 Section 8 of True Stories About Pets, edited by Jane Gray, Swiss Helm. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Michael Fasio. Little Willy by M. Prig. Do any of the wide awake boys take an interest in opossums? During a protracted stay in Australia, I had many opportunities of observing the frolicsome gambles of these woolly elves of the forests. They were widely removed from the sluggish or stupid little creatures they seemed to be in America. I have seen one of our fields left in the evening, ready for the next day's carting. The rich, heavy sheaves nicely set up and capped in compact shocks, running from end to end of a paddock of thirty acres. And I have visited the same field in the morning. To be reluctantly convinced that my favourite opossums were really the mischievous imps all Australians consider them. Scarcely a line of shocks remained as it was, but instead numbers lay prostrate, the sheaves scattered, the bands untied, and the heavy corn beaten and trampled down, partly eaten, and scattered about in woeful waste and disorder. The chief scenes of the destruction were within wide circles around several very large dead gum-trees, which had been singed and left to perish, and up and down these trees, among their great bare branches, and round about the shocks of corn, it appeared that the maddest of the opossums rebels had gone on. I kept one of the common species tamed in my house for some months, and I learned their troublesome activity too well. One of our servants, when out at night shooting them, killed two does, as the female opossums are called, each having a young one in her pouch, and these he brought to me. They were then about two-thirds the size of an ordinary squirrel, greyish-brown, soft-furred, sweet-faced little creatures, and I was as delighted with my prize as a child, and directly ordered a large tea-chest to be made into a cage with thin bars and a door on one side. As the man went on preparing the new abode, he observed quietly, Ah, miss, I have known many a people as kept tamed opossums, but never a one as wasn't glad to be quit of them again. This, however, I treated as most unworthy prejudice, and it diminished nothing of my zeal for the comfort of my poor little orphan pets. I gave them a warm bed of wool and fresh hay in which they hid themselves during the day, clasping each other with their paws and tails into one round ball. I fed them with bread, soaked in milk, and sweetened. But for the first few evenings I had to give it to them very carefully, on account of their sharp little teeth and claws. Afterwards they fed themselves, picking a piece out of the saucer and holding it in their forepaws, which, as well as the hind feet, have the toes so long and slender as to seem just like fingers, and in these little creatures the texture and color of the skin was soft and fair, quite a delicate pink, like a baby's fingers. They grew fast and played with each other at night, and after a time began to eat young corn, grass, and parsley. One day, when clipping the thyme in my flower beds, I unfortunately offered them a small bit and blossom. One of them refused it, but the other ate a small sprig and coiled itself up to sleep again. A friend, dining with me that day, hearing me mention having given some time to the opossum, immediately said it would die. At night, when the cage was, as usual, carried in from the veranda to the hall, I saw that the one which had eaten the thyme was ill and would not touch its food. Its eyes were dim, its nose hot and dry. My attempts to relieve it were all unavailing, and it grew rapidly worse, not noticing the efforts of its little companion to rouse it up to play as usual. And in the morning it was dead. The survivor, little Willie, continued growing and thriving well, and soon learned to unfasten his cage and let himself out into the hall, and then, such as scampering and scrambling and leaping and scuffling began, as no decent household who did not keep tame opossums ever heard before. Up the wall and along the row of hat pegs, knocking off all the hats and parasols to begin with, then, before you had time to catch a glimpse of him, frisking into the parlor, twisting his long tail over the top of a chair, and swinging by it gently to and fro, till suddenly he takes aim at the sideboard, springs upon that, kicking off everything in his way, such as a stray decanter or a vase of flowers, then he runs around the back to the center scroll work where he sits plotting new mischief, though seeming wholly occupied, combing his whiskers with a forepaw. If my open work box were on the table, he made it a rule to spring up, hook his tail into it, and straight away upset the whole apparatus, flying before the scattered contents into a corner, and peeping out like a sly, spirited half-shive, half-frightened child. At last we made a rule never to admit willy of an evening until we were disposed to be idle. For to read, write, or work with this spirit of mischief in the room was impossible, and he was restricted to the hall with a fresh, young wattle-tree, perpetually renewed, set upright in a stand for his special comfort. Perhaps the drollest thing was to see him at supper after he had attained the size of a cat, and was quite independent in his ways and manners. Willey's tree stood close to the table where his cage and saucer of bread and milk were placed at night, and as he hung like a great live pendulum, swaying about from a high branch, he would stretch out one hand and, taking a piece of bread, proceed very composedly to eat it, with his head hanging down and his hind feet uppermost. The sight of my little playfellow swallowing his food in this topsy-turvy style was enough to give anyone a fit of indigestion. Willey fully appreciated the delights of society, and used to make clamorous demands to be led into the parlor long before the appointed hour by running around the arch-trave of the door and crying angrily from the top. One night, to spite us, he contrived to slip into my bedroom and remained peeping at me over the corners of the bed until I pulled on a pair of strong gloves and dislodged him. One evening, when the weather was very sultry with constant lightning and distant thunder, Willey failed to appear and I sought him in vain. He had eaten his bread and milk and was gone. Every place was examined and we had given him up for lost when I saw something long and dark hanging out of one of my father's hats against the wall. This proved to be Posse's tale. I would not have him disturbed and he did not move till daylight. The tempest increased to a fearful height. The lightning was, for seven or eight hours, literally incessant and the simultaneous peels of thunder were deafening. Willey, with animal instinct, had doubtless known a storm was at hand and, as if in the forest, he would have sought shelter in a hollow tree so now, though well-housed, he sought a place of concealment. Laterally he often opened his cage before the time when it was carried indoors but I did not fear losing him as he always cantered into the house. But one evening, in going to his cage, I found it open as usual and my bird was flown. After this, we heard almost nightly an opossum on the roof and things left outside were tossed about much in Willey's scrambling style so we believed the house still to be visited by its old inmate. But though tempted by bread and milk, Willey never returned to his cage nor I must candidly own should I have cared to recover my pretty plague. Could I have felt certain he was well and happy? Or I had sometimes acknowledged that keeping one tame possum or a pet phalanger, for so the zoologically learned term and opossum had given me a sufficient insight into their manners and habits in a domestic state. End of Section 8. Section 9 of True Stories About Pets, edited by Jane Gray-Swisshelm This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. Please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Michael Fosseo. Daniel by Mrs. Clara J. Oh dear, said Margie, I haven't brought Daniel in. Why can't you just leave him out all night? said I. Oh, because I'm so afraid a cat might catch him. Margie was already in bed and so was everybody but me so I went softly downstairs, unlocked the front door and stepped out on the long piazza. What a beautiful, great moon. What dark shadows on the grass and how quiet. It seemed a shame to go to bed and so I hated to disturb Daniel curled so peacefully into a feathery ball on his perch. But I lifted down the heavy cage, carefully too, lest I spill water from his saucer and he began as usual when waked up took, took, took, took, took in a sort of whispered clucking. I carried him to the farthest corner of the kitchen, shutting every door as I returned that the household need not be roused by him in the morning and the last thing I heard as I left him in the dark was his cozy little took, took, took, took. This Daniel is a beautiful red bird. Till I came to Kansas I did not know what a red bird was. Of the many here Daniel was my first acquaintance. And I found him about the size and shape of a robin, a gray red all over except a peculiar black mark across the face and down on the throat as if he had put his red beak through a black ring and held it there. His eyes are like jet beads and on his head is a tuft of feathers which he can erect when he chooses. This occurs when he is excited in any way, whether startled or vexed or even when in very good spirits as a horse moves its ears. A single feather is not red all through except the long ones of the wings and tail but his mouse colored, red tipped. This undertone of gray softens and enriches the general vividness of hue. In winter Daniel was not very red except his bill and breast. But as spring advanced he grew brighter and brighter till he became gorgeous. With increase of color his voice returned also which during the cold weather was wanting. Some boys caught him in a snare two winters ago and gave him to my little daughter. I was reluctant to keep him imprisoned but Margie begged so hard that I yielded hoping he would escape some day. Red birds are hard to tame but under Margie's loving care Daniel seemed to have forgotten his former freedom and of his own accord returns to his cage after being allowed the range of the room. It is so funny at such times to see him look at himself in the glass on the bureau. For a better view he will hop upon the pin cushion and there will gaze at the beautiful bright creature before him till Margie has called me and I have called Charlie and Charlie has called Kate and we stand there whispering did you shut the door tight? Do you see him? There, you scared him off. No, no, he's only turning around. Suddenly off he darts to the back of a chair where he slips on its curved top till he slides off and he recovers himself before touching the floor and with a dipping flight gains the summit of the wardrobe. Here he views the landscape or and decides on the German ivy as the next point he will visit. Now he is more picturesque than ever on the broad windowsill in the sunlight all tiptoe to reach over the brim of the tall pot plants and take delectable little bites from the delicate green leaves whose color is such a contrast to his bright red. If I hadn't shut fast all those doors tonight when I left Daniel, this is what I should hear tomorrow or early in clearest, arious tones. Pichudal, pichudal, pichudal, pichudal and I should get another nap buy and buy cut short by the quick staccato pichudal, pichud, pichudal, be another pause and suddenly pichudal, pichu, chu, chu, chu, chu, chu pause again. rate, rate, you do, you do, you do, you do, you do, you do, you do, purr!" The trill weighed down under his breath. This contents him a good while, so that I get most asleep again. Suddenly rings out a loud whistle, whose wildwood notes can be not put into human words. And in despair at being broad awake in spite of me, I say aloud, Oh, Daniel, Daniel! Though Daniel is too far off to hear me, and might only feel pleased if he should. But by the time he purrs again I grow good-natured, for somehow that unique note makes me want to hug him. A dozen times a day Margie exclaims in true Western phrase, Just listen at Daniel, Mama, and again, Oh, I think he is so cute! And in view of her pleasure and his apparent content, I cannot find it in my heart to let him loose yet. Although I always think, I will sometime, perhaps. From Spunky Birds by Mrs. M. B. C. Slade Our cat's name is Tyge. It is short for Tigridia. He is spotted and marked like the elegant Tigridia blossom. We used to call him Nimrod, he was such a mighty hunter. The neighbors used to borrow him when their ratification meetings grew so noisy as to need a moderator. Sometimes Maria would come over from Mrs. M's and ring the bell and say, Is Tyge at home? There's mice. And Mrs. H. would say, Can Tyge spend the night with us? We've rats. And the next day they would say, Much obliged, he's cleaned them all out. But Tyge is a changed and humbled cat. He is a conquered cat, and conquered by a pair of old robins. They began a nest in the apple-tree in our backyard. Tyge smiled for Tyge in his way as a very fond of birds, especially at his breakfast time. He let them get their nest well under way, and then he went for them. He crept up the tree, lay across the nest, and waited. The robins came, and our hitherto invincible Tyge found his waterloo. They pecked his eyes, they pecked his nose, they pecked the top of his elegant head. Out of the tree he scrambled and fell, and they swooped down upon him and with their claws they pulled out great bunches of the handsome fur of his handsome back. He ran for the house, and they followed him to the very threshold. Then they filled the air with their angry opinions. They scolded, defied, and threatened, and Tyge gave in. Now those robins hop close to our back door, and look saucily into our back windows. They are feeding their fledglings now. Tyge sees the dainty morsels of their long, tender necks, and walks away. He has given up the backyard to them, while he goes in and out the front way, and lies in the parlor, on his scarlet damask cushion, a congered cat. End of Section 10, recording by Scott McMullen. Section 11 of True Stories About Pets, edited by Jane Gray, Swiss Helm. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Scott McMullen. Fred's Pet by Mrs. M. O. Johnson. Mother, Grandma, shouted Fred, rushing pel-mel into the house, and clattering upstairs. Come down quick, I have something to show you. Mother and Grandma obediently followed downstairs, and out on the west porch. There in the grass lay a little animal, black as coal, with long slender limbs, bright eyes, a small head, and lopping ears. Grandma, at the first glance, thought it was a terrier and cried out in dismay, for she was afraid of dogs of any description. But her fears were speedily banished. It was a kid which pet-loving Fred had bought for a trifle of a schoolmate who rejoiced in the possession of a family of goats. Grandma at first demurred about keeping him, but she was seldom proof against Fred's pleadings, and the arguments he always set forth on bringing home a live acquisition of any kind whatever. You won't let me have a dog, Grandma. You might let me keep this, I'm sure. I'd rather ten thousand times have a dog, but he's better than nothing. Nothing! My dear boy, haven't you, Charlie, to ride almost any time? And don't you own hens and pigeons and rabbits and cats and kittens by the dozen? You'd like a whole menagerie, I do believe. I would, Grandma, first rate, but honestly I'd give all the pets I have for a dog. Well, well, let the dogs alone while I'm alive, and you may keep the kid for all me. As to your mother, she likes it as well as you do, I don't doubt. Mother was at this moment sitting on the grass holding the little creature in her lap, tenderly patting and talking to him. Mother's consent was always taken for granted in Fred's pet enterprises, so it was settled that Billy should stay. Though I don't see what you want him for, added the old lady. It's not for beauty's sake, anyway. To be sure, he was not very pretty at that time, for he was thin and covered with short coarse hair that had no hint of gloss. But as Fred said, he would grow, and grow he did, very fast, thriving on milk and clover. His young master had to teach him to drink after trying vainly to borrow the baby's nursing bottle, and after Billy had learned he would not touch his milk unless it was warmed for him. He soon learned when to expect his breakfast and supper, and would trot up to the kitchen door, put in his head, and bleed. When his milk was set down before him, he knelt on his forelegs and lapped it very fast, wagging his little stumpy tail dog fashion all the while. Sometimes when the family were gathered around the table, they would hear soft, pattering footsteps along the entry, and presently the door would be gently pushed open and a little black head appear, with pleasant dark eyes and a ludicrous gravity of expression. Billy usually waited, however, for an invitation to enter, and stood quietly, looking from one to another, till someone, generally grandma, said, Come, Billy! She said it, to be sure, under protest. But the little creature's mute pleading was more than her gentle, easy-to-be-intreated nature could withstand. His goat-ship had found this out, and little did he care whether anybody else wanted him or not. In he came, glad and triumphant as a child when some marked privilege is accorded, trotted around the room, rubbed his head against her, and then looked for his breakfast. The sight of a round tin dish was sure to raise his spirits, and even its standing on the stove was no hindrance in his estimation. With his four feet serenely resting on the heated iron, in went his nose. Oh, the shrieks that rang out from human lips, the first time Billy touched the stove! But his friends soon grew used to it, and, finding he did not mind, concluded they wouldn't, and he was allowed to help himself as he liked. One morning, when grandma was eating her breakfast alone, she thought she heard the cat behind her chair. Scat, she said, but on looking around, no pussy was visible, only Billy, fairly mounted on the stove. He was dancing back and forth, eyeing the table, and seeming to enjoy the clatter of his elfish little hoofs. Of course there was not a great fire, but enough to keep the dining-room quite warm and comfortable. Billy dearly liked to trot around the table, and be fed with tidbits from the plates. Rolls or crackers, cake or pie, never came amiss. One day he jumped on the lounge, and then, with another spring, landed on the table without breaking or overturning a single dish. But those in authority decided that he had grown too large and active to be allowed in the house. Master Billy had no reason to complain, for he had the range of the whole farm and the barn, besides a stable of his own that his young master had built for him, with a regular stall and crib like that of a horse, and supplied with hay for both food and bedding. But Billy was social and liked to stay with folks, as long as Fred would play with him outdoors he was satisfied, but if left alone he would watch his chance and slip into the kitchen. Sometimes when Grandma was sitting quietly at work, she would hear him bounding upstairs, and in he would rush like a young tornado, shaking his head and prancing about in high glee at his success. Then there would be a time getting him down again. There was no such thing as driving him, for he would go pell-mell over chairs and table, bed and bureau, with small respect for looking glass or china-toilet set. If Fred tried to pull him, he would set his feet like a donkey and hold back, and it did no good to scold or whip him. By dint of coaxing crackers and candy, my young gentleman was usually lured downstairs. He liked apples and would sometimes come for these, but he could get them for himself under the trees, and much preferred to do so, for if Fred offered him a very nice one when outdoors, he would sniff at it, leave it and run off and help himself. He had a way of his own of getting into the bedroom over the kitchen. The woodpile gave him a convenient footing, once he would spring upon the shed-roof, jump into the window, and take a nap on the bed whenever he pleased. One day he jumped into the great wood-wagon, and began dancing about on the loose boards. Presently his foot caught and he could not get it out. Katie heard his frightened cry, and, leaving her dinner, ran to his aid. She pulled out his foot, gently, and he seemed really grateful. He remembered, too, and ever after kept clear of the wagon. Wherever he might be, even if a long way from the house, when any of the family called him, he would bleat instantly in answer and come bounding along with all possible speed. He loved to browse in the sunshine, and was very fond of young leaves and small twigs. He would stand on his hind feet and reach up into the bushes and grapevines, till his body was half-hidden, a droll little image enough. When the baby put flowers and leaves in his hat ribbon, as he often did, they were pretty sure to be eaten off. And when Fred sat reading on the grass, Billy would often come up behind him, put his forefeet on the boy's shoulders, and bite his hat or hair in play. He was always on friendly terms with one of the cats. Topsy the black one never could be won over to good fellowship. She spitted him to begin with the first time she saw him, and he returned the compliment by a push with his head. His horns were then just beginning to grow. She was somewhat frightened, and ever afterwards gave him a wide berth. But Kitty Gray liked to play with him. He would chase her around the dooryard, and she would come right back to him as soon as he stopped and start again. He tried to play with the hens, but they did not appreciate his social feeling any more than Topsy did. He would dash in among them when they were eating their breakfast, and they would scatter in all directions. Then he would walk off by himself and lie down, or begin to browse, wait till they came back, and in a twinkling return to the charge. Fred made a light harness for him, and taught him to draw a little wagon. But this took time and patience. Why, mother, he said one day, I never saw a goat learn like this one. The other boys knocked their goats about and thump and scold them, and they tip over the wagon and run away and do everything but draw. Billy does just as I tell him. Fred had many a merry time with his four-footed playmate. But by the time the wagon had become an old story, Billy grew so large and strong that Grandma was afraid of him. He would run against her in his rough play and almost throw her off balance. She was anxious, too, about her young trees, and could not bear to see the bark nibbled off. So she told Fred she would get a pet lamb if he would give Billy away. Fred knew a kind boy who would take good care of him and was much pleased to have him. One day, some time after Billy exchanged owners, Fred saw him harnessed to a little wagon and waiting at the door of a grocery for parcels. Fred had a talk with the boy as he was putting in his load and found he liked Billy, but that his goat ship would draw very well when he pleased, and not at all when he didn't please. As he grows older, won't is likely to predominate over will, but his young master enjoy his services while he can. End of Section 11. Recording by Scott McMullen. Section 12 of True Stories About Pets, edited by Jane Gray Swissell. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Phel. The Pet Squirrel by Mrs. Emily Shull Foreman. One day, as Charlie was walking in the woods near his home, he found a little gray squirrel lying on the ground at the foot of a pine tree. It was such a baby squirrel that he felt sure it had strayed away from its home in some hollow tree and lost its way back. Charlie's first thought was to hunt for the tree and find the nest and give the baby back to its mother. But as he looked up, he saw a great black cloud in the sky and felt a few spatters of rain on his face. So his second thought was to carry his fumbling home. He tucked the little furry thing under his jacket and ran home to his mother. As he held the little creature against his heart and kept it warm there, he began to love it. And when he got home, he asked his mother if he might keep it and take care of it and have it for his own pet. His mother consented and told him she hoped he would always be good to the little orphan squirrel and never forget to give it food and drink and tender care. Then she hunted up a basket and a soft old blanket that used to be wrapped around Charlie himself when he was a baby. And she laid the blanket in the basket so as to make a nice warm nest. And then she put the baby squirrel into it. Charlie named him Dick. And then as he had a name and a nest, the next thing was to find him some supper. It was plain that Dick could not eat nuts for he was a baby and had no teeth. Perhaps he would lap milk like a kitten. Charlie brought some warm milk in a saucer and put Dick's nose into it. But that only made him sneeze. Charlie began to look serious and his mother thoughtful but she smiled as she spoke. When babies lose their mothers, they have to take their milk from a bottle not to see if baby Dick will do that. Here, Charlie, take this money and go to the drugstore and buy a nursing bottle. Charlie ran down the street as fast as he could and soon came back out of breath with the nursing bottle in his hand. His mother poured the warm milk into it and put the soft rubber top into Dick's mouth. And what do you think? He sucked away just like a little human baby and I don't believe he ever missed his own buddy mother again. Charlie was so pleased that he danced about the room for joy. At first, Dick didn't like the feeling to bottle against his fur so Charlie's mother covered it with soft flannel and then Dick was completely satisfied. He would always put his baby paws around it and hold it close to him as he sucked away at his breakfast or supper. It was such a funny thing for a baby squirrel to use a nursing bottle that people who heard of it came from all directions to see the sight and Dick was quite the wonder of the village. I am glad to say that Charlie was very faithful to his little pet. He never failed to have the milk warm and to bottle clean and ready and Dick never went hungry. I wish all the babies in the world could have as good care as baby Dick had. He soon grew so fond of Charlie that he would not take his bottle from anybody else and he would run all over the house after his little master. In a little while, Dick grew into a very handsome squirrel. His fur was silver gray and very thick and glossy. His eyes were as bright as stars and his tail was so broad and bushy that when he sat down and let it spread over him like an umbrella, it covered him all up. By and by his teeth came and then he began to eat nuts. It was great fun to see Dick sit up on his hind legs with his great feathery tail waving over him picking up nuts with his little paws and cracking and eating them so neatly. Everybody in the house petted the little room and he led a very happy life. Charlie's grandmother used to sit at the window knitting almost all day and Dick had a trick of jumping into her lap. One day as he was lying on her lap he smelled a nut in her pocket so he found his way in and ate the nut and made a little visit there. After that, grandmother took care to have a few nuts in her pocket every day and Vrogi Dick found it out and made a real nest of grandmother's pocket. He used to run in and stay there a long time and keep us still as a mouse. Indeed, Dick was very fond of pockets. After a while he got tired of sleeping in his basket and took a fancy to the pockets of papa's overcoat. Every night when he was ready to go to bed he ran to the hat tree in the entry and climbed into his pocket nest and slept there till morning. That was the nearest he could come to sleeping in a tree. But as Dick grew older, he grew mischievous. He nibbled the corners of books like any little mouse, jumped into work baskets and upset them and even ran about in the pantry and left the tracks of his little feet on the pies and the butter. At last, Charlie's mother said Dick was too big to stay in the house any longer and he must go away. Charlie thought he would take him to the woods and leave him to be a wild squirrel like his brothers and cousins. But Charlie's mother feared Dick had been spoiled for a wild life. She thought he needed somebody to take care of him. So she took him to a kind farmer who had a large farm and a great many pets. The farmer was glad to have the pretty gray squirrel and Dick liked the farm and the country life. He lived very happily there till he was six years old and then he died of old age. And section 12, recording by phone. Section 13 of True Stories About Pets edited by Jane Gray, Swiss Health. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Farah Iftikar. A Pet Bird by Mrs. M. O. Johnson. The parsonage, as it was called, was a large old fashioned yellow house on the summit of a hill. It was built a little back from the road and had a door yard in front enclosed by a neat white fence. On one side was a flower garden with green fields and woods beyond. On the other side, the silvery river wound like a blue ribbon around the hill and across its borders gleamed the white village and church spire. Grand Old Elms shaded the house from summer heat and a black mulberry tree in the corner with its wide spreading branches made a nice pay house for the children and gave them a yearly feast. For children there were seven, four girls and three boys. And you may believe they had lively times. Their father was a country minister with the small salary of country ministers in those days. It was many years ago and he had his hands full aided to the utmost by the thrifty mother to feed and clothe them all. They had few books and the beautiful toys children have now were unknown. But there were stories told by the fireside in winter evenings. There were sleigh rides and coasting frolics in plenty. There were homemade dollies and bits of crockery for dishes, carpenter's blocks and chingle boats. And in summer there was merry outdoor life all day long. They had pets almost without number. The chickens, their own special care, the horse that the girls as well as the boys rode bareback without a thought of fear a little brown dog, the best of playmates, cats and kittens and the birds that came every day to be fed. Their nests were in almost every tree and the air was full of their glad music. They grew so tame that they would alight on the doorstep or windowsill to pick up crumbs, tip their pretty heads one side and look up fearlessly with their bright black eyes into the faces bent over them. One day the girls found a young blue jay that had fallen out of its nest or in some way lost its mother. They took him into the house and fed and tended him carefully and he grew and throwed till able to take care of himself. They never caged him and after he was strong enough to fly he had his full liberty outdoors. But the little creature did not forget the kindness he had received. He stayed near the house all summer flying in and out as it suited him, purging on the shoulders of his friends and following them about like a dog. Every morning regularly he flew into Anna's window and lighted on her pillow and tapped her eyelids gently till she would get up and give him his breakfast. He was very fond of curd and this she usually gave him. Why he chose her window was best known to himself for he was the pet of the family but so it was and he never made a mistake. So Anna would take a piece of curd upstairs at night to have it ready for his bird ship when he made his early call. When he had satisfied his appetite he would still linger hopping about her room now and then alighting on her shoulder arm asking in his own way for notice and looking up in her face with his bright eyes when she talked to him as if he understood every word. While she calmed her hair he would stand on a bureau watching her would pick up her hairpins and haul them one by one in his beak till she took them from him. He would take a lock of hair and draw it gently through his bill another and another till it was all crinkled on one side in a way that now would be quite fashionable. Then he would hop across the bureau and dress the other side to match. When she was ready he would fly out again or go downstairs with her and stay socially with the family that were at breakfast as happened to suit his convenience. Of course he had plenty to eat and one morning when a larger piece of curd was given him then he could dispose of at once he carried it into the study where the minister sat writing in dressing gown and armchair and purged on his shoulder. The old man kept perfectly still and allowed him to do just as he pleased. Very carefully he lifted the collar the dressing gown tucked in his curd snuggly and then with an air of virtuous satisfaction snoozed down the collar over it and took his way out of the window for his morning ramble. An hour or two afterwards he returned to the study the minister still sat writing. The bird went straight to him purged on his shoulder lifted the collar and took out his property. It was no uncommon thing for him to follow the girls when they went to walk or visit their young friends. But what was their surprise and perplexity one warm Sunday to see him come sailing into church? Yes, it was their own pet bird as was evident from his call society air as he surveyed the assembly purged on an old lady's bonnet. In those days the bonnets were on the side sufficient to afford standing room for three or four like him. She gave a fright and start Bob and off he went but only from a brown trimmed bonnet to a grey one and was beginning to raise a gale among the younger portion of the audience when the minister rose in the pulpit and Birdie, aspiring his old friend flew directly to the well-known resting place on his shoulder. The next Sunday Anna shut up the jay in the attic chamber. When she returned from church she went upstairs to release him never dreaming of having offended his majesty but the moment she opened the door he rushed at her as fast as his wings could carry him and bristling with temper gave her two or three pretty severe pecs with his sharp beak. This satisfied him however. He never laid up any grudge but was as friendly and affectionate as before. Well pleased was the roguish bird when he could find access to a work basket. A spool afforded him great amusement. He would carry it off among the trees and with an end of the thread in his beak fly from bow to bow rolling it off and entangling it in the branches as fast as possible. No use to call him when thus engaged. He would come when it suited his own convenience. Several times he took possession of a symbol much to its owner's vexation and when tired of playing with it left it wherever he happened to be. Such a search you would have in the grass to find it. It was provoking indeed but his friends winked at his ways. When the autumn days were short and the nights chilly he departed with a flock of his kind to a sunny climb. His friends missed him and by their winter fire often mentioned him recounting his pretty ways and sometimes asking one another do you think he will come back? But no one really expected he would fully remember his old haunts and frequent the houses had been his want. Spring came again with its warmth and shine and fragrant flowers and sweet bird songs. One of the first pleasant evenings the family were gathered just after tea in the wide old-fashioned porch. Suddenly a bird's cry a loud joyous note startled them for an instant and they're sailing over their head flapping his wings alighting on one friendly shoulder and then another and another rubbing his head against them to ask for caresses and ever and on uttering that eager glad cry there was their own blue jay. Every possible sign of delight the little creature showed perched on the branches close by or the honeysuckle vine entwining the porch he sang his sweetest songs and he returned to all the old ways flying in and out and following his friends as before. End of section 13 Recording by Farah Iftikar Section number 14 of True Stories About Pets edited by Jane Gray Swishelm This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Lola Janey of Alexandria, Virginia Chapter number 14 Hence in a Horse Car by Mrs. E. A. Levitt The horse car slowly tinkled its way up the broad city street. It was moderately filled with the very dintily dressed people who sitting front in one another were busily employed in pretending that there wasn't anyone else there and that they were as much alone as if they were sitting under a palm tree in the desert of Sahara and palpably making a failure of such pretense by looking extremely conscious when one of those who didn't pretend looked at them. The car stopped for the 40th time or so and a very large red-faced woman lumbered in followed by a very small boy who stumbled along treading on ever so many people's toes and ending by a plunge at a Percy little gentleman as the car got in motion and the Percy gentleman indignantly rejected him as if he were taking unwarrantable liberties and gave him such an impetuous that it brought him down on a vacant seat very violently jancing a slight, oh, out of his slender throat and a loud squawk from the fluffy brown hen that he was carefully carrying in his arms showing that she too suffered violence. It happened that as his seat was directly in front of his mother's and the two were so oddly accompanied that everyone left off making believe that they didn't see anything and began to stare at the newcomers with lively interests. Comfortably nestled down on each arm of the motherly, genial old lady were great white rooster and a little brown hen snugly tucked away in the warm red shawl that enveloped her fat person evidently wanting to be thus carried about. On the floor of the car there was a great pile of fresh straw which so rustled and stirred as to excite the rooster's attention and like the forecasting head of an active, needy family he considered the place with warm interests tipping his head on one side and fastening his blinking eye knowingly on some spot that seemed likely to furnish food for his ravenous family. He tipped his head over to the other side and searched with the other eye to make sure and then flooded up a little and made various guttural sounds down in his chest at the same time turning about as if addressing himself to the slender brown hen nestled so coasily down in her good-natured mistress's lap. But the brown hen didn't want anything to eat. Her appetite was quiet and she meant to improve the time and warmth by taking a gentle nap. So she shut up both her eyes tightly and tucked her head into the little nook that showed herself under the woman's arm and made her indifference so manifest that the rooster had to understand it. A new rustle in the straw attracted him again and he examined it anew this time making such deep noises that they seemed to come from his very claws. They were instantly responded to by the fluffy brown hen the lad carried. She was of a more energetic character than her sister and had already surveyed all the car passengers with a keen attention and immediately replied to the rooster's remarks which so far as they could be translated by an observer who was not a hen meant that down there was plainly an excellent feeding ground with a great deal to scratch up and suggestions of such tidbits as headnatured would delight in. There was no need for the rooster to put fine emphasis on his insinuations. The fluffy hen was but too ready to join him in a friendly dig and with all the impetuosity of her sex she was eager to take the first hop. So spreading her wings and uttering an exultant cackle she started for the revel. Great was her astonishment when the boy would not let her go. She was evidently accustomed to her indulgence and wanting to consideration as her appetite and had not been used to restraint. She cocked her head on one side and fixed her bead-like eye on the boy as though to say, do you really know what you're about? You never did deny me anything. Why begin now when it's such a rich field? The lad was disconcerted. He could not look back again into that eye. He cast an appealing glance at his mother. She assumed as severe a look as she could put on her broad, cheery face and shook her head. There was manifestly a good understanding between the members of this happy family and the hen seemed to comprehend with the boy that just now it was not considered best for her to get down. She resigned herself with reluctance and chuckled forth some remarks to the rooster who continued to either straw and give note to what he saw there. Perhaps the force that restrained him was more potent than that which the fluffy hen felt. At least he yielded to it sooner and scratched out a tumbled up place in the woman's gown and stirred it up well and turned it about till it was just rough enough to suit him. Then nestled his white head with his great red comb under a fold of her shawl and went to sleep. The little fellow grew weary of holding the fluffy brown hen so he slipped along and culled her down on the car seat beside him where she curled up in a soft bunch and crewed out her satisfaction. But his mother was scandalized as such infringement of car regulations in regard to children being held in the lap unless they paid full fare and she shook her head energetically at him and signaled that Biddy must be taken up again. Just then a much bedisoned lady who had been closely observing moved up to the kindly henwife and began talking to her in a low tone. But as she grew excited, she raised her voice and was heard to say, now my little sick daughter would be sure to like such fresh white eggs as your hens will lay and I hope you can let me have some every week. Indeed, ma'am. And I can just that. My man works at the brass foundry and he goes by your house in every day and he can leave just as well as not. Sure. And we have beautiful bits of backyard and my little boy keeps some hens just as clean. While he takes some time to chair about with the back to the table and a hippen, that's the name of the hen he has in his lap, ma'am. Claws hold it around in the back and just sits there like a Christian all the while he's at his mails. And truthfully, he keeps a tin plate for her and she picks a corn and make it off and every time he aces himself, indeed, and he does, ma'am. Just then, a mischievous lad on the platform of the car began a low cackling, ending in a loud shrill crow. The challenge rolls the rooster from his sleep and imagining that it was already morning and that he must have slept too long, he crowed lustily as fast as he could. This stirred up both the bitties and they thrust out their long necks and twisted their heads about and cackled so tumultuously that the car seemed full of hens. The good woman's face turned as red as her hair and that was very red indeed and she hardly knew where to look whilst her little son enjoyed the sport hardly and shook hippen to make her cackle still louder. Just then, the car was passing a block of shabby tenements and the woman's face brightened and she signaled to the conductor to stop the car and she hustled her feathered family hastily together and hurried them out into the open air where their noise would be less inflicted. The lad tossed hippen up on his shoulder and they all disappeared in one of the low buildings where if they were a fine bit of yard, it could scarcely have been larger than a horse car floor. End of Chapter 14 The Parsonage was a long, low stone house half covered with ivy and roses which gave it a very picturesque appearance. It stood in the midst of a large garden which in summertime was full of fruits and flowers. But when I first saw it in March, the snow still lingered about the hedges and the pastor's children were eagerly counting the days until it should be spring. On the south gable of the house built snugly up against the warm chimney was a stork's nest. It was a rough, ugly pile of sticks and twigs nearly as large as a baby's cradle and at this season was unoccupied. The pastor's family told me that for many years past a pair of storks had been accustomed to spend the summer here arriving always on the 1st of April and leaving on the 1st of August for a warm southern climb. There were many little villages surrounding ours each of which had one pair of storks in it and the birds all arrive and depart together in a body on the same day. Many a story did the children tell me of their own special storks which they called by the names of Hans and Mina and seemed to consider as almost a part of the family. When the storks come, said Bertha, it will be spring and the crocuses will blossom. It is funny, but the crocuses always do wait for the storks. One day there was a storm with rain and lightning. The pastor's wife was alarmed for in this flat sandy country the lightning often strikes the houses and sometimes whole villages are thereby consumed. When the storks come, said Fritz, we shall be safe from the lightning for it never strikes a house where there are storks in the nest. This is the belief of many persons in Germany and they are therefore glad to have the storks build upon their houses and are very careful not to injure or frighten them away. In time the snow was all gone and little brown leaf buds began to swell on the trees and the tinge of green showed itself about the garden and on the heath. One bright sunny day as I sat writing in my room a sudden glad cry arose from the children in the garden. The storks, the storks! I turned hastily to the almanac for the day of the month. It was the first of April. Looking from my window I saw on the lower roof a few feet below me a splendid large bird with snow-white plumage touched with jet black and long legs and bill of a brilliant red color. He stood erect turning his head from side to side with bright sharp glances as if examining what changes had taken place in his absence. Then after waiting a while he threw his head back over his shoulder and struck his hard bill upon the strong hollow bone of his wing producing a loud rattling sound that could be heard at a great distance. He was calling his mate, for the stork has no voice and this is the only sound that he can produce at any time. The children shouted, How do you do, Hans? Welcome home, Hans! Where's Mina? But Hans took no notice. He was apparently very uneasy and for some hours kept up an incessant rattling. The pastor began to fear that poor Mina had perished by the way as so many do in their annual migration. At length the bird took wing and for hours could be seen slowly sailing high in the air above the village and the heath as if looking for his mate. He came back sad and dispirited and moped till dark on the housetop refusing the food which we sympathizingly offered. Next morning he was off again. Evening came on when low there was a rush and a flutter in the air and a weary bird drooping and bedraggled descended to the house-gable and there rested seemingly too tired to move. It was the missing Mina. When Hans came home what a rattling and rejoicing there was on the housetop. The next day when the birds had rested and dressed their plumage how busy they became cleaning and repairing their nest. Now too they lost their first shyness and became familiar as they recognized their old friends. Hans was always rather distant and proud but Mina would come when called to be fed just as the poultry did and would sometimes even allow her back to be stroked. They would daily take long flights from home and once when we were riding on the heath many miles away from our village we recognized Hans and Mina stalking about a newly plowed field busily picking up the worms and grub which but for them would have done mischief to the farmer's flax and buckwheat. We called to them and Hans stood on one leg and surveyed us with a surprised and haughty air while Mina threw her head back and rattled. I suppose she knew us. If the birds had contented themselves with a diet of worms and mice and frogs all would have been well but they were also very fond of picking the bees from the flowers when the little insects were busily gathering honey and would even stand near the hives at the bottom of the garden and snap them up with a quick motion as they flew in and out of the hives. We built a lattice around the hives and this in a measure protected the little honey-makers but it was not long before the birds were guilty of a greater mischief than killing bees. The children had other pets beside the storks. Brits had a pair of rabbits and Lena took great delight in watching and feeding the little brown sparrows which occupied the box in the Great Linden Tree whose broad branches spread over half the house. One day there was a great flutter and commotion in the Linden and on going out to see what could be the matter we found all the sparrows darting in and out of the tree in great distress while Hans with a very satisfied air stood on one of the branches within reach of the box. We hastened to drive him away but it was too late. He had already thrust his long bill into each of the little round holes of the box and devoured every one of the young birds. After that we placed the box in another part of the tree against the side of the house where he could not reach it. By and by more little sparrows came but the stork never got another taste of them. Meanwhile Fritz's rabbits had a little family of 12 young ones, tiny creatures scarce three inches long soft and shining as satin. They had their nest under the house and had been there two weeks before we ever saw them. And how delighted the children were when one day Mother Rabbit came forth with her dozen of little ones hopping and skipping around her. What a pretty sight it was and how funny to see them all on the least alarm melt away as it were from sight and disappear into their hole like magic. All the children in the village came to see them and never was a boy so happy as Fritz with his rabbits. But alas when some days had passed on counting the young family we found that one was missing. On the day following there were only ten and the next day but nine. What could have become of the rabbits? I was sitting in an arbor one morning reading when I observed the old rabbits come out from their hole and I watched to see the little ones follow. How wild and shy they had lately become. Suddenly I saw the old ones crouch, throw back their long ears and stare and mingled fear and rage with protruding eyes at some object around the corner of the house. Soon it came in sight. The stork haunts walking gingerly along turning his long crooked neck this way and that pretending not to see the rabbits. But all the time sidling nearer in a sly, sneaking sort of way. I knew it in a moment. It was he who had eaten the rabbits. The little ones fled into their burrow at first sight of them and the old ones followed. The birds stepped cautiously to the side of the house and stood for some time motionless with his head down silently watching the entrance to the burrow. Presently a little shining head appeared and vanished. Then another more bold followed and in an instant before I could even scream that long sharp bill had darted down and the poor innocent little rabbit had disappeared. After this the young rabbits were kept in a hutch until they were too large for the storks to swallow, which was about two weeks. But a time soon came when this cruel haunt's hoop, as Bertha said, made so little of eating other people's children, had trouble about his own. And this was the way of it. Mina had laid two large fine eggs in the nest on the housetop. But one day we found one of them thrown out by the birds and on examination discovered it to be addled and on the very next day a bit of stone fell from the chimney-top into the nest and broke the remaining egg. The birds were very much distressed. Haunt seemed to think it was Mina's fault and strutted angrily about making a quarrelsome rattling. We felt very sorry for their disappointment. The summer would be a sad and lonely one to them, poor things, with no little ones to busy themselves about. In this state of affairs a happy thought occurred to the pastor. His wife had just brought in some goose eggs newly laid. Two of these he took and ascending to the roof by means of a short ladder, deposited them in the stork's nest. Yet hardly done so when Mina returned and with a great fuss and flutter proceeded to take her place upon the nest, evidently under the impression that these eggs were the original ones, that she must have been mistaken in supposing them destroyed. Haunt's two evinced great satisfaction and the two were again happy and satisfied. But one morning before we were all fairly awake, what an awful clatter on the roof. The eggs were hatched, but what strange little monsters were those in the nest? Not storks, no indeed, but two round broad-billed, splay-footed yellowish balls of down, such as had never before been seen in a respectable stork's nest. No wonder that the poor mother stork was bewildered and distressed and that Haunt's, after staring with all his might at the little changelings, stood with neck feathers on end and rattled himself nearly distracted. You will hardly believe what I am now going to tell you, but it is what I and the pastor's family saw with our own eyes. After rattling and stalking about for a long time, Haunt suddenly became quiet, stood on one leg and solemnly surveyed poor Mina. He looked exactly as if he were thinking what ought to be done with those changelings and in what manner Mina ought to be punished for having pretended that the eggs were her own. Then he suddenly flew away and in an hour returned with six other storks. You ought to have seen this company as they sat on the roof, staring at the wonderful creatures in the nest and every now and then rattling as if to express their astonishment. At length they walked up to the nest, pecked the poor innocent little gosslings to death, and then falling on Mina pecked and cut her and struck her with their strong wings and would no doubt have killed her outright if the pastor had not hastily ascended to the roof and driven them off. Hans went away with them, nor did he return the whole summer. He could not forgive Mina the trick which he fancied she had played upon him. As to Mina herself, we took her up torn and bleeding and the pastor's good wife tenderly bound up her wounds and made her a bed in the poultry coop where she nursed and fed her until she got well. She soon became very tame and would follow us about like a dog and at mealtime stand at the door to receive the choice morsels thrown to her by the children. At length she was quite well and strong and then she grew restless and suddenly one day was missing. A neighbor had seen her flying toward the northeast in the direction of the woodland marshes where the storks congregate before taking their departure in a body for the south. Neither Hans nor Mina ever returned. End of section 15, recording by Scotty Smith. End of True Stories About Pets by Jane Gray Swiss Elm.