With that Spotty disappeared. That is to say, his head and legs and tail disappeared. Peter stared very hard. Then he began to laugh, for it came to him that what Spotty had said was true. His house was with him, and now he had simply retired inside. He didn"t need any other house than just that hard, spotted sh.e.l.l, inside of which he was now so cosily tucked away.
"That"s a great idea! Ho, ho, ho! That"s a great idea!" shouted Peter.
"Of course it is," replied Spotty, putting nothing but his head out, "You will always find me at home whenever you call, Peter, and that is more than you can say of most other people."
All the way to his own home in the dear Old Briar-patch, Peter thought about Spotty and how queer it was that he should carry his house around with him.
"I wonder how it happens that he does it," thought he. "No wonder he is so slow. Of course, it is very handy to have his house always with him. As he says, he is always at home. Still, when he is in a hurry to get away from an enemy, it must be very awkward to have to carry his house on his back. I--I--why, how stupid of me! He doesn"t have to run away at all! All he has got to do is to go inside his house and stay there until the danger is past! I never thought of that before.
Why, that is the handiest thing I ever heard of."
Now Peter knew that there must be a good story about Spotty and his house, and you know Peter dearly loves a good story. So at the very first opportunity the next day, he hurried over to the Smiling Pool to ask Grandfather Frog about it. As usual, Grandfather Frog was sitting on his big green lily-pad. No sooner did Peter pop his head above the edge of the bank of the Smiling Pool than Grandfather Frog exclaimed:
"Chug-a-rum! You"ve kept me waiting a long time, Peter Rabbit. I don"t like to be kept waiting. If you wanted to know about Spotty the Turtle, why didn"t you come earlier?" All the time there was a twinkle in the big, goggly eyes of Grandfather Frog.
Peter was so surprised that he couldn"t find his tongue. He hadn"t said a word to any one about Spotty, so how could Grandfather Frog know what he had come for? For a long time he had had a great deal of respect for Grandfather Frog, who, as you know, is very old and very wise, but now Peter felt almost afraid of him. You see, it seemed to Peter as if Grandfather Frog had read his very thoughts.
"I--I didn"t know you were waiting. Truly I didn"t," stammered Peter.
"If I had, I would have been here long ago. If you please, how did you know that I was coming and what I was coming for?"
"Never mind how I knew. I know a great deal that I don"t tell, which is more than some folks can say," replied Grandfather Frog.
Peter wondered if he meant him, for you know Peter is a great gossip.
But he didn"t say anything, because he didn"t know just what to say, and in a minute Grandfather Frog began the story Peter so much wanted.
"Of course you know, without me telling you, that there is a reason for Spotty"s carrying his house around with him, because there is a reason for everything in this world. And of course you know that that reason is because of something that happened a long time ago, way back in the days when the world was young. Almost everything to-day is the result of things that happened in those long-ago days. The great-great-ever-so-great grandfather of Spotty the Turtle lived then, and unlike Spotty, whom you know, he had no house. He was very quiet and bashful, was Mr. Turtle, and he never meddled with any one"s business, because he believed that the best way of keeping out of trouble was to attend strictly to his own affairs.
"He was a good deal like Spotty, just as fond of the water and just as slow moving, but he didn"t have the house which Spotty has now. If he had had, he would have been saved a great deal of trouble and worry.
For a long time everybody lived at peace with everybody else. Then came the trying time, of which you already know, when those who lived on the Green Meadows and in the Green Forest had the very hardest kind of work to find enough to eat, and were hungry most of the time. Now Mr. Turtle, living in the Smiling Pool, had plenty to eat. He had nothing to worry about on that score. Everybody who lives in the Smiling Pool knows that it is the best place in the world, anyway."
Grandfather Frog winked at Jerry Muskrat, who was listening, and Jerry nodded his head.
"But presently Mr. Turtle discovered that the big people were eating the little people whenever they could catch them, and that he wasn"t safe a minute when on sh.o.r.e, and not always safe in the water,"
continued Grandfather Frog. "He had two or three very narrow escapes, and these set him to thinking. He was too slow and awkward to run or to fight. The only thing he could do was to keep out of sight as much as possible. So he learned to swim with only his head out of water, and sometimes with only the end of his nose out of water. When he went on land, he would cover himself with mud, and then when he heard anybody coming, he would lie perfectly still, with his legs and his tail and his head drawn in just as close as possible, so that he looked for all the world like just a little lump of brown earth.
"One day he had crawled under a piece of bark to rest and at the same time keep out of sight of any who might happen along. When he got ready to go on his way, he found that the piece of bark had caught on his back, and that he was carrying it with him. At first he was annoyed and started to shake it off. Before he succeeded, he heard someone coming, so he promptly drew in his head and legs and tail. It was Mr. Fisher, and he was very hungry and fierce. He looked at the piece of bark under which Mr. Turtle was hiding, but all he saw was the bark, because, you know, Mr. Turtle had drawn himself wholly under.
""I believe," said Mr. Fisher, talking out loud to himself, "that I"ll have a look around the Smiling Pool and see if I can catch that slow-moving Turtle who lives there. I believe he"ll make me a good dinner."
"Of course Mr. Turtle heard just what he said, and he blessed the piece of bark which had hidden him from Mr. Fisher"s sight. For a long time he lay very still. When he did go on, he took the greatest care not to shake off that piece of bark, for he didn"t know but that any minute he might want to hide under it again. At last he reached the Smiling Pool and slipped into the water, leaving the piece of bark on the bank. Thereafter, when he wanted to go on land, he would first make sure that no one was watching. Then he would crawl under the piece of bark and get it on his back. Wherever he went he carried the piece of bark so as to have it handy to hide under.
"Now all this time Old Mother Nature had been watching Mr. Turtle, and it pleased her to see that he was smart enough to think of such a clever way of fooling his enemies. So she began to study how she could help Mr. Turtle. One day she came up behind him just as he sat down to rest. The piece of bark was uncomfortable and scratched his back, "I wish," said he, talking to himself, for he didn"t know that any one else was near, "I wish that I had a house of my own that I could carry on my back all the time and be perfectly safe when I was inside of it."
""You shall have," said Old Mother Nature, and reaching out, she touched his back and turned the skin into hard sh.e.l.l. Then she touched the skin of his stomach and turned that into hard sh.e.l.l. "Now draw in your head and your legs and your tail," said she.
"Mr. Turtle did as he was told to do, and there he was in the very best and safest kind of a house, perfectly hidden from all his enemies!
""Oh, Mother Nature, how can I ever thank you?" he cried.
""By doing as you always have done, attending wholly to your own affairs," replied Old Mother Nature.
"So ever since that long-ago day when the world was young, all Turtles have carried their houses with them and never have meddled in things that don"t concern them," concluded Grandfather Frog.
"Oh, thank you, Grandfather Frog," exclaimed Peter, drawing a long breath. "That was a perfectly splendid thing for Old Mother Nature to do."
Then he started for his own home in the dear Old Briar-patch, and all the way there he wondered and wondered how Grandfather Frog knew that he wanted that story, and to this day he hasn"t found out. You see, he didn"t notice that Grandfather Frog was listening when he asked Spotty about his house. Of course, Grandfather Frog knows Peter and his curiosity so well that he had guessed right away that Peter would come to him for the story, just as Peter did.
XVI
WHY PADDY THE BEAVER HAS A BROAD TAIL
Usually the thing that interests us most is something that we haven"t got ourselves. It is that way with Peter Rabbit. Peter is not naturally envious. Oh, my, no! Peter is pretty well satisfied with what he has, which is quite as it should be. There is only one thing with which Peter is really dissatisfied, and it is only once in a while, when he hasn"t much of anything else to think about, that he is dissatisfied with this. Can you guess what it is? Well, it is his tail. Yes, Sir, that is the one thing that ever really troubles Peter.
You see, Peter"s tail is, nothing but a funny little bunch of cotton, which doesn"t look like a tail at all. The only time he ever sees it is when he is back to the Smiling Pool and looks over his shoulder at his reflection in the water, and then, of course, he really doesn"t see his tail itself. So sometimes when Peter sees the fine tails of his neighbors, a little bit of envy creeps into his heart for just a little while. Why, even little Danny Meadow Mouse has a real tail, short as it is. And as for Happy Jack Squirrel and Reddy Fox and Bobby c.o.o.n and Jimmy Skunk, everybody knows what beautiful tails they have.
Once Peter thought about it so much that Grandfather Frog noticed how sober he was and asked Peter what the trouble was. When Peter told him that it seemed to him that Old Mother Nature had not been fair in giving him such a foolish little tail when she had given others such beautiful ones, Grandfather Frog just opened his big mouth and laughed until he had to hold his sides.
"Why, Peter," said he, "you look so sober, that I thought you really had something to worry about. What would you do with a big tail, if you had one? It would always be in your way. Just think how many times Reddy Fox or old Granny Fox have almost caught you. They certainly would have before this, if you had had a long tail sticking out behind for them to get hold of. I had a long tail when I was young, and I was mighty glad to get rid of it."
After he heard that, Peter felt better. But he didn"t lose interest in tails, and he spent a great deal of time in wondering why some of his neighbors had big, bushy tails and some had long, slim tails and why he himself had almost no tail at all. So when Paddy the Beaver came to live in the Green Forest, and made a pond there by building a wonderful dam across the Laughing Brook, the first thing Peter looked to see was what kind of a tail Paddy has, and the first time he got a good look at it, his eyes popped almost out of his head. He just stared and stared. He hardly noticed the wonderful dam or the equally wonderful ca.n.a.ls which Paddy had made. All he could think of was that great, broad, flat, thick tail, which is so unlike any tail he had ever seen or heard of.
The very next morning he hurried over to the Smiling Pool to tell Grandfather Frog about it. Grandfather Frog"s big, goggly eyes twinkled.
"Chug-a-rum!" said he. "Paddy the Beaver has one of the most useful tails I know of. Would you like to know how he comes by such a queer tail?"
[Ill.u.s.tration: The first thing Peter looked to see was what kind of a tail Paddy has.]
"Oh, if you please! If you please, Grandfather Frog! I didn"t suppose there was such a queer tail in all the world, and I don"t see what possible use it can be. Do tell me about it!" cried Peter.
"Chug-a-rum! If you had used your eyes when you visited Paddy, you might have guessed for yourself how he came by it," replied Grandfather Frog gruffly. "Some people never do learn to use their eyes."
Peter looked a bit sheepish, but he said nothing and waited patiently.
Presently Grandfather Frog cleared his throat two or three times and began to talk.
"Once upon a time, long, long ago, when the world was young--"
"It seems to me that everything wonderful happened long ago when the world was young," interrupted Peter.
Grandfather Frog looked at Peter severely, and Peter hastened to beg his pardon.
After a long time Grandfather Frog began again.
"Once on a time, long, long ago, lived Mr. Beaver, the great-great-ever-so-great grandfather of Paddy up there in the Green Forest. Old Mr. Beaver was one of the hardest working of all of Old Mother Nature"s big family and one of the smartest, just as Paddy is to-day. He always seemed happiest when he was busiest, and because he liked to be happy all the time, he tried to keep busy all the time.
"He was very thrifty, was Mr. Beaver; not at all like some people I know. He believed in preparing to-day for what might happen to-morrow, and so when he had all the food he needed for the present, he stored away food for the time when it might not be so easy to get. And he believed in helping himself, did Mr. Beaver, and not in leaving everything to Old Mother Nature, as did most of his neighbors. That is how he first came to think of making a dam and a pond. Like his small cousin, Mr. Muskrat, he was very fond of the water, and felt most at home and safest there. But he found that sometimes the food which he liked best, which was the bark of certain kinds of trees, grew some distance from the water, and it was the hardest kind of hard work to roll and drag the logs down to the water, where he could eat the bark from them in safety.