As they neared the barnyard Mrs. Duck turned and said:
"The hens will peck and fight, but mind, I hope that all of you Will gobble up the food as fast As well bred ducks should do."
The woman who took care of the poultry yard was already there. From a well filled pan she was scattering handfuls of corn in all directions.
There were a great many chickens, who darted hither and thither, picking up the grains of corn. When the corn was all gone she set down a dish of food. No sooner had she done this than Mrs. Duck exclaimed:
"You"d better get into the dish Unless it is too small; In that case, I should use my foot And overturn it all."
The ducklings did as they were bid, And found the plan so good That from that day the other fowls Got hardly any food.
"My, but she"s a wise old duck," said Puss to himself with a grin.
"WHEN I WAS A LITTLE BOY"
IT was a queer looking house that Puss, Junior, saw in the distance. It seemed more like a box, with another little box tacked on, through the top of which rose a long piece of stove pipe, which, I suppose, served as a chimney, although chimneys are usually made of bricks in Old Mother Goose Country.
On the front porch sat a little old man, smoking a pipe, from which the smoke drifted away in little gray clouds, while the smoke from the stovepipe chimney stretched out like a long black feather.
"Good-day," said Puss, taking off his hat.
"Come and rest beside me," said the old man, pushing forward an armchair. So Puss sat down, and after wiping the perspiration from his forehead remarked, "A warm day, my good sir."
"Yes, indeed," replied the little old man, "but all days seem very much alike to me."
"Do they?" asked Puss. "Why?"
"Well, I"ll tell you the story of my life," said the little old man, and, taking his pipe from his lips, he began:
"When I was a little boy I lived by myself, And all the bread and cheese I got I laid upon the shelf.
The rats and the mice They made such a strife, That I was forced to go to town, And buy me a wife.
The streets were so broad, And the lanes were so narrow, I was forced to bring my wife home In a wheelbarrow.
The wheelbarrow broke, And my wife had a fall.
Farewell wheelbarrow, wife and all."
"And have you lived alone ever since?" asked Puss.
"Yes," replied the old man, "and the mice and the rats give me no peace.
They eat up all my cheese and flour."
"I"ll help you," said Puss. "Let me stay here to-night, and I"ll catch every rat and mouse that bothers you inside the house."
"You can make up poetry as well as I can," said the old man, with a laugh. "Why, that"s the first laugh I"ve had in many a long year. I like you, Sir Cat. You are an obliging sort of person. You shall have the best that my small home affords. I only hope you will rid the place of rats and mice."
"Leave that to me," replied Puss, with a grin.
GOOD RIDDANCE
NOW, let me see. In the last story we left little Puss, Junior, in the house of the old man who brought his wife home in a wheelbarrow. Well, Puss heard him take off his shoes and get into bed, and then out went the light. I guess the old man leaned out of bed and blew it out. But Puss didn"t go to bed. Oh, my, no! He slipped off his red-topped boots, so as not to frighten the rats and the mice and stole softly over to the window. The moon was bright and the stars were twinkling in the sky.
"It"s a long time since I"ve been a mouser!" laughed Puss to himself. "I wonder if I have lost my cunning?" And he sat down by the window and crossed his leg over the other. "Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse," and it was not the night before Christmas, either. Pretty soon the sound of scampering feet caught his ear, and, turning his head, he saw a dozen mice or more running over the floor, and after that two big rats stole softly across the old rag rug in front of the fireplace.
With a leap, Puss landed close to the rats, and with his right paw, laid hold of the nearest, and with his left paw caught the other. "Squeak, squeak! Oh, let us go!" they cried.
"Not unless you promise to leave this house," replied Puss, fiercely, his whiskers standing out straight and his eyes glaring like two b.a.l.l.s of fire.
"We will, we will!" squeaked the rats.
"Then go!" cried Puss, "and don"t you ever come back!"
"We won"t, we won"t!" cried the terrified rats.
And after that Puss softly crept into the kitchen, where on the table sat three little mice eating a piece of cake. In a second Puss had them fast in his claws.
"Squeak, squeak!" screamed the little mice.
"I"ll spare you," said Puss, glaring at them with eyes as bright as automobile lamps. "I"ll let you go if you"ll promise to leave this house with all your sisters and brothers and cousins and aunts and fathers and mothers and grandmothers and grandfathers, and all your friends, and everybody else that I can"t think of, for I"m so mad I could eat you."
"Oh don"t," they cried; "we"ll go, we"ll go! We"ll promise to leave."
And after that the little old man was never bothered with rats and mice.
MISTER FOX
IT was late in the evening as Puss, Junior, entered a gloomy forest. It was very dark beneath the big, tall trees, so by and by he stopped and looked about him, when all of a sudden--
"A fox went out in a hungry plight, And he begged of the moon to give him light, For he"d many miles to trot that night."
Well, as soon as the Fox had finished asking Lady Moon to show him the way Puss cried out:
"Oh, Mr. Fox, take me with you, for I"m lost in this forest." But goodness me! the Fox was so frightened at the sound of Puss, Junior"s, voice that he jumped behind a tree.
"Who speaks to me?" he asked, faintly.
"Puss in Boots, Junior."
"Ah," replied the Fox, coming out from his hiding place, "now I"m not afraid. At first I thought you were a farmer; farmers don"t like me!"
"Why should they?" asked Puss. "You steal their ducks and chickens."