The Cheerful Cricket and Others Part 1

The Cheerful Cricket and Others.

by Jeannette Marks.

CHEERFUL CRICKET

The Cheerful Cricket had been running around anxiously in the gra.s.s all the morning. Mrs. Cricky carried her head down, and when she ran she scuttled, and when she stopped she was absolutely still, except for her eyes, which she turned about brightly in every direction. Mrs. Cricky was looking for food for Chee, Chirk and Chirp. Usually Mr. Cricky brought home the food, but he was a member of the Marsh Gra.s.s Vesper Quartette--made up of himself, Miss K. T. Did, Mr. Frisky Frog and Mr.

Tree Toad Todson, first cousin to Toadie Todson--and they had all been out very late the night before, so Mrs. Cricky didn't wish to disturb him.

At last Mrs. Cricky found what she wanted, and home she came. Chirp and Chee and Chirk were fed, and then it was time to begin school. Mrs.

Cricky always taught her own children. She had rented three little toad-stools, not any bigger than tacks, from Toadie Todson, and these the children used for desks. She often said that she thought round-top desks better than flat, for then the children were not so likely to lean their elbows on them. School began promptly as the sun rose; nine o'clock would have seemed a lazy hour to the little Cricketses. The princ.i.p.al study Mrs. Cricky taught was Cheerfulness, much the same as you are taught reading and writing. She said that the whole duty of a cricket was to be cheerful. After this she gave them some lessons in Fear. These lessons were something like the things your mother tells you, such as, "Don't go near the water," "Fire burns," "Don't put beans in your ears," "Look before you leap;" only Mrs. Cricky told Chirp and Chee and Chirk never to go near one of old Stingy's spider-webs, and when they saw a giant coming with a fish pole in his hand, to hop away as fast as they could. Then, too, she said there was a four-footed animal, called a cat, that caught little crickets to eat them up. After this they all chirruped together as she waved a blade of gra.s.s to keep time, then she rang a blue-bell and school was over. She put three little clover-leaf sunbonnets on them and sent them out into the sun to play.

Now Chirp and Chee and Chirk were like other little boys and girls who do not learn their lessons very well. And Chee was careless about listening to his lessons in Fear. They went right out with their three little clover-leaf sunbonnets on and down to the edge of the lake. Chee climbed way up to the top end of a large blade of gra.s.s, and was balancing there, much as you like to on a spring-board, when accidentally he fell into the lake. Chirp and Chirk ran to and fro, frightened to death, calling for help. But n.o.body heard them. In the meantime Chee was kicking in the water and making a great fuss, when a big oak leaf floated by, and Chee scrambled on. If, however, the leaf had not come at just that moment Chee would have drowned. When the leaf floated in sh.o.r.e they all went home and told Mother Cricky. She stopped chirruping for quite a long time and didn't say anything at all. When Mrs. Cricky began to chirrup again she said it served them just right, and she hoped it had taught them all a lesson. Then they all chirruped together, because Chee was safe, and Mrs. Cricky said: "Now let us all sing a little song to show that we are happy." And this is the song they sang:

_Jump, Jump_

_Rather Fast_

Jump, jump everywhere, How we like the summer air, Chirp, chirp, chirp in tune, On the gra.s.s beneath the moon.

THE SLOTHFUL TOAD

The slothful Toad (his real name was Toadie Todson) crawled out of his hole and looked about. He saw a Bee near by buzzing busily over a rich large clover blossom, and a st.u.r.dy Ant dragging a white parcel marked "Food" toward a round sandy house, and a cheery little Cricket marching rapidly up a green stalk in search of a dinner for three hungry little Cricketses. It was a busy time for all except Toadie Todson.

The spring had just come, that much Toadie Todson knew, and all these neighbors were busy putting their houses in order. Well, the Bee was stocking his honeycomb house, the Ant was putting her summer pantry into order and filling it with cookies, cream cheese, cake, and honey that her Majesty, the Queen Bee, sent over every day. And the Cricket, although his house was out of doors under a big green oak leaf that had dropped to the ground, was busy piling up all the food he could find for Mrs. Cricky to guard while she nursed the three little Cricketses.

Toadie Todson was tired to see so much going on. He wished they would all be quiet and stop hurrying around. He drew a long sigh, which made him swell up and look rounder and fatter than ever. Why couldn't his neighbors feed as he did? He just sat there and opened his big red slit of a mouth, gave a lazy snap, and a noisy fly, still buzzing, was swallowed up. He moved a little further away from his hole, dragging one fat, squashy leg after the other, then down he squatted again.

A little ball of green inch-worm dropped off the bush on to Toadie Todson's back and began to measure its length over Toadie's big warts and veins. It made him feel very important to have an inch-worm all to himself to tickle his back, as important as an Egyptian Queen with a slave to tickle the sole of her foot all the hot afternoon long. Toadie Todson swelled with pride as the green inch-worm went measuring up and down, up and down his back.

The Busy Bee just then flew buzzing by and buzzed to Toadie as he went: "There's a sand-slide rolling down this way. I'm getting out's fast as I can." When the Bee said sand-slide it sounded just like "Sz-sz-sz--z-z-z-z--ide." Toadie Todson opened his fat eyes and dropped his mouth in an ugly laugh. It made him sick to see any one in such a hurry. Then the Honest Ant went scurrying past and very kindly gave him the same message. But Toadie only sneered the more. He had been living in this very spot for years, almost as many as you have lived, and nothing had ever happened to him. No, he would stay right there, it was too much trouble to move for anybody. The green inch-worm was very green, and went on measuring Toadie Todson's back, for it didn't understand a word the Bee and Ant had said,

Suddenly, gravel, gravel, gravel, slip, slip, slip--and Toadie Todson was under mountains of sand with a great big rock square on his back.

The green inch-worm began to bore its way out of the sand; it could hear Toadie Todson groaning and saying:

"O! O! I wish I'd never been so lazy. I might have lived an' been as happy and rich as the Bee or the Ant. O, O!"

And the green inch-worm knew that Toadie Todson was dead.

Not more than six hours after this Mrs. Cricky overheard the green inch-worm practising a tune. It pleased her so much that she tried to sing it again to Father Cricky for the Marsh Gra.s.s Vesper Quartette. Of course it was all about Toadie Todson, and this was it:

_A Lament

Very slowly_

Mournful, mournful notes, In our little throats we sing Flowers, flowers dead, For our Toadie's head we bring

THE SULLEN CATERPILLAR

All the little green Inch-Worms and the energetic, thin Road-Worms called him Glummie for short, although his whole name was Longinus Rotundus Caterpillar. That's a very long, hard name, and they couldn't be bothered with a name like that for such a sulky fellow as he. And for fear I shall take too long telling my story about him, we also will call him, not Longinus Rotundus Caterpillar, but Glummie. Glummie was born into a most talented and attractive family--that means a family that could do many things very well and was pretty to look at; but from the time he went out to eat his own leaves he was sullen. n.o.body knew exactly what was the matter. It is true his sisters were prettier than he, for they had long yellow hair that waved all over a silky green body, and they had dark yellow-brown eyes. But a boy should not mind having his sisters prettier than he. And he had an older brother they all called "Squirm." He was very much liked; he was browner and larger than Glummie, and he was always doing nice things for his brother, and Glummie shouldn't have been jealous.

But, however all that might be, this day Glummie was sulking away in the gra.s.s, and making himself generally disliked. Two Katydids had said a pleasant "Good-morning" to him, and almost jumped out of their green coats when he snapped out, "It ain't" Mrs. Cricky in pa.s.sing by chirped pleasantly, and Glummie glowered so out of his great, fierce red-brown eyes at her that she hurried on, in terror of her life. There was only one thing snappier than he on the gra.s.s by the lake sh.o.r.e that morning, and that was the Snapping Turtle. Presently a Locust came along and turned on his buzzing hum right in Glummie's ear. Then Glummie was furious, raised his head and struck at the Locust. Now the Locust was a tease, and this pleased him immensely. So he cracked his wings right in the very face of Glummie and began to sing:

_The Firefly Song

Not too fast_

Dancing, dancing, Fire--flies dancing, Flash your wings, Frog-gie sings, Dance my little wings, dance.

Glummie fairly raged, till the hairs all over his fat body stood up straight, and his long stiff whiskers--and he had whiskers on both his head and his tail--fairly bristled. He grumbled out that he didn't see why he couldn't live in peace in the gra.s.s; that all he wanted was to be let alone. Then he said he knew how he could get away from the society of worms and crickets and katydids he hated, and all the deafening noises they made to drive him crazy. Thereupon, with a sulky twist of his head, he crawled toward the road. He had just crawled into the first wheel-rut when a big, jouncing, yellow Kentucky cart came by and made an end of Longinus Rotundus Caterpillar.

Mrs. Cricky said the moral of his end was very plain to her. She told all the little Cricketses that you couldn't expect to speak sullenly to people and have them like you, and that you couldn't expect to live away from the society of other people without having something killed in you.

Mrs. Cricky called it love; and then, perhaps a little inconsistently (ask your mother what that means), she added, she for one was glad Glummie was dead.

GREEN INCH-WORM

Greenie, Toadie Todson's Green Inch-Worm, was measuring his way carefully around a birch tree. Since Toadie Todson's death, he spent a large part of every day looking at trees and measuring distances, so that Stingy could spin his webs in the best manner possible.

All the rainbow qualities of web were spun on white birch trees. Greenie was humming over mournfully to himself the song which Mr. Tree Toad Todson had composed in memory of his cousin Toadie Todson--A Lament.

Greenie sang the words over and over again and seemed, as his voice grew more and more mournful, to be happier and still happier. That is often the way with melancholy people. Greenie felt he had good reason to be unhappy. Not so long ago his first cousin, Longinus Rotundus Caterpillar, or by his more familiar name Glummie, had been killed. Then his master, Toadie Todson, with whom he at least had a lazy time, was killed in a sand slide. And now he spent all his days at work for Stingy, who was a very exacting master. If he so much as stopped to nibble a little from a tender green birch leaf, Stingy would fly at him and bid him go to work at once.

But one day Greenie discovered something about him which he intended to use to good advantage. Stingy was in love. Every day at certain hours Stingy went quietly off, and one day Greenie followed him. There down in the meadow under a big apple tree he found Stingy together with five other spiders. They were arranged in a row before Silken Web, more often called Silkie, whom they were courting, and Silkie was waiting, ready to accept the spider who did best. Out danced the first spider. The s.h.i.+ning hairs all over his body glistened in the sun, now he seemed silver, now jet black, now crimson as he whirled, jumping lightly into the air.

Silkie looked for a second and then turned her head away. It was plain she would have none of him. Off dejectedly crawled the first spider.

Greenie watched, fascinated by this bright colored little spectacle under the blossoming apple tree. Then his eyes grew dark and angry. He had to work when he was hungry. He had not had a single holiday for over a month, he had been spoken to crossly, his Family Tree had been scoffed at, he--well, he had had enough of this!

The last fine cobweb Stingy spun it was Greenie's business to fold and put away carefully in the centre of a b.u.t.tercup. He would get it and be back before it was time for Stingy to dance. He measured his way quickly over to the b.u.t.tercup, his little back fairly popped into the air every other half second as he went furiously humping himself along. He found the cobweb covered with the gold dust of the b.u.t.tercup, and taking it up hastily he hurried back. He knew just the spot where Stingy would dance before Silkie, beside a tall piece of Timothy Gra.s.s.

The fifth spider was finis.h.i.+ng his dance as Greenie reached the bottom of the Timothy Gra.s.s stalk. Out came Stingy with a fierce and self-confident air which plainly said, "All the other five have failed, now I am about to succeed." He looked at Silkie, then began to dance.

First he whirled round madly, and so swift and light was he that he seemed to have wings. His broad back and thin, tufted legs shone with dusky, golden colors. After whirling around he hopped several times lightly into the air.

In the meantime Greenie climbed the stalk and was waiting. Stingy was just about to do a sideways-hop, when over him fell inches and inches of his own gold dusted cobweb. Down he tumbled, his legs all tangled up in the web. Fiercely he fought to get out, while off scuttled the other spiders leaving him to his Fate. For a minute, the little green hairs on Greenie's back stuck up straight with merriment. Then complacently he measured his way home to his own Family Tree. Mrs. Cricky as she pa.s.sed him heard him muttering: "It's a long worm that has no turning, a _very_ long worm that has no turning!"

"Well," said Mrs. Cricky, "that may be true, but it is none of a cricket's business; it is just as well not to take part in other people's quarrels. Your Father says the _Cricket Rule_ is the best precept for living he has ever known, and your Father, children, is a very wise cricket. I dare say Greenie has had a hard time, but then, lazy worms often do. Now let us sing a little song about these flowers we've been hopping about in; it's pleasanter. Chirp, don't sing too loud, Chirk, not too fast, and Chee, don't mumble your words:"