The Child's World Part 2

[Ill.u.s.tration: A bird in a tree]

A STORY OF BIRD LIFE

I

Once there came to our fields a pair of birds. They had never built a nest nor seen a winter.

Oh, how beautiful was everything! The fields were full of flowers, the gra.s.s was growing tall, and the bees were humming everywhere.

One of the birds fell to singing, and the other bird said, "Who told you to sing?"

He answered, "The flowers and the bees told me. The blue sky told me, and you told me."

"When did I tell you to sing?" asked his mate.

"Every time you brought in tender gra.s.s for the nest," he replied.

"Every time your soft wings fluttered off again for hair and feathers to line it."

Then his mate asked, "What are you singing about?"

"I am singing about everything," he answered. "I sing because I am happy."

By and by five little speckled eggs were in the nest, and the mother bird asked, "Is there anything in all the world as pretty as my eggs?"

A week or two afterward, the mother said, "Oh, what do you think has happened? One of my eggs has been peeping and moving."

Soon another egg moved, then another, and another, till five eggs were hatched.

The little birds were so hungry that it kept the parents busy feeding them. Away they both flew. The moment the little birds heard them coming back, five yellow mouths flew open wide.

"Can anybody be happier?" said the father bird to the mother bird. "We will live in this tree always. It is a tree that bears joy."

II

The very next day one of the birds dropped out of the nest, and in a moment a cat ate it up. Only four remained, and the parent birds were very sad. There was no song all that day, nor the next.

Soon the little birds were big enough to fly. The first bird that tried his wings flew from one branch to another. His parents praised him, and the other baby birds wondered how he had done it.

The little one was so proud of it that he tried again. He flew and flew and couldn't stop flying. At last he fell plump! down by the kitchen door. A little boy caught him and carried him into the house.

Now only three birds were left. The sun no longer seemed bright to the birds, and they did not sing so often.

In a little time the other birds learned to use their wings, and they flew away and away. They found their own food and made their own nests.

Then the old birds sat silent and looked at each other a long while. At last the mother bird asked, "Why don't you sing?"

"I can't sing," the father bird answered. "I only think and think!"

"What are you thinking of?"

"I am thinking how everything changes. The leaves are falling, and soon there will be no roof over our heads. The flowers are all gone. Last night there was a frost. Almost all the birds have flown away, and I am restless. Something calls me, and I feel that I must fly away, too."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Two birds flying over a field]

"Let us fly away together!" the mother bird said.

Then they rose silently up in the air. They looked to the north; far away they saw the snow coming. They looked to the south; there they saw green leaves.

All day they flew. All night they flew and flew, till they found a land where there was no winter. There it was summer all the time; flowers always blossomed and birds always sang.

--HENRY WARD BEECHER

BOB WHITE

There's a plump little chap in a speckled coat, And he sits on the zigzag rails remote, Where he whistles at breezy, bracing morn, When the buckwheat is ripe, and stacked is the corn: "Bob White! Bob White! Bob White!"

Is he hailing some comrade as blithe as he?

Now I wonder where Robert White can be!

O'er the billows of gold and amber grain There is no one in sight--but, hark again: "Bob White! Bob White! Bob White!"

Ah! I see why he calls; in the stubble there Hide his plump little wife and babies fair!

So contented is he, and so proud of the same, That he wants all the world to know his name: "Bob White! Bob White! Bob White!"

--GEORGE COOPER.

HOW MARY GOT A NEW DRESS

Mary lived a long time ago. She was a little girl when your great-great-grandmother was a little girl.

In those days all cloth had to be made at home. Aunt Dinah, Aunt Chloe, and Aunt Dilsey were kept busy spinning and weaving to make clothes for the whole plantation.

One day Mary's mother said, "Aunt Dilsey, Mary needs a new dress, and I want you to weave some cloth at once. Can you weave some very fine cloth?"

"Yes, ma'am," said Aunt Dilsey. "I have some cotton I've been saving to make her a dress."

Aunt Dilsey got out the cards and carded the cotton smooth and fine.

Then she fastened a roll of this cotton to the spindle and sent the wheel whirling around with a "Zum-m-m-m--Zum-m-m-m!"