthony Ant thought he would better see what a tree was like now that
he was in one, and after he had explored it he could go down to the
ground and off around the remainder of the world. It would save time
to see this tree now, and he would not have to climb another. One tree
must be more or less like all the others. So he tried one branch after
another. If he had thought he was alone in that tree after the Robin
and the Squirrel had left it, he was very much mistaken. It was full of
people--or rather, creatures.

The first one he met was a yellow Caterpillar different from any he
had seen before. After that he saw a small Measuring Worm that tries
to measure everything it travels over, inch by inch. Inchworm is its
other name. Then came a funny Bug that looked at him out of the corners
of his eyes in such a queer way that Anthony Ant knew it would be no
use to try to talk to him, as the Bug did not look like one that wanted
to talk to any one. Then came a branch with a lot of tiny red Spiders
not much of any size at all. They were friendly enough and asked him
to play tag with them, but he had no wish to play with them, as he was
afraid he might step on some of them or knock them off the branch, and
that would never do!

As Anthony Ant walked out on one of the leafiest branches of all, he
saw where the Robin had once lived, for there was a large nest. He knew
it at once by the pictures of nests his mother had shown him when he
was a tiny baby Ant.

No one was at home in this nest. The young birds had been hatched
many weeks before, and learned to fly, and were too big to have to
be cuddled in nests any more. It was interesting to see a real nest,
anyway, and the Ant began to think he had learned enough so far on his
trip to make a book good enough for schools.

He was feeling pretty puffed up at being so smart, when all at once
another thing happened to make him forget everything but running off to
hide again. There was the worst hammering under him you could think
of. Anthony Ant just scuttered up to a higher twig right away and
peeked down.

“Tap, tap, tap!” went the noise, and my! It was nothing but another
Bird. This one had the red on his head instead of on his breast like
Mr. Robin. Since Anthony Ant knew that this hammering Bird was a
Woodpecker and hunted for Grubs and Bugs in tree trunks, he crawled
out on to the stem of a leaf where there was no chance for a big Bird
to light, and just hid in a fold of the leaf until the Woodpecker flew
away.

The next thing that Anthony Ant found was something that made him give
a glad cry. It was a tiny green Worm--the very sort his mother had
sent him after lots of times to get for the larder. This would be food
for him for many meals, and, since Worms do not just walk into your
lunch basket when you tell them to, Anthony watched his chance, gave
a spring, and caught the small green Worm as Ants have been taught to
catch small green Worms since Ants and Worms were made. Though it seems
cruel, it really was one of the things not cruel at all, and Anthony
Ant had a good supply of food for his journey for one while.

All the remainder of the day Anthony explored the great tree. Never
had he dreamed there could be so many things in one tree before. It
was like a big garden and menagerie and shop and city besides. Why,
you could get almost anything you wanted in the tree! He found that
some Ants that looked a bit different from his own family, and from any
other Ants he had seen, were living there in the soft inner wood of the
trunk, and not wishing any better sort of home than that. They seemed
rather friendly and asked him to stop to see their colony.

“We must be sort of cousins,” said one of them, stopping in his work,
“and I’ll look in our photograph album right away and see if we have
your picture in it. Come into the parlor.”

Anthony went inside, but the place had a stuffy, woodeny, musty smell
to him, and he was quite sure he would not like to be a tree Ant and
have to live there.

They looked over the album, and oh me, oh my! There seemed to be no end
to the cousins those tree Ants had! There were pictures of baby Ants,
and growing-up Ants, and grown-up Ants. There were Ants photographed
each alone, and with other Ants in groups; pictures of Ants at picnics,
and at school, Ants in graduating classes, and at golf and tennis
and baseball, and swimming, and fishing, and going abroad, and in the
company of other notable Ants, “reading from left to right,” and all
that sort of thing--but never a picture of any Ant like Anthony Ant,
nor like any of his family and their own cousins.

“Nope,” said the tree Ant. “I’m afraid you don’t belong to us at all.
But have some supper with us, anyway. We’d like to hear about other
Ants that are not like us. It would be a pleasant change.”

So Anthony Ant stayed to supper and found, at any rate, they had a good
cook, and the salad of cold boiled Dragon Fly was delicious.

Then the Ant said good-by and went out upon the tree highway again. He
wanted to collect the dried berry for his lunch basket, and it might
take some time to find where he had left it, as he had traveled pretty
nearly all over the tree.

He found it before the twilight came, and, as it was too late to think
of traveling far on the ground that night, he made up his mind to stay
up in the tree until morning. The berry was not quite dry enough to
pack, anyhow. So he crawled out of sight under the loose piece of bark
where he had hidden from the Robin, and thought the morning sun would
dry the berry in plenty of time for him to have it by the time he was
ready to go down the tree.

[Illustration: _When an Owl in plain sight called out, “Hoot!” Anthony
smiled_]

It had been a busy day, and he was glad to settle himself early for a
night’s sleep. Mr. Bat, coming out from a hollow in the tree, swooped
close to Anthony Ant, but Anthony only smiled, and when an Owl in plain
sight called out, “Hoot!” Anthony smiled again, and of course you
know it was because he had the pass that said:

  +--------------------------+
  |  T      A      T      F  |
  |  H      N      H      R  |
  |  I      T      R      E  |
  |  S      H      O      E  |
  |         O      U         |
  |  I      N      G      F  |
  |  S      Y      H      R  |
  |                       O  |
  |  T      A      A      M  |
  |  O      N      N         |
  |         T      Y      H  |
  |  P                    A  |
  |  A             N      R  |
  |  S             I      M  |
  |  S             G         |
  |                H         |
  |                T         |
  +--------------------------+




A VENTURE OF MOTTOES


The first thing to be done in the morning was to pack up what was left
of the berry, of course. After his long sleep, and a scrubbing at a dew
basin in a hollow of a leaf, and a good breakfast of some of the things
in his lunch basket, the Ant felt ready to walk miles. So he packed up
the dried berry and started down the tree, eager to be off over the
field again and to see some more of the world.

For a wide space under the tree the traveling was easy, for the ground
was fairly smooth and not cluttered up with things to be climbed over
and under. But that soon came to an end, and the same sort of trip
he had taken yesterday, when he went over and under, and down and up
things all the time, had to be taken again for a long distance. This
might be the way the entire journey around the world would be, for all
he knew.

Everywhere along the way the whole field was busy with life. Everyone
was working busily, and not one creature he met was sitting idle.
Half of the ones he met did not so much as see him, they were so
busy, and the other half took time merely to look at him, or to say,
“Good-morning!” in such a hurry that they hardly knew they were saying
it.

One old Grasshopper, however, stopped his cutting of a grass stem for
a minute. “What!” exclaimed the Grasshopper. “Do you mean to tell me
you are going off for a picnic, you young rascal? You ought to be at
home working with your family. You are a bad boy, sir! The very idea!
I never heard of such a thing! If you were my son, I should have to
give you such a whipping that it would be a long time before you would
forget it. What is the matter with you? Are you lame or anything?”

“No, sir,” answered Anthony Ant, rather frightened at the Grasshopper’s
cross voice. “I am not going to a picnic, and I am not lame, either.”

“Then tell me, why aren’t you at home working?”

Well, of course, you know Anthony Ant had to tell all about his reason
for leaving home, and at the mere mention of Dr. Alexander Beetle Bug
the old Grasshopper put back his head and laughed so hard that he
almost spilled a large drop of molasses out of his mouth.

“Well,” said he, when he could stop laughing long enough to speak,
“I’ll let you go without the whipping. You won’t need it, for, if Dr.
Bug has prescribed that trip for you, you won’t need any punishment
from me. His will be quite enough. His dose will be stiff enough to
fix you!” And he went on laughing so hard that the Ant thought the old
Grasshopper must be crazy.

[Illustration: _“Look here, son!” cried the Grasshopper_]

“Look here, son!” cried the Grasshopper, stopping his laugh quickly
when he saw the Ant was about to run away in disgust. “Now don’t be
angry. Only foolish fellows get angry at nothing at all. That is a
piece of advice worth pasting in your hat: _Don’t get angry at nothing
at all, and don’t get angry at anything!_”

“I haven’t any hat,” said Anthony Ant sulkily.

“So I have noticed,” said the Grasshopper. “Where is it? Did you run so
fast away from work that you did not stop even to put on your hat? You
must be a Gubblechook! And yet you took time to get your lunch basket
and other things, I notice. You don’t look much like a Gubblechook,
either--not yet, anyway.”

“What is a Gubblechook?” asked the Ant.

“A Gubblechook,” replied the Grasshopper, “is a fellow who is afraid of
work--so afraid of it that even if he could see the shadow of it coming
around a corner he would run and hide where he could not see it. You
can always tell a Gubblechook when you see one too.”

“How?” asked the Ant.

“Oh, by his looks,” said the Grasshopper. “He begins to look sort
of gubbly and chooky after awhile. His eyes lose their shine that
is better than Fireflies’ sparks. His mouth droops like a withered
squash blossom. His hair falls around over his face and flops in
strings around his ears. His tongue hangs out after awhile. His nose
points down for keeps, and he ends by sleeping forever and ever, and
then seven more forevers besides. If you don’t look out, you’ll be a
Gubblechook before long. Better paste this in your hat too: _Don’t be
afraid of work!_ It is the only thing that will keep you from turning
into a Gubblechook, you’d better believe! But where _is_ your hat?”

“A Field Mouse ate it,” answered the Ant.

The Grasshopper laughed harder than ever.

“That isn’t a joke!” said Anthony Ant with a pout.

“Well, I should think not!” exclaimed the Grasshopper. “Hats don’t grow
on every bush these days, I can tell you! But, just to show you I am
not making fun of you and that I really want you to be something better
than a Gubblechook, I’ll make you a present of as nice a hat as you
ever had in your life.”

The Ant was ashamed of himself. “I could not take it,” said he.
“Besides, Mother would not think I ought to take it when I can’t pay
for it, I know.”

“Nonsense!” said the Grasshopper. “She’d let you earn it, though,
wouldn’t she?”

“Well, yes,” the Ant answered.

“All right, then,” said the Grasshopper. “Let me see if you have
forgotten how to work. First, I’ll show you the hat to let you know I
am honest when I say it is the best one you ever had--or I should say,
the best you _can_ have, for of course you have not had it yet.”

From a swinging grass back of him the Grasshopper brought out a hat
that would exactly fit Anthony Ant, and it was made of the finest straw
to be had in the whole wide field. It certainly was a beauty!

“Now,” the Grasshopper went on, “I want a certain hollow under a stone
made a little deeper or wider or something, so I can get in and out
better. That stone covers my favorite rest room, but the hollow is too
small for me to wiggle into and out of easily. Here is a shovel.”

Well, sir, Anthony gave his basket and case into the Grasshopper’s
care, and went at the job for all he was worth. By and by he had the
hollow big enough so that when the Grasshopper tried it the size was
the very thing.

“I can see that you are still able to keep the name of Anthony Ant of
Ant-Hill Manor,” said the Grasshopper. “It is a pity to let your good
strong muscles get flabby. A Gubblechook’s muscles always do, you know.
So not only am I going to give you the hat, but I am going to give you
two pieces of advice all pasted in, into the bargain. Look inside the
hat.”

Anthony Ant looked inside. The Grasshopper was not a Gubblechook,
anyway, for he had worked hard to make the fine lettering of the words,
and he had taken much pains with the hatband he had made himself.

Anthony read the words inside the hat:

“DON’T GET ANGRY AT NOTHING AT ALL, AND DON’T GET ANGRY AT ANYTHING!
DON’T BE AFRAID OF WORK!”

He thanked the Grasshopper, took his hat and put it on, and, with
basket and case, marched on once more over and under the scenery.




A VENTURE IN QUESTIONS


The afternoon was at its hottest when Anthony Ant next stopped for a
rest. There was such a fine mossy stone in the shadow of a thick clump
of weeds that it made the very place to camp out for awhile.

He took off his new hat and placed it carefully where no Field Mouse
could get it. He was a pretty wise Ant now, he thought, for he had
learned a few things in his tramp, and one was that Field Mice and hats
are not to be trusted together if you ever want to see the hats again.
Then he tasted some of the dried berry and took a little nip at the
Worm he had caught in the tree, and found his sandwiches were nearly
gone. There would be about enough to last him for his supper, and
then he would have to get on as well as he could without sandwiches.
His cheese was nearly gone too. What a good time they had had at that
Wild-Rose Tea House--they three! He and the small Spider, Size Two and
the Ladybug had been such very good friends.

“Hello!” said a voice suddenly. “What on earth are you doing there
eating such nice things all alone?”

Anthony Ant was never more surprised in his life! There sat a Firefly.
You would not have guessed it to look at him, for there was not a bit
of fire showing anywhere about him. The Ant knew him as a Firefly,
though, because his mother had told him all about Fireflies when he was
a little boy.

“It’s all I’ve got to eat,” said the Ant in answer to the Firefly’s
question. “But I’ll give you a taste of anything you want, just the
same.”

“You speak as though there wasn’t any more food to be had in the
world,” said the Firefly. “Your voice sounded so solemn.”

[Illustration: _“It’s all I’ve got to eat,” said the Ant_]

“Well, if you hadn’t any more food except what was in your lunch
basket, I guess your voice would sound solemn, too,” replied the Ant.

“It would not!” declared the Firefly very firmly. “Why should it, when
there is plenty of food in the world? Just because your lunch basket
is empty at times, is no reason for feeling solemn. If there was a
famine, that would be different, but there is food all about you.”

“Yes, but you have to go catch it,” the Ant whined.

“Well, why not?” asked the Firefly.

Anthony Ant was about to say it was too hard work to have to go catch
your food all the time, when he suddenly thought maybe the Firefly
would call him a Gubblechook if he did not look out, so he kept still.

“What’s the matter?” asked the Firefly. “Don’t you know how to catch
food?”

“Mercy, yes!” cried Anthony. “Look in my basket. I caught that.” And he
pointed with one of his feelers to the little green Worm.

“Let’s see,” demanded the Firefly, and he peeked into the basket.

“Have a piece,” said Anthony Ant. “You’ll find it very fine and tender
and juicy.”

“No, thanks,” replied the Firefly, “but I’ll taste this fancy pink
cake, if you want me to.”

“Do!” said Anthony. “Take the whole of it!”

“Oh!” said the Firefly, as he took the cake. “Where have I seen and
tasted such cakes before? Oh, I know! You must have been to the
Wild-Rose Tea House!”

“Yes,” said Anthony, “that is where all but the dried berry and the
Worm came from. Have you been there?”

“Often,” answered the Firefly. “I always stop there on my way home from
a band concert at night for a little cake or two and a cup of Wild-Rose
Berry Coffee. They make a specialty of that coffee there, and there is
nothing like it to rest a person after an evening’s flitting. I flitted
nearly every evening of June, and pretty nearly all of July, without
missing a night, lighting up things with my lantern. But now I go only
occasionally, for the season for flitting is nearly over for us, and
we are spending our time on vacations a bit for a rest from our hard
season. This cake is delicious and is my favorite sort. You were wise
to pick out this kind of cake. It is the best they make there.”

“I didn’t pick it out,” said the Ant, and told how his friends had
taken him there, and also all about the way he had left home.

“Maybe you were sick,” suggested the Firefly, who seemed really
kind-hearted and not one who would lecture him for not working. “You
know that work is such an old sort of thing, that it was invented when
the world was made, and everybody works at something or other always,
whether it is hard work or more the kind of work one would rather do.
So any one who suddenly, like you, does not want to work, nor even help
bring in the family’s food, must be sick--not sick enough to go to bed,
probably, nor to take medicine out of a bottle, perhaps, but just sick
enough so that if he does not have a change he may be sick in bed.
Anyhow, I’d keep at Dr. Beetle Bug’s prescription long enough to find
out how it works--for even prescriptions have to work, you see!” And he
laughed a cheerful laugh at the joke he had made.

“How can I tell when the prescription has worked enough?” asked
Anthony, for here was some one worth meeting. He seemed to know all
about things.

“Well,” said the Firefly, “do you feel that if you were at home now,
this very minute, you would be glad to work hard all day as the others
do?”

“No!” cried the Ant.

“And are you lonesome for your mother and the others in the family?”

“Well, ye-es,” said Anthony Ant slowly. “It would be nice to see them,
but I do not have to cry yet because I can’t see them.”

“How about nights?” asked the Firefly. “Do you wake up in the night
and feel scared, and wish your mother were there, and all that sort of
thing?”

“Well, I’m not so scared since I had the pass, you see, though I do
sometimes wish I was where Mother could talk to me.”

“I don’t think you’re ready to give up your trip yet,” declared the
Firefly, “but the way to know is to ask yourself all those questions
every day. Then when the time comes that you think there is nothing
finer than a good, long, honest, hard day’s work, and you are so
lonesome you’d give anything you had to see Mother, and the lump in
your throat, which sometimes gets too big to keep you from choking out
loud almost, really does make you choke out loud--then you may know
that the doctor’s prescription has worked enough, and you are cured,
and can go home and live happily ever after, just as Fairies do in
stories.”

“I’ve had lumps in my throat several times,” Anthony Ant told the
Firefly, “but I’ve swallowed them. And it did seem sort of nice to
carry out earth again when I was working for the Grasshopper, but I
might not like to carry earth all day as I used to, and I’m sure I’m
not crazy about hunting even my own next meal.”

“Oh, then don’t think of giving up the cure yet!” said the Firefly.
“If you give up cures too soon, you often become worse than before you
tried them.”

“Oh, thank you!” cried Anthony Ant. “Now suppose I should have all
those feelings before I got all the way around the world. Shall I keep
on, or go home at once?”

“You won’t need my answer on that question,” said the Firefly, “for you
will _just know_, and when any one _just knows_, he never has to be
told. You may be sure you will do the right thing without the advice of
any one. Thank you for the cake--especially since you soon will have to
do a little work to fill your lunch basket again. I hope we meet again
some time. I want to know how this cure business comes out. Good-by!”
And off he sailed through the warm air.




AT THE HOLLOW-LOG INN


Oh, my, my, my! If ever Anthony Ant thought the cure had worked, it was
the very next morning! The rain was pouring more like a Niagara Falls
than a plain, hard shower, and he just had to grab his things and run
into a horrid, dark, toadstooly-smelling log where anything might live,
and anything might happen to him, too. There was not another place to
go unless he ran into an Angleworm’s hole, and he had had all he wanted
to do with Angleworms for one while. The rain swished and swooshed and
bliffed and bluffed so against things and on them that it was not safe
to stay under a leaf, nor under most stones however far the hollows
went under them. He would have been drowned.

Away back in the middle of the great, horrible log there was not so
much as a drop of rain. At any rate, the log did not leak, even if it
was as dark as the darkest cellar and might have things in it. He was
lucky not to have gotten his new hat soaked, and he had all his things
with him, though there was not much in his lunch basket.

[Illustration: _Anthony had to grab his things and run into a dark
log_]

He found that all sorts of creatures were gathered in the center of the
great log. There were Crickets, and Thousand-legged Worms, and Daddy
Long-legs; and little Bugs, and medium-sized Bugs, and big Bugs; and
a Toad, and a Lizard, and a green Snake, and a draggled Moth, and a
Walking-Stick Insect, and a Snail in a shell, and a Snapping Beetle,
and a Berry Bug, and a Katydid; and a funny thing that might have
been a Katydidn’t; and an unpleasant, wiggly thing part Bug and part
Worm; and a Locust, and a Slug; and goodness knows what else besides.
For there were all sorts of things he could not see that wiggled, and
twisted, and shoved, and poked, and pushed, and slithered, and slid,
and joggled, and the dark made it impossible to see.

Although the place might be full of ladies, Anthony Ant found the
safest way to keep his hat at all was to leave it on his head. So he
did, for no one was thinking much of manners, he knew. The only thing
any one could think about was getting away from the rain. Why, there
were creatures in there that almost always ate each other when out in
the open. But here they were glad enough not to think of such a thing,
but just to be content with keeping from being killed by the rain.

That was indeed the moment when Anthony Ant would have given everything
he had if he could have been safe and sound in Ant-Hill Manor. An
awful lump, Size Sixty-seven, got into his throat, and was almost
unswallowable! The noise of the rain thumped upon the log until it
seemed as though it would pound it all to smithereens or splintereens.
And the roar of the wind and the rain together sounded through the log
until you couldn’t think, blink, or wink. There were twenty-seven other
noises besides, which the Ant thought he never had heard before.

All at once, whatever light had managed to creep faintly in at one end
of the log was blocked out, making that end as black as the blackest
night.

“Snoof, snoof, snoof!” said something as big as the log nearly.

The whole company made a dash for the other end of the log, and the
rain and wind drove them back, so there they were. If they got out,
they would be thumped to pieces by the rain in about half a second. If
they stayed in, the awful Snoofer, whatever he was, might trample them
to nothing at all. What to do, they didn’t know!

[Illustration: _The birthday luncheon_]

The Snoofer really was a Woodchuck, perfectly friendly, though too big
for any of them to get too near in a crowded place where there was
no room for him and them to pass each other.

“Hello, folks!” said he. “Don’t move. Plenty of room. You’re all
welcome to Hollow-Log Inn. It’s not fit weather for any of you to get
out into, so you stay in. This is an inn, and you’re in, so there you
are for a joke worth having. Make yourselves at home.”

Well, at least they were not so frightened after that, though they
jolly well knew they would have to look out if he turned around much or
came their way.

“Seems good to get in,” said he. “I like my other underground house
better than this, but I was caught when I was making a run for it from
a long hunt in the woods, and I happened to think Hollow-Log Inn had a
better roof than Burrow Hall. Why, I’ll wager Burrow Hall is full of
water. If the rain hasn’t run down through all the entrances, it must
have soaked through the ground above the halls by this time and flooded
them badly. I hope all of you are all right and none the worse for the
big drops, nor for the poundings and bruisings you may have had from it
before you came inside.”

Mr. Woodchuck spoke such kind words, which they managed to hear in
spite of the thumping of the rain and the roar of the wind, and in
spite of all the twenty-seven noises besides, that they knew some one
ought to thank him politely.

But, mercy! Who could thank him in all that noise, when their voices
were so little and his voice so big? They were sure they could not
make him hear, so they bowed politely and smiled. As he could see well
in the dark, he knew what they meant, and said he would do all the
talking, and they need not try to answer till the storm was over.

They all bowed again.

“Before I do much talking,” said he, “I’ve got to have a snooze. I’ve
been on the go all day, and a little snooze will fix me right up. Maybe
the rain and wind will quiet down a little so we can hear ourselves
think better by that time.”

Well, sir, the Woodchuck curled himself into a fat ball of wet fur that
smelled--well, just like wet fur--and to sleep he went, and not a bit
more for the wind, and the rain, and the noise they made, cared he! And
he even snored, and that made the twenty-eighth noise to be heard in
and out and around about Hollow-Log Inn!




THE WOODCHUCK’S DREAM


Maybe you think that after the kind words of Mr. Woodchuck, and the
harmless way in which he just curled himself up and went to sleep,
there was nothing more to be feared from him, but there was!

The snoring itself was pretty bad, but they could stand that. And the
smell of the wet fur, that began to steam when he grew warm and snuggly
as he slept, was pretty bad, but they could stand that too.

The real scary thing about it was that in his sleep he did something
besides snore. He talked to himself, and made horrible, deep noises in
his throat, and sometimes snoofed so suddenly that it made them jump.
The whole log shook with the rain, wind, snoring, snoofing, and other
noises, and trembled like the whole company.

[Illustration: _In his sleep the Woodchuck did something besides snore.
He talked to himself_]

All at once he wakened with such a start that they thought their last
minutes had come this time. But after the big start that terrified
them he was all right, and wakened the rest of the way more slowly and
gently, though he still did a lot of short, muffled snoofings for a few
minutes.

The rain and the wind died down meanwhile, and there were not quite all
of those twenty-seven noises outside, so things really were much better.

“Hello, folks!” he said as he slowly and carefully uncurled himself.
“How’s the weather? Any better?”

They all nodded, so he said, “Good! I hope I did not snore and make
other noises. Did I?”

Well, to be honest, they all had to nod again, and they did.

“Now, that’s too bad,” he said. “It must have frightened you, and you
shall have an explanation. You see, I had a fierce dream, and when I
have a fierce dream I suppose I make fierce noises. This time I dreamed
I was a Pirate with a capital _P_. Want to hear about it?”

Well, of course they had to nod again, and, to tell the truth, they
were all curious to know what a Pirate was, for none of them had seen
one. The Woodchuck was so kind too, for all his noises, that if they
were careful to keep out from under him they were safe enough. He had
them come as close to the center of the log near him as they could, and
then, in as low and soft snoofly sort of voice as he could, he talked
to them.

“I suppose dreams come to us because of things we have been thinking
hard about in the daytime, or things that have happened to us out of
the common. That’s why I dreamed my fierce dream, no doubt. Here’s the
thing that made me dream:

“As far back as yesterday, I was off near a fine cornfield a good bit
of a distance from here, where in the spring I nearly got caught once
for eating some of the corn the farmer had just planted in the hills.
My farthest entrance to Burrow Hall is near that field, and it was
easy to get up there and find plenty to eat in those hills freshly
planted. I had such a scare that time that not till yesterday did I
have any more to do with that field than to run along the thickly
tangled border of tall weeds once in awhile when I wished to go to
another field. But yesterday the field was lying so quiet in the warm
sunshine that I thought it quite safe to leave the tangled border and
go into the thick rows of cornstalks. There is nothing that smells much
better to me than the corn when the sun shines on it. Oh, my, but I
like to take long whiffs of it!

“When I walked into the nice, long green hallways between the rows of
corn, I was so happy I could have sung a song I used to sing years ago
about ‘How Pleasant It Is in My Old Ground Home,’ but I kept perfectly
quiet, for I knew it would not do to sing, as there might be men in
that field. But I wandered slowly in and out of the rows, and felt the
cool, green leaves of the corn brushing against my sides. I took the
longest, deepest breaths I could, and the sweetness of the warm, ripe
tassel blossoms on the top of the stalks came down to me and made me
want to smell that sweetness forever. It made me drowsy too, and there
was such a quiet, snuggly spot to curl up in on the sun-warmed ground
close to a bunch of the thick stalks that I made myself forget about
men and all things bad, and crawled into the smallest ball I could make
of myself. The last I remembered was the good, clean, sweet perfume of
the corn.

“I may have slept a long while, and I may have slept only a few
minutes, but I could not tell. Yet all at once I was flying for my life
through the rows of corn. I dodged here and there into other rows and
then doubled back on my tracks to keep the man who was chasing me from
knowing where I was. At last I was back in the friendly tangle of the
weeds along the fence, and shivering with fright from head to tail.
Through the weeds I could see the cornstalks moving where the man was
rushing about hunting for me. Soon I saw him come out of the field and
look all around.

“‘You old Pirate, you!’ he cried, shaking his fist toward the place
where he thought I was hiding myself.

“Now that is the very worst name any good, innocent Woodchuck can be
called. Do any of you know what it means?”

They all shook their heads.

“Neither do I,” said the Woodchuck. “That is, I don’t know much except
that a Pirate is an awful thing. Once I saw pictures of a Pirate in
a book two boys were reading in the farmer’s barn. They hid the book
in the hay, and afterward part of it was under the corncrib where I
strolled through, one day. The Pirate in the pictures was lean and
dark and fierce-eyed, and he had knives, and a sword, and pistols, and
a great black hat, and a black ship, and awful boots, and the worst
lot of men like him on the ship, you ever saw. The words in the book
were dreadful. I don’t know the meaning of them, but I am sure no good
Woodchuck ever would want to say them and couldn’t invent such bad
words if he tried. I saw a lot of things said about pieces of eight,
about the Jolly Roger, about scuttling the ship, and about walking the
plank. Anyway, I know from the farmer’s looks, and the way he shook his
fist, that he could not have called me a worse name.

“That made me dream I was off on the big ocean in that black ship, and
that I had that black hat, and looked mad as mad, and took my sword
and waved it around my head, and hollered all those words I read in
the book. Then all at once another ship came sailing along the ocean
and fired a big cannon at me--bang, smash! Off I rolled into the
ocean--ker-plunk, splash! Then I woke up, and glad was I to find I was
not so awful a thing as a Pirate with a capital _P_, as they spelled
him in the book. If that farmer had seen the picture of the Pirate
and then looked at me, he would have seen at once there was no reason
to call me such a thing--an innocent Woodchuck like myself who never
carried a sword in my life, nor would think of such a thing!”

[Illustration: _Stepping as carefully as they could, out marched the
whole company from Hollow-Log Inn_]

The whole company thought the same thing, and as the storm had
stopped, and they could make the Woodchuck hear, they thanked him, not
only for letting them stay, but for telling them his dream. It had been
like a lecture, for a lecture teaches things, and they had learned what
a Pirate is.

Then, stepping as carefully as they could on the nearest dry places,
out they went from Hollow-Log Inn: Anthony Ant, the Crickets, the
Thousand-legged Worms, the Daddy Long-legs; the little Bugs, the
medium-sized Bugs, and big Bugs; the Toad, the Lizard, the green Snake,
the draggled Moth, the Walking-Stick Insect, the Snail in a shell, the
Snapping Beetle, the Berry Bug, the Katydid; the funny thing that might
have been a Katydidn’t; the unpleasant, wiggly thing part Bug and part
Worm; the Locust, the Slug, and goodness knows what else besides!




A VENTURE WITH NEW FRIENDS


Anthony Ant did not wait long to see what became of the others in the
company. Some of them were creatures that might like to eat Ants, once
there was no more rain to make them forget they were hungry. But he
soon found that to get over the ground was not a good thing to try to
do at present, by any means. It was so full of puddles here and there,
and the whole place was still so drippy from so much rain, that he
would have to walk maybe miles out of his way in going any distance at
all. Then there was the danger of big drops falling on him.

He went back to the log, but not inside. Instead, he climbed up outside
and sat on top of Hollow-Log Inn.

It was all pretty forlorn. There was no one nearer to talk to than Mr.
Woodchuck down inside the log, and probably he had gone to sleep again.
The log was wet and unpleasant, so that Anthony could not sit there
long, but had to stand up. In Ant-Hill Manor even wet days like this
were not bad at all. Mother Ant read stories to them. They could play
in the tool house, and do picture puzzles, and paint in their painting
books, and make the phonograph play cheerful tunes, and do seventeen
other different things. Never had they been obliged to sit out on logs
in a wet world.

The Ant could not even take any interest in eating his lunch, for he
was too lonesome to feel hungry. Besides, he would have to stand up to
eat, and it would be no fun at all. He did not know how soon he might
need food badly when he could not find any to catch, and the little he
had left in his basket he thought he’d better save for awhile. So he
did not even unstrap his basket, but stood around first on some of his
legs and then on some other of his legs, feeling sort of miserable and
whiney--the way some children feel when they make that noise that is
almost like the cry of a little puppy dog.

All at once the sun came out, and one of the Crickets that had been in
Hollow-Log Inn began to crick, crick, crick from some high place near
by, and the world seemed a little better. Anthony Ant went to the end
of the log and peered over at things, and he saw by looking down at a
puddle on the ground that the sky above was blue, for it had given the
puddle a blue face.

He was crawling down toward the ground near the puddle, and stepping
very carefully around on the dry inside of the entrance of the log,
when suddenly Mr. Woodchuck thought he would go out to see the world
too. In coming through the entrance--or exit, as it now was to the
Woodchuck--he brushed poor Anthony Ant right along with him. The little
Ant had only time to clutch tight hold of Mr. Woodchuck’s fur as well
as possible, and to trust to luck.

Mr. Woodchuck did not know about the passenger he was carrying, and
Anthony Ant was too frightened to try to call to him to stop. So on he
went with Mr. Woodchuck, and Mr. Woodchuck headed straight out to the
open field where the grass was not so deep, and the weeds were not so
tall as near the log. How wet the field was! The Ant luckily was on top
of the Woodchuck’s back, and well down in the fur, so he did not get
the brushing from the grasses and weeds he would have had on either of
Mr. Woodchuck’s sides.

[Illustration: _The Woodchuck went in the same direction the Ant wished
to go_]

The Woodchuck went in the same direction the Ant wished to go--straight
as could be toward the right--and that was something worth while. But
out in the middle of the field was one of the entrances of Burrow Hall,
and all at once Anthony Ant found himself going down into a hole
under a great rock. Something must be done about it that instant if he
did not want to get lost in the middle of the earth. He caught at a
grass blade bending near enough to reach him, and drew himself up to
the stem. Mr. Woodchuck therefore went down into the hole without his
passenger, and the Ant was safe and sound very much farther on his way
around the world, and also in a good, dry spot where it would be a fine
plan for him to stay for the night. By morning it would be dry in the
field, so he could travel twice as fast. He sat and swayed on the long
grass stem, and fixed his feelers, and scrubbed himself nice and clean,
and ate all but just enough for his breakfast in the morning. Then,
when the sun went down, he cuddled into the place where one of the
blades of grass was joined to the stem, and there he fell fast asleep,
without dreaming he was a Pirate, either.

The world was all singing and shining and smelling sweet when he woke
in the morning as rested as could be. Oh, but it would be a fine day
to travel! He could imagine the other Ants of Ant-Hill Manor getting
out their little wheelbarrows from the tool house and starting in
for the day’s work after a nice breakfast. A tiny lump came into his
throat even on this lovely morning when he felt so brave. Just to think
of them all so contented and happy at their work made him a little
homesick. He would have been glad to work with them that fine morning,
he knew. But he wouldn’t go home yet. No--no, sir-ee, so there! He
coughed to show how brave he was. He ate all that remained of his food
to show how brave he was, and the breakfast made him feel braver yet.

First of all, he would go hunting food as he so often had done at home.
When his lunch basket was well filled, he would show that he could take
the whole of Dr. Alexander Beetle Bug’s prescription whether it was
good or bad to follow out.

But here the worst thing of all happened. Anthony Ant was too quick in
bragging about what he would do. He stepped off too lively on his next
Ant Venture. Ants sometimes lose their balance or their footing, you
know, and Anthony Ant lost both his balance and his footing at the same
time. Down he went to the short grasses below. While a fall like that
would not have made a bit of difference to him usually, this time it
did for the reason that he landed upon the veranda of a fine, new home
a large jumpy Spider had just finished building. That is what the large
jumpy Spider built the veranda for. He had made the veranda webby and
sticky on purpose. Though he made it for catching flies, he did not in
the least object to other insects he might eat.

[Illustration: _Anthony Ant lost both his balance and his footing at
the same time_]

“Ho, I have you now!” he cried, as he ran out from his house cave back
in the clover.

“Oh, please don’t hurt me!” cried Anthony Ant. “I fell down quite by
accident. I did not mean to!”

“I can’t help that,” said the Spider. “I’ve got you now, and as soon as
I get you tied up I shall take you back into my house and eat you.”

Oh, how poor Anthony Ant cried! He kicked and he screamed, and his feet
were more and more tangled in the web all the time.

The Spider was just reaching for him and would have given him a big
bite to quiet him until the tying had been done, when a big, buzzy
thing pounded down so hard into the web veranda that the large jumpy
Spider ran back in a hurry. It was a big Bumblebee, and he was so angry
at the way the Spider was treating so small a creature as Anthony Ant
that he flew from a clover-blossom feast he was having, and bounced up
and down upon the web veranda to show what he thought of such business.

When the Spider saw who he was, there was a fight, I can tell you!
Out rushed the Spider with more web ropes and jumped all around the
Bumblebee, biting at him and trying to tangle him in the ropes. But the
Bumblebee took care to keep his wings out of the web, and he bounced
the veranda up and down so hard that he tore it all to pieces, and got
out Anthony Ant and pulled him away from the place. Then when he saw
how Anthony’s feet were tangled, he helped untangle them. Anthony told
him about the dressing case, and the Bumblebee hunted until he found
it, and Anthony’s hat and basket too. It was not long before Anthony
and the Bumblebee had their bruises and knocks bandaged and dressed
with salve and healing things.

“Say,” said the Bumblebee, “that was a close shave, wasn’t it?”

[Illustration: _Off the Bumblebee bumbled_]

“Oh!” cried Anthony Ant. “I owe you my very life, sir! I never can
repay you!”

“Oh, yes you can,” said the Bumblebee with a grin.

“How?” asked the Ant eagerly.

“By coming up to Clover Lodge for tea at four o’clock this afternoon.
That is Clover Lodge, yonder. I’ve got to be off to work now, but I
always stop at four for a bit of refreshment. It rests me, for you see
I’m an old fellow. I’ll say good-by now, but shall hope to see you
there on the tip-top blossom at the hour named. Good-by!” And off he
bumbled.




AT CLOVER LODGE


To sit upon a sweet, pink clover blossom is more than pleasant. But
to sit there sipping clover tea, with clover sandwiches and clover
honey and clover cakes, while you talk to a nice old fubbly gentleman
Bumblebee, is about as magic as anything that can happen.

“It hasn’t hurt you to take a day from your work, I’m sure,” remarked
the nice old fubbly Bumblebee. “You could not have worked after that
jambling and jipping you had in the Spider’s web. It is a wonder you
could even crawl as far as this, but I knew that if you could manage it
a bit of refreshment here at Clover Lodge would set you right up. Feel
better already, don’t you?”

“Oh, yes, sir, I do!” cried the Ant.

“You are such a busy creature naturally,” said the Bumblebee, “that
I have been wondering how you happened to get into the Spider’s
neighborhood at all. I have not seen any Ant homes near there.”

Anthony hung his head.

“I wasn’t working,” he confessed.

“What!” cried the nice old fubbly gentleman Bumblebee. “Not working!
Oh, I see, I see! You were off on a hunting trip after food for the
family pantry.”

“No, sir,” said Anthony Ant meekly.

“Sick, then?” asked the Bumblebee gently.

“No, sir,” said Anthony Ant, and told him the whole story.

Well, how that nice old fubbly gentleman Bumblebee laughed! He laughed
most of all at the point where Anthony told the name of the doctor.

“What! Alec Beetle Bug? The old rascal! I know him well. He is a good
sort, but a regular Villain for jokes too. Oh, he’s all right, and his
prescription hasn’t hurt you, though I wish he could see how nearly it
made an end of you! Never mind. Stick to the cure, only look out for
jumpy Spiders next time. Well, well, well!” And he fell to chuckling so
hard that the Ant could see that Dr. Beetle Bug and the Bumblebee must
have been full of fun in their youth.

All things come to an end, and some come to an end too soon. This
little visit at Clover Lodge was one of the good things that ended
sooner than the Ant could have wished. But Bumblebees have to get home
before dark, and it was a long air trip the nice old fubbly gentleman
Bumblebee had to take to reach his.

“I’d stay here all night if I were you,” he said to Anthony Ant. “It
won’t cost you a thing. You will find plenty of honey in the clover
cupboards, and all these cakes and things are paid for, so take what
are left with you in the morning. Good luck to you! Some day I’m
coming to Ant-Hill Manor to hear how things turned out with you. You
tell Doctor Alec to take a trip over my way some day, and I’ll let him
feel my pulse, ha, ha! Tell him to come over to hear my latest jokes.
Good-by, lad!” And off he went.

Ah, but the Ant did not like to see the sun go down that night! Clover
Lodge was so lonely and cold and blue without that nice old fubbly
gentleman Bumblebee. The sun set in a glow, but it made him feel only
more lonely, and all his sore spots seemed to ache. What if that jumpy
Spider should crawl up Clover Lodge’s ladderway in the night and grab
him! Oh, if only the nice old fubbly gentleman Bumblebee would come
back!

Once asleep, poor Anthony Ant had bad dreams. He woke in a fright, and
in the soft moonlight saw all kinds of things coming after him, or
thought he saw them, which was just as bad. One shadow looked like the
jumpy Spider--so much so, that he sat right up and screamed!

Then all at once he thought of his pass. He took it from the basket
where he had stowed it away, and set it up where he could see it in the
moonlight and where everything else that might come to harm him would
see it. It looked almost Japanese in the moonlight.

Then he fell asleep again and dreamed a Japanese dream of cherry
blossoms, and wind bells, and incense, and storks, and funny bridges,
and a pale blue mountain, and plum trees, and all that sort of thing.
It was such a lovely dream that it woke him up as wide awake as the bad
dream had. But there was a difference now. He was not the least afraid,
but he thought hard.

Now, as he thought, the night wind blew, and the stars twinkled, and
the grasses swayed, and the Crickets not too tired to crick did it,
and the soft moonlight kept on shining. It was all like a poem--rather
solemn, and rather happy, and rather lumpy-in-the-throat--of the good,
cheerful sort that made you want to cry or laugh, or a little of each
without knowing whether you were happy or sad. Anyway, with a shout
of joy, suddenly Anthony Ant felt the last part of the cure of Dr.
Alexander Beetle Bug’s prescription take hold. He was cured! No more
change for Anthony Ant! He had had all he wanted. He _knew_, for he
asked himself all the questions the Firefly had told him that would
help him know whether or not the cure was finished, and there was no
doubt about the matter any more. Did Anthony Ant want to work? He
_did_! Was he lonesome without his mother and the others? He _was_! Did
he wish his mother was here nights when he was scared? Yes, he _did_,
pass or no pass! Moreover, if another large, weepy sort of lump should
rise in his throat, he felt he never could swallow it as he had managed
to swallow the others. He would have to choke out loud! He would go
right back home in the morning! He no longer needed any Firefly to tell
whether or not the cure was finished. At last he himself just _knew_!

So he tucked himself up once more, slept the remainder of the night in
peace, and finished that lovely Japanese dream.




WHAT THE YELLOWBIRD SAID


Now in the morning, as we know, things look very different. What people
make up their minds in the night to do the next day, they sometimes do
not carry out at all. But with Anthony Ant this was not so. He was more
than ever sure the right thing to do was to go back home. The more he
thought of it, the surer he was.

“I’d better not be in too much of a hurry to start, after all,” he
thought. “Mercy, me! Here I was, nearly running off without eating a
mouthful or taking any of this good food to help me along!”

He found that some one must have been there after all while he was yet
dreaming. He must have slept very late, indeed. So he had, for before
the sun had wakened him that mischievous, nice old fubbly gentleman
Bumblebee came to Clover Lodge and played a trick--a fine, good trick.
He packed Anthony Ant’s lunch basket full of the most nourishing food
there was to be had at Clover Lodge, and the little jar that had
held the Wild-Rose Tea House cheese was now full to the brim with
the sweetest Clover Lodge honey. Then, someway or other, there was a
steaming pot of Clover coffee and clover pancakes piping hot, ready to
be eaten with some of the Clover Lodge honey on them.

The reason for all this was that, out of curiosity, the nice old fubbly
gentleman Bumblebee had come back. By the teardrops on the cheeks
of Anthony Ant, who did not know himself that he had cried in his
sleep, and by the way the little Ant looked, the wise, nice old fubbly
gentleman Bumblebee knew what Anthony Ant had made up his mind to do.
So he flew about doing the fine, good trick hard and fast, and then
went about his business, knowing right well that it would not be long
before Ant-Hill Manor would be having back again one of its very best
workers.

You know how hard it is to eat your breakfast Christmas morning when
your presents are waiting to be opened? Well, sir, that’s just the way
it was with Anthony Ant trying to eat his breakfast this morning. As
good as the breakfast was, it seemed as though it was the hardest work
to swallow a mouthful, he was so crazy to be off to the left on his
journey home. But he made himself eat the cakes and honey and drink the
steaming, good clover coffee. Then he reached for his basket to pack,
and how surprised he was to find it packed! He never would have known
who had played this fine, good trick on him if it had not been for
something scrawled on a leaf in a sort of buzzling handwriting, and the
something said, in the slang language sometimes used by such a person
as the wise, nice old fubbly gentleman Bumblebee, “Go _to_ it!” And it
was signed just “B.”

[Illustration: _Something was scrawled on the leaf in a sort of
buzzling handwriting_]

Whether that meant go to the eating of the lunch or to the carrying out
of the home trip, Anthony Ant did not stop to figure out. He just gave
a gulp of joy at the thought of such a kind, thoughtful friend as the
nice old fubbly gentleman Bumblebee had been in his deeds, and, after a
look about to see that hat, case, and basket were gathered together, he
took them and started on the homeward way.

It was pleasant going too. The roughnesses were not so rough, and the
smoothnesses were smoother. Why, he did not even have to think which
way was right and which was left! It was as though a magnet kept
drawing him but one way, and he knew that pulling feeling he had was
the Ant-Hill Manor direction drawing him home.

Anthony Ant steered clear of the spot where he knew the jumpy Spider
had nearly caught him for keeps. Not once did he take his eye off the
track ahead to be sure no other jumpy Spider was ready to pounce upon
him.

No jumpy Spider pounced upon him, but there was one very exciting Ant
Venture yet. It happened at the top of the tallest thistle in the
field. Anthony Ant had climbed it to get a good view of the land before
he traveled too far over what might be the hardest part of the field.
Sometimes it saves time, you know, to take time. So sometimes it saves
time, in traveling, to take time to go a bit out of your way to have a
look at the general path ahead as far as you can see.

Up went the Ant along the thistle stem, and he did not mind the thorns
the least bit. He went around them and between them, and had no trouble
getting to the top at last. He climbed over the top of the cluster of
blossom heads. There were a few buds not yet opened, and a few blossoms
quite opened, and a very few that had grown so old that their hair had
turned white and was ready to fly away.

He was sitting on one of the fat little buds, where he could see over
the heads of the grasses and low weeds, when all at once something
flew down so near Anthony that the whirring of the wings nearly made
him lose his balance. He dodged back between this bud and the next one
where the something with wings could not get him. My, what an exciting
world this was!

The thing with whirring wings that came to a stop near him was a little
Yellowbird with black on his tail and wings. He was not after Ants
at all, but after the seeds he knew were under the whiteheaded old
blossoms. He busily pulled off the fluff which flew away into the
summer air, and then he dug out the small seeds which were young and
juicy and sweet, as they were not yet ripe and too hard.

Anthony thought it safe to speak to the bird, so he said, “O sir, would
you mind telling me if there are any jumpy Spiders in this way to the
left I am taking toward the brook?”

“Yes,” answered the Yellowbird. “There are lots of them.”

“Oh, my!” said poor Anthony Ant. “I was caught by one once, and nearly
lost my life. What shall I do to escape them?”

“Ho!” replied the Yellowbird. “I should not mind them if I were you. I
never do.”

“Yes, but you are big and can eat them up if you want to, and they are
afraid of you,” said Anthony. “But, you see, I am so small they can
eat me without a bit of trouble, and what to do, I cannot tell.”

“Where are you going?” asked the Yellowbird. “Are you running away from
home? All the other Ants I have met this morning were busy at work. You
are the only one I have seen doing nothing but sitting still.”

Anthony told him all about things, and the Yellowbird said, “Oh, well,
then, I’ll help you. First of all, be on the watch for the webs, of
course, and then steer clear of them. But if a jumpy Spider darts out
at you from behind something where he has been hiding, just say my name
three times to him in a loud voice, and he will run and hide. For if
he thinks I am around he will hide himself, and if he knows you are my
friend he won’t meddle with you. Now, good luck to you, and go home
at once. You will find a straight-ahead road or course through this
field. Keeping always to the left, as you now are, will bring you to
the brook in time, and then you will know where you are.”

“Thank you so much!” said Anthony Ant, and took off his hat to bow
politely.

You know little Yellowbirds like this one say something every time they
dip their wings in flying across a field. Well, this little Yellowbird
flew away soon, and as he flew he said out of real joy at finding
Anthony Ant going back to Ant-Hill Manor: “Back home again! Back home
again! Back home again!” every time he dipped his wings.




THE TWO TRICKS


Yes, sir, it was exactly as the Yellowbird had said, as Anthony Ant
found as he went away from the thistle and on through the tall, thick
grass with his face set toward the left. Everyone was working. Not a
Bug, nor a Beetle, nor a Worm, nor a Caterpillar, nor anything whatever
at all had time to more than nod at him as he passed through the busy
field world. They were all digging, or hunting, or building, or getting
meals, or something of that kind all along the way. The farther he
went, the more he thought how fine a thing it would be to get at that
little wheelbarrow of his again.

By and by, as he was crawling along over a blade and under a blade,
and on the ground, and up a weed to a bridge across to another weed,
and down that weed, he came plump out over a monstrous new web of a
monstrous jumpy Spider. There, sir, was the jumpy Spider’s head poking
out of the cave house at the back of the web. Anthony Ant was so high
above the web that he was as safe as could be, but he saw at once that
it would not do for him to go down that weed. It would land him right
on the monstrous jumpy Spider’s web, and that would be an end of Master
Anthony Ant.

“Oh, ho!” said he. “I’m pretty glad to be up here instead of any
nearer.”

Just for fun he played a trick on the monstrous jumpy Spider. He bit
off a small piece of leaf and dropped it down upon the web veranda.
You ought to have seen how fast that Spider pounced upon the bit of
leaf! Although Anthony Ant was so safe, he had to shiver to think how
he would have felt in the place of the leaf. Then the monstrous jumpy
Spider, looking up, saw Anthony Ant, and began to dance up and down on
the web veranda in a great rage.

[Illustration: _The monstrous jumpy Spider, looking up, saw Anthony
Ant, and began to dance up and down in a great rage_]

“What do you mean, you villain, you!” cried the old Spider. “You young
scoundrel! Let me get at you once and I’ll show you!”

He bounced up and down so hard on the web veranda that Anthony Ant
shook like a bit of leaf himself. Oh, my, my! Of course, he had no
business to play a trick upon the monstrous jumpy Spider, and it was
mean, even if the old Spider was a bad fellow who killed innocent Ants
and things he could catch. Yes, it served the Ant right to have this
scare, he well knew, and the scare was turning out to be a real danger.
The Spider shook the whole web so hard that the entire bridge of this
weed was wiggling so fast that the Ant could not back away on it to the
weed from which he had come, and thus get away. No, sir! He was nicely
paid for his wicked little trick. Unless the old Spider stopped that
shaking of the web, Anthony Ant would be thrown down upon it and eaten
up. He clung on as hard as he could with all his feet and hands. Then
all like a flash through his mind came the words of the Yellowbird, and
in as loud a voice as his trembling would let him he cried down at the
monstrous Spider, “Yellowbird! Yellowbird! Yellowbird!”

Well, sir, you should have seen the sudden change in that Spider’s
looks! He had been black and fierce looking, and now he was almost
gray, he was so pale. Besides, he was no longer stiff and fierce, but
limp and scared, and, as well as the limpness would let him, he lost no
time in getting back into that farthest-away corner of that cave house
at the back of the web veranda.

It did not take Anthony Ant long to climb back along that bridge, and
off by another little out-of-the-way path until he could safely pass
the spot where the old monstrous jumpy Spider lived. He said to himself
he never would play a wicked trick again on anything.

It was high noon when he stopped to eat some of the Clover Lodge
refreshments. How good they tasted! As he ate, he thought of that good,
nice old fubbly gentleman Bumblebee, and how the trick the Bumblebee
had played was a kind one. That was the only trick to play--one that
was good and kind--not a wicked one like that he himself had just
played on the old Spider. Anthony had taken off his hat to cool
his head while he ate, and he saw the mottoes the good, friendly
Grasshopper had pasted in for him. The longer motto he read aloud:

“DON’T GET ANGRY AT NOTHING AT ALL, AND DON’T GET ANGRY AT ANYTHING!”

Well, he had not been angry today, but he had made the Spider get
angry. That was almost as bad as though he himself had been angry. His
mother had told him many a time that even if you did not take part in a
sin, but made someone else do the sin, it was as bad as though you did
it yourself, and you were no better than the one who sinned.

“I guess I was pretty terrible,” said Anthony Ant with a thoughtful
sigh.

All at once he thought of something. He would be braver than he ever
had been in his life. He would go back softly to that bridge and ask
the Spider’s pardon. And this is the way Anthony Ant did it:

He put on his hat, took all his things, and traveled all that long way
back, though it made it nearly half a day more before he would be home.
Climbing carefully and quietly to the bridge, he stole slowly out over
the old monstrous jumpy Spider’s web veranda and dropped a small Fly he
had caught on the way on purpose for a peace offering.

Out came the monstrous jumpy Spider in an instant and grabbed the Fly
in a hurry.

“O Mr. Spider!” called Anthony Ant. “I am the bad Ant that teased you
this morning by fooling you with the piece of leaf. I am very sorry.
I’ll never do it again, and I caught the Fly for you just now to let
you know I really mean it when I say I am sorry. Will you please
forgive me this time?”

My, but the Spider was surprised! He nearly dropped the Fly, and would
have dropped it, only that he was so hungry he already had bitten into
it, and stopped with the bite in his mouth. But never had any one asked
him for forgiveness before, and the more he thought about it, the more
surprised he was.

By and by, in his surprise, he let the Fly fall right out of his mouth
to the floor of his web veranda, and he said slowly, “Well, that beats
me! I never heard the like! To think you would be so kind to me when
I was so angry at you I could have eaten you, and should have if I
had gotten hold of you! I know I’m a gruff old fellow, and I’m sorry
too, and it was mighty good of you to bring me the Fly. I thank you.
If there was anything to forgive you for, I do from the bottom of my
heart!”

Anthony Ant thanked him, and with a light heart said good-by. He ran
back the way he had come, to make up for lost time. The journey seemed
only half as long to the spot where he had eaten his luncheon. Though
it was nearly time to think of supper, he felt well repaid by the good
feeling in his heart for all that long journey back to make his peace
with the Spider.

As for Mr. Spider as he sat in his doorway after his feast given him by
the Ant, he thought and thought more than ever he had thought in his
life. The words he thought were about the same as those in the Ant’s
hat:

“DON’T GET ANGRY AT NOTHING AT ALL, AND DON’T GET ANGRY AT ANYTHING!”




THE ANT VENTURE OF THE CAT-TAIL


The next day Anthony Ant came to a bit of marsh. He had not passed this
bit of marsh on his way out from home for the reason that he was not
following his exact footsteps back. His many little side trips and Ant
Ventures where things made it not so easy to get along made him take a
different path back. But by traveling always toward the left he knew he
would come out in time to the brook, which was a sort of landmark--I
should say, _water_mark, to make it exactly true.

This marsh was a most interesting place. He crawled up a tall cat-tail
to see if he could catch a glimpse of the brook, for he knew the brook
had many marshy spots near its banks on either side from place to
place along its course. This might be one of the brook’s marshes.

At the top of the cat-tail he found he was not yet able to see far
ahead. There were other cat-tails taller than the one he tried, and he
had made a mistake in guessing he could see far from this one. As he
was thinking about the matter, a beautiful Dragon Fly with gauzy wings
came sailing across the cat-tails and lighted upon the one nearest
him--within speaking distance. He was not a bit afraid of the Dragon
Fly. Dragon Flies may catch Mosquitoes and Gnats and such things, but
Anthony Ant knew the Dragon Fly did not eat Ants.

“Good morning, Mr. Dragon Fly,” said Anthony Ant politely.

“The same to you,” replied the Dragon Fly in a friendly voice.

“You are so wise,” said Anthony, “and see so much of the world, that
I should like to ask you if this is a marsh belonging to the brook or
just a marshy spot in the field and not near a brook at all. Which is
it?”

[Illustration: _“Good morning, Mr. Dragon Fly,” said Anthony Ant
politely_]

“Both!” answered the Dragon Fly with a little grin.

“How could it be both?” asked Anthony Ant.

“I’ll tell you,” said the Dragon Fly. “It really is a little spot by
itself, not connected at all with the brook, because there is a good
stretch of land between this marsh and the brook. But it is also a sort
of a belonging of the brook, because, when there are rains and rains
and rains in the spring, sometimes the brook flows right over this way,
and this marsh spreads over toward the brook, and it is almost like one
big marsh, or one big brook, whichever you would rather call it.”

“I see,” said the Ant. “Can you see the brook from the cat-tail where
you are sitting?”

“No,” said the Dragon Fly, “but I have seen it, and this very day too.
I just came from that way. It doesn’t take an airplane like me long to
get as far as the brook, you see. But it would take any one as little
as you without wings a good long time, I should think. I should guess
you had part of another day’s journey ahead of you if you started right
off. Are you in a tearing hurry to get there?”

“Well, the sooner I do, the sooner I shall get back to Ant-Hill Manor,”
said the Ant, “and I cannot get there any too soon to suit me.” And he
told the Dragon Fly all about his coming away from home and everything.

“Well, well!” said the Dragon Fly. “I don’t blame you for wanting to
get back. Now that is a funny thing. It never would do at all for me
to go back to the place where I was born. I could not possibly live
there.”

“Why not?” asked the Ant.

“Because,” was the Dragon Fly’s answer, “I was born down in the marsh
where I was first a water creature living under the water, and crawling
about sort of buglike and sort of wormlike, I suppose, till I was
old enough to crawl up a weed, and sit and dream by the hour. Then I
suddenly found I was the owner of these wings which I did not have when
I was living in the water. So I crawled right up into the air, and my
wings dried to this lovely gauze. The sun put into them all the colors
of the rainbow. Here I have lived ever since, around these cat-tails
where I can sail up and off for ever and ever so far to see the sights,
and then come back here to sit and think about it all. But I never
could live in the water again where I was born, you see, or I should
drown.”

“That is so,” said the Ant. “And what is the best thing you have seen
in your air trips?”

“The best thing I have seen in any sort of trip I ever have taken is
the sun,” replied the Dragon Fly. “There is nothing that can match
it--not even the moon on the loveliest night when the Whippoorwill
calls, and the Owl cries, and the Bat frisks, and the Fireflies dance
with their lanterns, and the whole marsh is more like a Japanese
picture than like anything that possibly could be just plain marsh.
Yes, sir, the sun is the best thing in the world. I have often tried to
fly to it to thank it for my rainbow colors it gave me after my stupid
sort of life in the water.”

“It is lovely,” remarked the Ant thoughtfully, “but don’t you like the
dew too? It was lovely early this morning, and so refreshing to bathe
in. Then I thought nothing could be so lovely in the world as dew.”

“Oh, yes,” said the Dragon Fly. “Dew is all right in its way, but give
me the sun every time. The sun drinks up the dew after awhile, anyway.”

“So it does,” said the Ant. “I have noticed that.”

“By the way,” the Dragon Fly went on, “between the marsh and the brook
you want to look out for the sundew when you sit down to rest anywhere.”

“Oh, but the sun won’t hurt me,” said Anthony Ant. “It never has, and
I’ve traveled on the hottest days. As for the dew, why, it couldn’t
possibly hurt me. Haven’t I bathed in it right along?”

“Oh, I see you don’t know what I mean, but you’ll find out if you
happen to meet the sundew. You may not meet it, anyway, and if you
should, it won’t hurt you much. I know you won’t linger with it too
long, and you are strong.”

“What is it like?” asked the Ant.

The Dragon Fly chuckled.

“I’m not going to tell you,” was his answer. “Just for fun, I’m going
to let you find out for yourself. Don’t be alarmed, though. I’d surely
tell you if it was too dangerous for you. It is for smaller things than
you. I’ll risk you. Anyway, you may not even see a glimpse of it. Lots
of people spend too much time thinking about unpleasant things that
after all never happen to them, so don’t waste a second’s thought on
it. Good luck to you!” And away he sailed to take a nearer look at the
sun.




THE ANT VENTURE OF THE DRAGON FLY’S TRICK


Thoughtfully Anthony Ant crawled down the cat-tail and went on toward
the brook.

“Since I cannot reach the brook tonight, I may as well go carefully,
camp out in some pleasant spot for the night, and rest my feet so that
I shall be able to stand the way of the rough spots around the brook
more easily tomorrow,” he said to himself.

Nothing exciting happened until he came to such a spot. It was a soggy,
spongy, mossy spot in the field where the grass was not too tall, and
where the ground was a bit more moist and sweet fern made the air like
perfume.

Here Anthony Ant pulled off his shoes and stockings and hung up his hat
where he could keep an eye on it. He never had forgotten the Field
Mouse Ant Venture. Then he sat down on a comfortable-looking flat weed
that was almost like a cushion. How cosy this seat was! It seemed to
fit him exactly. As he bore his whole weight upon it the weed cushion
began to fit more and more cosily about him, he thought.

The Ant was drowsy. He thought he would take a small nap of not more
than seven or eight winks before he ate his supper. He started to get
up just to turn himself over a little more to the side, when, lo and
behold, sir, he found it easier to think about getting up than to get
up! He was held down rather too firmly by tiny red hairs that were
folding all about him from the weed cushion. That did not suit him,
you’d better believe, so he roused himself in a hurry and began to pull
himself away. He found that he was getting covered with something
sticky that helped keep him back in the clutches of the thing he had
sat down upon.

At last, by twisting and turning and kicking and pulling, he freed
himself and looked back to see the queer sort of plant that had tried
to catch him. There he saw a tiny Fly already dead from having been
folded in by those fine red hairs of another of the cushion leaves of
this strange plant.

“Ha, ha, ha, ha!” chuckled a good-natured voice above him. “What do you
think of sundew now?”

Anthony Ant looked up, and there sat the Dragon Fly peering down at him
through great far-seeing, horn-rimmed glasses he wore on his air trips.

“I was sailing by and thought I’d see if by any chance you had come as
far as this on your homeward way,” said he, and lighted upon a sweet
fern leaf near Anthony.

“Bring your things over here,” he continued. “Better sleep in the sweet
fern bed tonight. It’s perfectly safe. I’ll help you brush up a bit
first.”

Anthony Ant needed brushing. While the Dragon Fly helped him scrape off
the sticky stuff and wash and comb himself, with the things Anthony
had in the dressing case, the good-natured Dragon Fly told the Ant all
about sundew and how it ate up little insects it held with the sticky
stuff and the hairs that curled over things that lighted upon its
leaves.

The Ant invited the Dragon Fly to stay to supper with him, for there
was plenty for both in the lunch basket, and enough for Anthony’s
breakfast besides. The Dragon Fly was tickled to pieces over the Clover
Lodge honey. He never had tasted it before.

[Illustration: _The Ant invited the Dragon Fly to stay to supper with
him_]

After supper what do you think they did? Why, they just sat and talked
about this thing, that thing, and the other thing, until it was later
than Dragon Flies and Ants stayed up usually. The Dragon Fly told
Anthony Ant all the best of the marsh stories he could think of that
ended pleasantly. Anyway, so far as the Dragon Fly knew, he could not
tell a story that ended unpleasantly. Such stories he never remembered,
as they never cheered any one up and they left bad tastes in the
mouth, he said. But he _did_ tell the Ant about Will-o’-the-wisps; and
about the pale blue, wild iris that blossoms in the spring; and about
Red-winged Blackbirds that bring new stories from the South every
year; and about a Marsh Hen; and about the little Wild Duck that knew
something worth while; and about Frogs and what they meant by the
different noises they called across the marsh on lonely nights; and
about the murmuring of the waters around the rushes; and about the
songs in poems the rushes whispered; and about the Wind that carried
the poems to places where there were no poems. Anthony Ant thought it
all a beautiful dream.

Then the Dragon Fly said “Good night” and “Good luck” once more and
sailed off to bed in the marsh, and Anthony Ant tucked himself up in
the sweet fern. First, however, for fear there might be something he
had not yet seen that might hurt him, he put his pass out in plain
sight. He even took care to guard against any jumpy Spider that might
be around there by calling out in his loudest voice, three times, like
this: “Yellowbird! Yellowbird! Yellowbird!”




THE ANT VENTURE OF A HAPPY MEETING


Oh, but the next morning was a morning worth looking at twice! Anthony
Ant looked at it twice too. All the time he was scrubbing up he sang
the little tune he liked best as played by the phonograph at home, and
all the time he ate his breakfast he thought about the tune when he
could not sing it. He was not long in getting on his way, either. He
was homesick for a look at the brook. Who knows how much more homesick
for the home far over on the other side!

The Dragon Fly, you remember, told Anthony Ant it might not take more
than a part of the day for an Ant like Anthony to reach it. But, though
the Ant started early and traveled fast, he had to make a number of
long side trips to get out of the way of things that cluttered up his
path and to keep out of the way of several jumpy Spiders. Besides,
there were several things that chased him out of his path a number of
times and nearly caught him. So not until late in the afternoon did the
traveler come to the brook.

As Anthony Ant drew nearer and nearer the brook, he thought something
was calling him down toward the right. It was something that did not
have a voice, and yet it was something that called him so plainly that
he had to go to see what it was. And what _do_ you think the something
was? Why, nothing more nor less than a wireless message! Yes, sir,
a wireless message! It told him to come down to the right, and then
straight ahead.

He did this, and as he went on he heard the brook. It was bubbling
softly in the distance somewhere. Then, after a little more traveling,
he saw a sight that made him really toss up his hat for joy. No wonder
he had received a wireless message! Why, there was the famous rose bush
of the Wild-Rose Tea House! Oh, my! The wireless message must have been
sent by the small Spider, Size Two, or by the Ladybug herself!

He lost no more time standing there tossing up his hat, but clapped it
upon his head as fast as he could and began to climb the rose bush.

He was up at last. Ah, yes! And there sat the Ladybug and the small
Spider, Size Two, smiling for all they were worth. They had known how
to make him find the proper place for a supper that night! They had
studied broadcasting carefully, you see.

If it had not been an impolite thing to do, they would have danced
around and around to show how happy they were at meeting again. But
in a tea house so famous as the Wild-Rose Tea House you cannot get up
and jump around without making people wonder where your manners are,
you know. So they merely shook hands with a good, hard grip of all
the hands they three had, and told him his place was all set at their
table, and his supper all ordered, and they had not had theirs yet but
were waiting for him. So it was not many seconds before one of the best
suppers ever served at that famous tea house was placed before one of
the happiest parties of three that ever took place there.

“Well, well, well!” cried the small Spider, Size Two. “Your Ant
Ventures by land and sea, as they say in stories, would fill a book!
You ought to write a book about it all when you get home.”

“Yes, indeed, you surely ought to!” said the Ladybug.

Anthony Ant laughed.

“I know a place I’d never go to try to sell the book,” said he, “and
that is Mrs. Angleworm’s house. She has no use for books, I could see
that plainly!”

Anthony took out the little jar of Clover Lodge honey to add to the
treat. The keeper of this fine tea house of the Wild-Rose came to taste
it too. He said he thought it paid to help other tea houses along, and
he would order some right off, and advertise it as being used at the
Wild-Rose Tea House. It would help Clover Lodge along to have so fine
an advertisement, he knew.

The Ladybug said she would come here often, then, for her afternoon
tea, and always call for Clover Lodge honey with the delicious
Wild-Rose tea cakes he knew so well how to make. This pleased the
keeper of the tea house so much that he told them that if they would
stay for the evening he would serve them large portions of his newly
invented Wild-Rose Ice Cream free of charge. He knew they would like
to have it. At a certain table he would give them they could hear the
band concert with the brook accompaniment and have the best view of the
Firefly illumination. Though it was late in the season for Fireflies,
he had engaged some to come for the evening, and it might be worth
while. They accepted his kind invitation at once.

It was one of the happiest evenings the Ant ever knew. They talked of
the trip on the boat and wondered where the poor thing was now. The new
ice cream must have been magic. It was different from any they ever
had tasted before, and sent little thrills of joy all through them. Yet
each one somehow knew that the whole happiness of the feelings they all
had, came from the fact that Anthony Ant had at last come to his full
cure. They and he all knew he was doing the right thing in going home
hard and fast.

“I am not going to write a book when I go home,” said he thoughtfully,
before they separated that night.

“Oh, aren’t you?” asked the Ladybug. “What are you going to do?”

“Just work!” said Anthony Ant joyfully.




THE ANT VENTURE OF AN EMBROIDERED MOTTO


Good luck followed Anthony Ant all the remainder of the way home. It
even seemed not to be following him, but waiting for him ahead at
every turn. His feet did not get blistered and sore. His lunch basket
once more had been slyly filled at the Wild-Rose Tea House, but this
time by the good-natured keeper himself, who packed it with enough
nourishing things to last the Ant for the final part of the journey. A
good floating bit of stick was already waiting for him at the edge of
the brook, and soon floated gently to a small stone, and from that to
a branch that hung out from the home side of the shore. Then he had no
trouble finding the old trail to Ant-Hill Manor, and when he passed
the Angleworm’s doorway he saw no sign of her.

[Illustration: _Mrs. Angleworm turned back to get her broom_]

Now, since Anthony Ant had learned a few lessons by the way, he
thought all at once about the nice old fubbly gentleman Bumblebee’s
good, kind trick. He decided, for fun, to play a nice, good trick on
Mrs. Angleworm. He took one of the prettiest of the cakes from the
Wild-Rose Tea House and then rapped at the doorway. Out she soon came.

“Mercy, gracious!” she cried. “Here’s that horrid book agent again!”

She turned back to get her broom, but Anthony Ant bowed politely, and
said, “Oh, do wait just a minute! I am not an agent for anything, and
here is something free of charge to prove it!”

He held out the cake, and when she saw that, she did not know what to
say. She took the cake, as he insisted, and she said she was sorry. You
see she had caught sight of the motto in his hat: “DON’T GET ANGRY AT
NOTHING AT ALL, AND DON’T GET ANGRY AT ANYTHING!” Besides, she saw the
other motto: “DON’T BE AFRAID OF WORK!” Even if the Ant was an agent,
it was his work, maybe, and of course he must not be afraid of it. She
wished him good luck if he ever did sell books, anyway.

It was that very day, and still morning, when Anthony Ant stole up to
the high ground above Ant-Hill Manor and peeked down at it. What a
happy lump came up into his throat! What a dear place it was!

Ah, there they were, all busy at work. And there was the tool house
with door wide open as it was until time to put back the wheelbarrows
at night, though it should have been closed each time to keep out any
dampness. He knew that when it was left open like this his little
sister, Antonia, was the one to blame. She always forgot to close that
tool-house door.

He knew what he would do! He would steal down behind it, and crawl
around it to the open door. When they did not see him, he would get out
his own little wheelbarrow--he could see it near the door--and, without
letting them see him at first, he would work till they found him out!

[Illustration: _Anthony knew what he would do! He would get out his own
little wheelbarrow_]

He had no trouble carrying out this plan. He had been working for an
hour before one of them stopped to look up at all, and then suddenly
discovered him.

“Why, here’s Anthony back again!” cried the discoverer.

Then, I can tell you, they crowded about him! They dragged him inside
to Mother Ant. Then they all had a surprise. Nothing surprises mothers
much, as you may find out some day. Long before, she had had all kinds
of wireless messages. Don’t ask how, for I don’t know exactly, except
that they are always inside mothers, somehow. So there was a fine party
waiting for them all in a thicket near Ant-Hill Manor. To this thicket
she led the way.

There, whether you believe it or not, the noon meal was spread. At the
head of the table, ready to carve, was none other than Dr. Alexander
Beetle Bug!

Were there other invited guests? Well, I should say there were! And
there they sat. Even the Angleworm was there; and the jumpy monstrous
Spider that had become gentle; and the fussy, fuzzy Caterpillar; and
the Ladybug; the small Spider, Size Two; the Mole of Molesworth Hall;
the August Croaker; the Robin; the Squirrel; the Flicker, who promised
not to touch an Ant today; the Grasshopper; the Firefly; the Woodchuck
and all the creatures that were kept from the rain in Hollow-Log Inn;
the nice old fubbly gentleman Bumblebee; the Yellowbird; and the Dragon
Fly.

Oh, what a time they had! Anthony Ant sat at the end of the table with
his mother. Everyone laughed and talked at once and had the best time
you can imagine.

Not everyone is rewarded for doing the right thing as Anthony Ant
was--that is, not by receiving presents and being praised, and all that
sort of thing. But Anthony Ant knew inside his bones that it was reward
enough just to come back to his good little wheelbarrow again. He had
had all the change he wanted!

[Illustration: _The insects suddenly tuned up, to the joy of everyone_]

The celebration had to last until after dusk for a special reason. That
reason was that the night insects could come with their surprise. They
had read the wireless messages. Wishing to add something of their own
to the joy, they stole into that thicket until, unseen by the company,
they had surrounded the merrymakers, and at a signal from all the
Fireflies they could muster so late in the season they suddenly tuned
up, to the joy of everyone. You never heard such a serenade in all your
life, I am sure!

In the midst of the enjoyment the Ladybug handed Anthony Ant something
in a large paper. He looked inside, and there was the motto she had
promised, all framed! It was embroidered in a new stitch that looked as
your mouth looks when you smile--a curve with the points turning up.

“I could not embroider the motto in _cross_-stitch,” said she. “I
preferred to make it _pleasant_-stitch instead.”

And so to this day, in Ant-Hill Manor, there hangs, nicely framed and
most delicately embroidered in pleasant-stitch, this motto:

“NEVER THINK OF THE GOOD-BY PART OF A PLEASURE UNTIL THE GOOD-BY PART
COMES!”

That is one reason why I am not going to say a word about the good-by
part of this party. I should much rather have you sit and chuckle
at the way Dr. Alexander Beetle Bug is digging the nice old fubbly
gentleman Bumblebee in the ribs instead of feeling his pulse, while
they both giggle and buzzle over old jokes they knew when they were but
young Beetle Buglet and Bumblebeelet. And I should much rather have you
listen to the music of those joyous insects with their flutes, violins,
zippers, and zingers, and zoomers, and buzzoons, and drummerinos, and
all the funny instruments only night insects know how to play. If you
look and listen until it all soaks right into your mind, you will know
how wonderful was that very most greatest peace of Anthony Ant!




  Transcriber's Notes:

  Italics are shown thus: _sloping_.

  Variations in spelling and hyphenation are retained.

  Perceived typographical errors have been changed.






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