The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Sheep and Lamb, by Thomas Miller
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Title: The Sheep and Lamb
Author: Thomas Miller
Release Date: February 27, 2012 [EBook #38995]
Language: English
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[Illustration: SHEEP AND LAMBS.]
[Illustration: Violet Stories]
Bessie's Country Stories.
SIX VOLUMES.
THE SHEEP AND LAMB.
THE YOUNG DONKEY.
THE LITTLE RABBIT-KEEPERS.
THE COCK OF THE WALK.
THE COWS IN THE WATER.
THE YOUNG ANGLER.
Bessie's Country Stories.
THE SHEEP AND LAMB.
BY THOMAS MILLER.
_ILLUSTRATED._
New York:
SHELDON AND COMPANY.
1871.
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1868,
By SHELDON AND COMPANY,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the
Southern District of New York.
Electrotyped at the
BOSTON STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY,
No. 19 Spring Lane.
The Sheep and Lamb.
THE PET LAMB.
WHERE you see the square church-tower, in the picture of the "Sheep and
Lamb," stands the pretty village of Greenham, hidden behind the trees.
The sheep and lambs that appear so little, because they are such a way
off, are grazing on Greenham Common. The two that are so near you, and
the pet lamb, round the neck of which the little boy has placed his
arm, are in a small paddock, often called a croft, close, or field, that
is separated from the Common by a bank, on the top of which the little
child sits who is feeding the sheep. The girl holding the child, and the
boy looking over his shoulder, live at Greenham, and have come across
the Common to ask how Johnny's father is, and to look at his pet lamb.
You will notice that Johnny looks very grave and sad; and well he may,
for his father has met with an accident, and has not been able to do any
work for several weeks, and is so poor that he will be forced to sell
his two sheep and Johnny's pet lamb to pay the rent of his cottage. You
cannot see the cottage in the picture, nor anything but a bit of the
little field that lies at the back of it, in which the boy sits fondling
his lamb. That girl is servant in a great farm-house, though she does
very little besides looking after the children and feeding the poultry,
for they keep great strong servant girls where she lives, to milk, and
brew, and cook, and wash, and clean, and make butter and cheese in the
dairy. She is a girl with a very feeling heart, and the two boys she has
brought across the Common are very fond of her, and many a merry romp do
they have together.
"So, father is not able to get about yet," she says to Johnny, "and he
is going to sell your pet lamb to pay the rent? I am so sorry, Johnny,
and wish I were a rich lady; then your lamb should not be sold. But I am
only a poor girl, and have but a shilling a week and my victuals." The
tears stood in Johnny's eyes, and he folded the lamb tighter in his
arms, and said, "It's a deal fonder of me than our Gip, for he runs away
from me, and barks at everything he sees. It follows me everywhere, and
licks my face and hands, and if I pretend to run away and hide myself,
it stands and looks about, and bleats for me, just as it used to do
when it was quite a little thing, and wanted its mammy. Father says I
mustn't cry; he hopes he shall get well soon, and next spring I shall
have another pet lamb, and he won't sell that until it's a great fat
sheep. But I can't help it; and I shall never have another little lamb I
shall be so fond of as this, shall I?" And he drew the lamb closer to
him, and looked very tenderly at it when he said "Shall I?" and the lamb
went "ba-a-a," as if it said, as well as it could, "No, never;" then it
lay down, with its pretty head on his arm.
"I'll tell you what I'll do, Johnny," said the little boy who stood
behind his brother close to the tree, "I'll give you one of my lambs,
for father has given me two to do what I like with; then your father can
sell it, for it's bigger than yours, and you can still keep your own pet
lamb. Come with me, Polly, and help to drive it here, and make it jump
over the bank; then you won't cry, will you, Johnny?"
"No," said Johnny, crying harder than ever, for the kindness of the rich
farmer's little son touched Johnny's tender heart as much as the sorrow
he felt for the loss of his lamb, which he came to bid farewell to, as
the butcher was coming with his cart in the cool of the evening to take
it away, along with its mother and another fat sheep.
Polly, who was a strong girl of her age, at once snatched up the little
boy, who was sitting on the bank feeding the sheep, and ran off with him
in her arms to help Charley to drive his lamb off the Common--where it
was feeding--into the little close, to be in readiness for the butcher
when he came with his cart. They had some trouble with it, for it had
not been petted like Johnny's; and Charley had many pets that he cared
more for than he did for his lambs.
When it was driven off the Common, and made to jump over the bank into
the paddock where Johnny still sat fondling his pet lamb--and not until
then--that artful little Polly said, "Ought not you to have asked your
father first, Master Charley, before you gave Johnny one of your lambs?"
"What should I ask father for, when he gave them to me to do what I
liked with--sell, or give away, or anything?" asked Charley; and there
was a proud expression in his handsome face, which brought the color to
Polly's cheeks, and made her feel that she had no right to interfere,
though she had "aided and abetted," inasmuch as she had helped to drive
the lamb into the little close.
"I shall look out to-night for butcher Page's white horse," said
Charley, "and when he passes our door, cut across the corner of the
Common, and be here before him, Johnny, and help to drive the sheep and
lamb out, and tie yours up to the apple-tree until he's gone. Don't say
anything to your father and mother until butcher Page has gone."
Johnny promised he wouldn't, so went in-doors, his lamb following him,
while the one Charley had given him made himself quite at home, and
began nibbling away at a little patch of white clover which grew in one
corner of the field.
Johnny's father was a hard-working laboring man; but farm labor is so
poorly paid for in most country places, that it is very difficult to
save up more than a few shillings against sickness or accidents, which
often happen unaware, as was the case with him; for the shaft-horse
chanced to back suddenly, as he was going to fasten a gate, and the
wagon wheel went over his foot and crushed it. He had not been able to
work for several weeks; and though his master was kind to him in sending
little things from the farm, he knew he must not expect him to pay his
rent, and to do that he had to sell his two sheep and Johnny's pet lamb
for a few pounds to butcher Page. He was a kind-hearted man; for as soon
as the lamb entered the cottage it went up to him, and as he patted its
pretty head, he sighed heavily, for he felt almost as much troubled at
parting with it as did little Johnny.
You will seldom see a dumb animal go up to anybody, of its own accord,
that is not kind to all God's creatures. They seem to know who loves
them and who does not. Dogs, more than any other animals, seem gifted
with the power of finding out those who are kind and those who are not.
One strange boy shall pat a dog, and he will begin to wag his tail,
while he growls if another boy only strokes him. I always like the boy
best that the dog is pleased with. Johnny's lamb laid its head on his
father's knee, and while he patted it he shut his eyes, as if it were
painful for him to look at the pretty creature necessity compelled him
to part with. It then went bleating up to Johnny's mother to be noticed,
and as she stooped down to kiss it she had to "button up" her eyes very
tight indeed to keep in the tears. Johnny kept his secret faithfully,
and said not a word about the lamb his friend Charley had given him.
Instead of running across the corner of the Common in the evening,
Charley and Polly, with his little brother sitting in her lap, came
riding up to the cottage in the cart with the butcher; for Mr. Page had
to call at the great farm-house on his way through Greenham about some
fat calves he wanted to purchase of Charley's father. Polly asked if the
children might ride with him, for she was very anxious about Johnny's
pet lamb; and, as she said to Charley, "I shan't feel that it's quite
safe until I see Mr. Page drive back without it."
Johnny's father was too lame to assist in getting the sheep and lamb
into the cart, so Polly and Charley drove them out of the small close
behind the cottage, while Johnny minded the little boy, who sat with his
tiny arms round the lamb's neck, kissing it, and saying "so pitty," for
he could not talk plain enough to say "pretty."
"Surely this can't be the same lamb I bargained for a week ago," said
the butcher, as he was about to lift it into the cart; "why, it's got
four or five pounds more meat on his back. You must give Johnny this
shilling for himself. It's a much fatter lamb than I took it to be,"
and he gave the shilling for Johnny to his mother, after looking around,
and not seeing the boy. Having paid the mother for the sheep and lamb,
he drove off, and the poor dumb animals stood quiet, and seemed as happy
in the cart as children who are only going away for a drive. How
different they would look when put into the shed adjoining the
slaughter-house, where so many sheep and lambs had been driven in to be
killed.
What a blessing it is that we do not know beforehand what is going to
happen to us, for if we did, how wretched we should feel, counting the
hours and days until the evil befell us, and living a life of misery
all the time. Nor is it ourselves alone that would be made miserable,
but our parents, and all who love us; so that, however painful death may
be, it is one of God's greatest mercies not to let us know when death,
which comes to all, will come. This is not hard to understand, if you
will be very still, and forgetting everything else, think about it.
The two sheep and the little lamb, as they were driven along the pretty
country road in the butcher's cart, could have no more thought that they
were carried away to be killed, than you would that some terrible
accident might happen to you, if taken out for a ride.
No sooner had the butcher driven off than Polly ran into the little
meadow, clapping her hands, and exclaiming, "All right, Johnny! he's
gone!" then she stooped down and kissed the pretty lamb, which began to
lick her brown, sun-tanned cheek, as if to show how grateful it was; for
the few kind words she had uttered were the means of saving it from the
butcher's knife.
When the children returned home across the Common, and after they had
finished their supper of home-made brown bread and rich new milk,
Charley went and stood between his father's legs, for the rich farmer
was smoking his pipe, and had a jug of ale of his own brewing before
him. Charley was deep enough to know that when his father was enjoying
his pipe and jug of ale, after the day's labor was done, he was always
in a good humor, and while Polly stood fidgeting and watching him,
biting the corner of her blue pinafore all the time, and "wishing it was
over," Charley looked up with his bold truthful eyes, and said, "Please,
father, I gave Johnny Giles one of my lambs to-day to sell to the
butcher, so that he might keep his own, which he is so fond of; it's
such a pet, and he was crying so, and Mr. Page would have taken it away
to-night in his cart if I hadn't given him mine, for you know Johnny's
father is lame, and poor, and can't do any work, and so had to sell his
two sheep and--"
"Johnny's pet lamb too," said the farmer, interrupting him, but still
stroking Charley's hair while speaking. "Well, Charley, it was your own
lamb, to do what you liked with; but I should have liked Johnny's father
better if he had sent word to let me know that he had sold your lamb
instead of his own."
"Please, sir, he doesn't know that butcher Page didn't take away
Johnny's lamb in the cart," said Polly, rushing to the rescue, "because
we kept it in the little croft, and drove Charley's lamb out instead,
for little Johnny had been crying so all day that it made us all sorry
to see it."
"I felt sure you had had a finger in the pie, Polly," said the farmer,
looking kindly on his little maid, and well knowing how fond she was of
his dear children. "And now, sir," continued the farmer, looking at
Charley as sternly as he could, while a pleasant smile played about his
mouth, plainly showing that the knitted brows were but drawn down in
make-believe anger, "this is the way I shall punish you." Polly saw the
smile, and knew it was all right, and that there would be no punishment
at all, though little Charley looked rather frightened. "As you have
given one of your lambs away to please yourself, you must give the other
away to please me. Drive it into Mr. Giles's little croft to-morrow
morning, and, as it might miss its mother, let her go with it; then,
when the lamb grows to be a sheep, Johnny's father will have two sheep
again besides his pet lamb. Now kiss me, and say your prayers to Polly,
and be off to bed." "O, I'm so glad!" exclaimed Polly, clapping her
hands, while the tears stood in her eyes, as she came up to take
Charley away from his father.
"I'm sure you are, Polly, for you've a kind heart," said the farmer,
kissing the little maid as well, "and now be off with you;" and five
minutes after he was busy examining his stock-book, and seeing how many
fat bullocks, heifers, calves, sheep, and lambs he had ready for market,
and thinking no more of the value of the ewe he had ordered to be driven
to the little croft of the lamed laborer, than he did of the second jug
of ale he had sent one of his servants to draw from the cask.
Now Polly, though but a poor cottager's daughter, and having only, as
she had said, "a shilling a week and her victuals" as wages at the rich
farmer's was a thoughtful little maid; and fearing that Johnny's father
and mother might be unhappy when they found that Charley's lamb had been
sold instead of their own, she set off full run to Mr. Giles's cottage,
before she went to bed, to tell them all about the sheep and the other
lamb which she and Charley were to drive into the close in the morning,
and how pleased her good master was at what Charley had done.
Johnny was seated, fast asleep, on a little rush hassock, with his head
on his mother's knee, and one arm round the neck of the pet lamb, which
was coiled up before the fire; and when she had made known the good
tidings, and kissed both Johnny and his lamb, she started off back as
fast as she came, for the bats were already flying about, snapping at
the insects, and she heard an owl hooting from the trees that overhung
the road she was running along.
No one lay down to sleep in the beautiful village of Greenham on that
calm, sweet night, when spring was treading close on the flowery border
of summer, with a more peaceful mind or happier heart than Polly; for
she felt that her pity for Johnny's sorrow, caused by the thought of
his so soon losing his pet lamb, had also been carried to the heart of
little Charley, and that but for the words she had spoken the pet lamb
would then have been shut up at the end of the slaughter-house, where,
no doubt, poor lambs were hanging up that had been killed. Pretty thing!
How could butcher Page find in his heart to kill them, so kind a man as
he was? And Polly fell asleep while trying to puzzle out whether it was
not as sinful to kill a sheep as a little lamb, and wishing that roasted
lamb was not so nice to eat as it was, with mint sauce.
THE GREEDY DUCKLING.
[Illustration: DUCK AND DUCKLINGS.]
ALTHOUGH you cannot see her cottage, you can look at a portion of the
brook that runs by the end of her garden, in which the old white duck
and three of her little ducklings are swimming, while the remainder have
left the water and got out on the grass to be fed. That is the old
woman's little granddaughter who is holding the duckling in both her
hands, and kissing it, and the other is her companion, who lives over
the hill where you see a little morsel of blue sky between the
overhanging leaves, and who has come all the way along that footpath to
play with her, and feed the little ducklings. If you notice the duckling
the granddaughter is petting, you will see it has got its eye on the
food in the little girl's hand; and if you could read its thoughts, you
would find it was saying to itself, "O, bother your fuss and stew! I
wish you would put me down, and let me gobble up some of that nice new
bread before it is all gone. Kissing, and patting, and nursing me won't
fill my belly, I can tell you; though it's all well enough, when I've
eaten until I'm full to the very top of my neck, to snuggle to you and
be kept nice and warm, while I have a good long nap." You can see by its
eye it's a sly little duckling; and though it pretends to be so fond of
the child, lying still and such like, yet it's all of a fidget to get
down, and quite envies the little ducklings that are feeding out of the
other girl's hand. That is the Greedy duckling.
Now the grandmother is such a funny little old woman, having one leg
shorter than the other, which causes her to go up and down as she walks!
The villagers call her Old Hoppity-kick, because, when she walks with
her horn-handled stick and moves it along, she goes "hop," and when she
moves both her feet she goes "hoppity," and when she pulls up her short
leg to start again, she gives a kind of a little "kick" with it; so that
what with her long leg, her short leg, and her stick, the noise she
makes when she walks rather fast sounds a good deal like "hoppity-kick,
hoppity-kick."
Then she has a sharp, hooked nose, not much unlike the beak of a poll
parrot; and she wears round spectacles with horn rims, and these she
always calls her "goggles;" and, besides all this, she is hump-backed,
and has an old gray cat that is very fond of jumping on her hump, and
sitting there when she goes out into her garden, looking about him as
well as she does, as if to see how things are getting on. She talks to
her old cat, when she has no one else to speak to, just as she does to
her granddaughter.
She came up one day with her stick in her hand, her goggles on, and the
gray cat sitting on her hump, where he went up and down, down and up, at
every "hoppity-kick" she gave, and stopped to watch her granddaughter
feed the ducklings. "Why, what a greedy little duckling that is beside
you," said granny, pointing to it with her horn-handled stick; "he
doesn't seem willing to let his little brothers and sisters have a taste
of the food you are giving them, pecking and flying at them, and driving
them off in the way he does. I'm sure he is a nasty, greedy little
duckling, and when he gets big enough I'll have him killed."
"I don't think he's so greedy, granny," replied the little maid, taking
him up in both her hands, and kissing him; "it's only because he's so
fond of me, and jealous of the other ducklings when they come close to
me. Look how still he lies, and how he nestles up to me! He's very fond
of me."
"Humph; fond of you for what he can get, like a good many more in the
world," said old Granny Grunt, while the gray cat gave a "mew, mew," as
if to say, "Right you are, old granny;" then off she went,
"hoppity-kick, hoppity-kick," back again into her cottage, the hem of
her quilted petticoat making bobs up and down all the way she went.
"You're not a greedy little thing, are you, ducky?" said the little maid
to the duckling, kissing it again, when her grandmother and the cat had
gone. "It's because you love me so, isn't it? and don't like any of the
other little ducklings to be noticed, do you?"
"O, what a silly Sukey you are!" thought the Greedy Duckling, laying its
head on one side of her face, as if to show it was so fond of her it
didn't know what to do. "Do you think I would make such a pretended fuss
over you as I do if you didn't give me three times as much to eat as any
of the rest of the ducklings get? Not I. I often feel as if I should
like to bite a bit off the end of your silly little nose when you are
kissing and fondling me. Do you know I would much rather have my head
under the water, and be poking about among the mud for worms, little
eels, and frogs, and such like things, than have your lips so near me?
Why, the other day you'd been eating onions; and though I dare say I
shall smell strong enough of 'em some day, and sage too, as I've heard
your old granny say when I have to be roasted, yet that time won't come
yet for a long while, and I don't want to be reminded of my end before
it does come. Why don't you empty your old granny's jam pots, or her
honey jar; that smell wouldn't be so bad to bear as onions,--Fah!"
Now you begin to see what a deal of truth there was in what old Granny
Grunt said, and what a wicked and ungrateful duckling this was, to have
such evil thoughts, pretending to be so fond of the little granddaughter
all the time. It was quite as bad as if a naughty child, after having as
many "goodies" given it as it could eat, made fun of the giver behind
the back, while before the face it pretended to be all love, and honey,
and sugar. It's deceit, that's what it is, done for what may be got; and
if anything, deceit's worse than story-telling, as you pretend to be
what you are not, and to feel what you do not, while a story once told
is done with, if you don't tell another on the top of it, and have the
honesty to confess it was a story when close questioned and you speak
the truth. But deceit! it's so dreadfully shocking! it's hypocrisy, and
I know not what besides, as you have to keep it up, wear a mask, seem
what you are not. O, dear! O, dear! I can't say how bad it is, it's so
very bad.
Now the Greedy Duckling knew which way the granddaughter came, and used
to watch and wait for her, often a good way from the others, when she
was coming with food; and if the little girl in the drawn and
magenta-colored bonnet happened to be with her, she would say, "Look at
the dear little duckling! Though it's so fat it can hardly waddle, it
couldn't stop till I came, but is so fond of me it's come to meet me!"
Then she began to feed it, giving it as much as ever it could eat, while
the other dear ducklings, that were waiting so patiently by the brook,
hadn't even so much as a smell, until that nasty, greedy little wretch
had been crammed full to the very throat. Let us hope he was often
troubled with a touch of the bile as a just punishment for his
greediness. He was now so fat that he used to fall asleep on the water,
and the wind blew him on like a floating feather, while his little
brothers and sisters were diving, and swimming, and playing, and
splashing about, and having such jolly games as made one quite wish to
join them on a hot summer's day. This was the first judgment that
overtook him for his greediness: he was too fat to play, and if he
tried, puffed and blew like a broken-winded horse, and was out of breath
in no time; for his liver was not only out of order, but what little
heart he had, and that wasn't much, was buried in fat.
He now took to eating out of spite, so that there might be next to
nothing left for the other little ducklings. Whether he was hungry or
not, he would stand in the centre of the food that was thrown down, and
though he couldn't eat it himself, bite and fly at every duckling that
attempted to touch a morsel. One of his little brothers one day went at
him, and gave him "pepper," I can tell you; and when he found he'd met
his match, what did the fat, artful wretch do but throw himself on his
back, quacking out, "You ain't a-going to hit me when I'm down?"
Now, selfish and greedy although he was, and disliked by the rest of the
family, he had a little sister,--which was, that dear duckling you see
swimming at the front of its mother, as if asking her if it may go out
of the water for a little time, and have a waddle on the grass, for it
is a most dutiful duckling,--and this little sister was the only one of
the family that treated the Greedy Duckling kindly, for she used to say,
"Bad as he is, he's my brother, and it's my duty to bear with him."
After a time, when, on account of his selfishness and greediness, the
rest of the family had "sent him to Coventry," which means that they
wouldn't have anything to do with him,--neither eat, drink, nor swim
with him, nor even exchange so much as a friendly "quack,"--then it was
that he began to appreciate the kindness and self-sacrifice of his
little sister, who would go and sit with him for the hour together,
though he was too sulky at first even to "quack" to her.
It so happened one day, when his pretty little sister had been talking
to him, and telling him how much happier his life would be if he were
more social, and how greatly his health would be improved if he ate
less, that after saying, "I don't care if they won't have me amongst
'em; little Sukey gives me plenty to eat, and I can sleep well enough by
myself, and much better than if they were all quacking about me; and
though you come and stay with me, I don't ask you, nor I don't want
you; and I dare say you only do it to please yourself, and----," before
he could say another word, his little sister said, "Run, run!" for she
had seen a shadow on the grass, and knew that a great hawk was hanging
over them; and they had only just time to pop under the long, trailing
canes of a bramble, before down the hawk came with such a sweep, that
they could feel the cold wind raised by the flapping of his great wings,
though he could not reach them for the bramble; nor did he try to get at
them where they were sheltered, for the hawk only strikes his prey while
on the wing, picking it up and keeping hold of it somehow, just as
Betty does a lump of coal, which she has made a snap at, and seized with
the tongs.
"He would have been sure to have had you," said the little sister, after
the hawk had flown away over the trees, "as you stood the farthest out,
and are so fat; and I was so near the bramble, he would hardly have had
room for the full spread of his wings, if he had made a snap at me."
"I don't see that," replied the Greedy Duckling, "for as I'm so heavy, I
think he would have been glad to have dropped me before he had reached
his nest; while as for you, you're such a light bit of a thing, he
would have carried you off as easily almost as he would a fly that had
settled on his back."
"But supposing he had dropped you after flying with you about six times
the height of a tall tree; what use would you have been after you had
fallen?" asked the little duckling. "Why, there would have been neither
make nor shape in you, but you would have looked like a small handful of
feathers somebody had thrown down on the place where oil had been spilt.
Our dear old mother would not have known you, for you would no more have
looked like what you are now, than a snail that a wagon wheel had gone
over did before it was crushed, when he was travelling comfortably along
the rut, and carrying his sharp-pointed house on his back."
"Well, as I don't care much about my shape now, I suppose the thought of
it would have troubled me less after I'd been killed," said the Greedy
Duckling; "all I care for in this life is to have as much to eat as I
can tuck under my wings, and not to have any noise about me while I'm
asleep. As to washing myself much, that's a trouble, though I do manage
to give my head a dip when I have a drink. There was an old man used to
come and sit under the tree beside our brook, and read poetry; and
sometimes, between sleeping and waking, I used to pick up a line or two;
and I liked those best of all that said,--
'I just do nothing all the day,
And soundly sleep the night away,'--
because they just suited me to a T."
In vain did the clean little sister endeavor to persuade him to wash
himself oftener, take more exercise, mingle more with his family, eat
less, and try to make himself more respected; it was all of no use:
instead of becoming better, he got worse.
There was a hole under the wooden steps that led up to old Granny's
cottage, and the Greedy Duckling, having found it out, used to creep in
and watch until the old woman's back was turned, when Sukey would be
sure to feed him; and very often he found food about, and helped himself
to it, no matter what it was. One day Granny had made a custard, which
she left standing on the table until the oven was hot, when the Greedy
Duckling got at it, and after putting in his beak, and having had a good
drink, he held his head aside, and said, "Bless me! though rather thick,
it's very nice--not at all like muddy water. I can taste milk, and I'm
sure there are eggs, also plenty of sugar; what that brown powder is
floating at the top I don't know; but it must be spice, I think, for it
warms the stomach. But here comes old Granny: I must hide under the
table until she goes out, or I shall have another taste of that
horn-handled stick of hers; then, if she hits me fairly on the leg, I
shall have to go hoppity kick, as she does. I should like to finish that
lot very much, it's so good. O, how comfortably I could sleep after in
my little nest under the step! I'll keep a sharp eye on old Granny and
her cat."
The cat had been blamed for many things it had never touched, which the
Greedy Duckling had gobbled up; and as he sat washing himself on the
hob, which was beginning to be warm, Granny having lighted a fire to
heat the oven, he spied the duckling under the table, and kept his eye
on him without seeming to take any notice at all.
"I shall be having the cat lapping up all this custard, if I don't put
it somewhere out of the way," said the grandmother; "it will be the
safest here;" and she put it into the oven without quite shutting the
door, then went out to get some more wood to put under the oven, which
was hardly warm.
"I shall have time enough to finish that lot before old Granny comes
back, for she has the wood to break into short pieces," said the Greedy
Duckling, who had seen her put the custard into the oven; so he just put
out his wings and went in after it, and began pegging away at the
custard, for it was a big oven and there was plenty of room.
"I've been blamed often enough for things you've stolen and eaten, and
I'll get out of that," said the cat; "for though I know you'll be out of
the oven and hiding somewhere the instant you hear her hoppity kick on
the cottage floor, yet if she looks at the custard before she shuts the
oven door, and finds half of it eaten, she'll say I've had it." So
saying, the cat made a spring from off the oven on to the floor, and
while doing so, his hinder legs caught the oven door, and, with the
force of the spring, shut it to with a loud clap and a click, for the
handle always caught when the door was pushed to sharp. Away ran the
cat, and in came old Granny with the stick, which she began to shove
under the oven, until in time it was so hot that she couldn't take hold
of the handle to turn her custard without holding it with the dishclout.
"Why, I declare, if it isn't burnt to a cinder!" exclaimed old Granny,
as she threw open the oven door; when there was such a smell of burnt
feathers and fat as nearly knocked her down; for the fat duckling first
ran all to dripping, which ran all over the oven bottom, and then got
burnt black, it was so hot; and she never could, nor never did, nor
never will make out what it was that made her oven in such a mess and
spoiled her custard, nor what became of her Greedy Duckling.
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Transcriber's Notes:
Page 10, "shiling" changed to "shilling" (but a shilling)
Page 64, PICTURES AND STORIES OF ANIMALS... price missing in original
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