The Curious Book of Birds, Abbie Farwell Brown [dark books to read .txt] 📗

place and I will spare you."

The Duck led him softly to the entrance of the cave, and pausing there cried out to the Fox inside, "Come out, Madame Fox, I have brought the witness."

"Let him come in, let him come in!" cried the Fox, for she had grown very hungry indeed and hoped for a double meal.

"No indeed," answered the Duck; "he insists that you must come out." So the Fox crept stealthily to the door, but as soon as she popped out her wicked old head the Hunter was ready for her, and Bang! That was the end of the Fox's pilgrimage.

The Duck also had had enough of being a pilgrim. He went home with the Hunter and became a tame Duck, and lived happily ever after on the pond near the Hunter's house.

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THE GROUND-PIGEON

ONCE upon a time there was a little Malay maiden who lived in the forest with her father and mother and baby sister. They dwelt very happily together, until one day Coora's father decided to clear the ground on the edge of the forest and have a rice plantation, as many of his neighbors were doing.

So one morning early after breakfast he started out with his axe on his shoulder to cut down the trees and make a clearing.

"O Father, let me go with you!" begged Coora. "I do so want to see the plantation grow from the very beginning."

But her father said No, she must stay at home until the trees were felled.

"And after that may I go with you?" asked Coora. And her father promised that it should be so.

The days went by and at last the trees were all felled in the clearing. When Coora heard this she jumped up and down on her little bare brown feet until her anklets tinkled, and cried, "O Father! Now I may go with you to the clearing, may I not? For so you promised."

But again her father shook his head and said, "No, Coora, not yet. You must wait until the fallen timber has been burned off. Then you shall go with your mother and me to the planting of the rice."

Coora was very much disappointed, and the big tears stood in her eyes. But she only said, "Do you promise that I may help plant the rice, really and truly?"

And he called back over his shoulder, "I promise!"

At last the fallen timber was burned away, and the ground was ready for planting. One morning Coora saw her father and mother making ready to go out together. "Oh, where are you going, Father and Mother?" she asked.

"We go to the planting of the rice," answered her father, slinging a big bag over his shoulder.

"But you promised that I should go with you when that time came?" cried Coora wistfully. "Please, please may I not be your little helper?"

"No, no, Coora," answered her mother impatiently. "Do not tease us so. You must stay at home to take care of your little sister. Be a good girl this time, and when the rice is well grown we will all go together and harvest it. That will be great fun!"

"Shall I really go? Do you promise, Mother?" asked poor Coora hopefully, for she felt sure that her mother would not deceive her.

"I promise," said the mother, not looking her in the eyes; and the parents went away through the forest to plant the rice.

Time went by until the rice had grown tall and was ready for the harvest. Now Coora heard her parents talking of the matter, and she was very gay, for now she expected a happy, happy day. She dressed herself and made ready to go to the harvesting, as her parents had promised. But when she joined them, smiling joyfully, they turned upon her frowning and bade her return to the house and take care of everything until their home-coming. Then poor little Coora burst into tears and said, "O my Father and O my Mother, I have obeyed you without a word every time you broke your promise to me. And still you continue to put me off from day to day, when this is the thing I long to do so much that it seems as if my heart would break. Think of it! The clearing has been made, the timber burned, the rice planted and grown, and now it is ready for the harvest. But I have not even seen the place where all this has happened. O Father and Mother, why are you so unkind to me?"

"There, there!" cried her father and mother together, "do not make a fuss over so small a matter. You cannot go to-day; but wait until the rice is gathered and it is time to tread it out. Then we will let you help us, you may be sure. We promise, Coora, that you shall really and truly go."

"You promise!" echoed Coora bitterly. "You have promised me before and nothing came of it." But even while she spoke the unkind parents were gone.

Then Coora fell to weeping most sorely, for she knew that she could not trust the word of her father and mother; and that is a most terrible thing. At last she rose and wiped away the tears and looked about the little cottage where she had been patient through so many disappointments. And she said to herself, "I can bear it no longer. It is not right that I should be made to suffer like this when a little thing would make me so happy. I must see the rice field; I will go to-day."

Coora tidied the cottage, putting everything in its place and making it look as beautiful as she could. Then she took up the little sister who had fallen asleep on the floor, and kissing her tenderly placed her in the hammock which swung from wall to wall of the hut. Lastly Coora took off the golden bracelets and earrings and the tinkling anklets which she wore like other little Malay girls, and left them in a shining heap behind the door. But she kept her necklace about her pretty little neck.

Now Coora had learned a little magic from a witch, just enough magic to serve her turn. She went out and picked two palm leaves which she fastened on her shoulders and changed herself into a bird, a bright, beautiful Ground-Pigeon, with many-colored metallic feathers. But the necklace still made a band about her pretty little neck, as you may see on every Ground-Pigeon to this day.

Coora the Ground-Pigeon fluttered away through the forest until she came to the rice plantation where her parents were at work. She alighted on a dead tree close by them and called out, "Mother, O Mother! I have left my earrings and bracelets behind the door and have put my little sister in the hammock."

Astonished at these words her mother looked up, but saw no one, only a Ground-Pigeon perched on the tree over her head. "Father," she cried to her husband who was at work beside her, "did you not hear Coora's voice just now?"

"Yes, I thought so," answered the father angrily. "The wicked girl must have disobeyed me and have followed us here after all. I will punish her if this is so." They called to her, "Coora, Coora!" until the forest reëchoed. But no one appeared or answered.

"I will go home and see if she is there," said the mother. "Either I heard Coora speak or there is some magic in the forest." And she hastened back to the cottage. There she found the baby in the hammock and the bracelets and earrings in a shining heap behind the door, as the voice had said, but there was no Coora anywhere. Surprised and anxious, once more the mother ran back to the plantation.

"Coora is gone, husband!" she cried. "It must have been her own voice which we heard just now. Hark! She speaks again!"

Again from the tree they heard a sweet voice calling, "Mother, O Mother, I have left my earrings and bracelets behind the door and my little sister in the hammock. Good-by, Coo-o-o-ra!" As she spoke her own name Coora's voice warbled and crooned into the soft coo of a Ground-Pigeon's note, and her parents glancing up saw that this bird must be their child, their Coora, magically changed.

"Let us cut down the tree and catch the wicked girl!" cried the father. And seizing his axe he chopped away lustily until the tree fell with a crash. But even at that moment the Pigeon fluttered away to another tree, crooning again the soft syllables which she has spoken ever since, "Coo-ra, coo-ra, coo!"

From tree to tree about the rice plantation the distracted parents pursued the Pigeon; but it was in vain to try to capture her. Ever she escaped them when they seemed about to lay hands upon her soft feathers. After following her flight for many miles they were obliged to return home, sad and sorry and repentant. For they knew now that it was their own unkindness and their broken promises which had driven their daughter away from the cottage, never to return.

The beautiful Ground-Pigeon still lingers near the rice plantations which she had so longed to visit. Still she plaintively calls her name, and still she wears the necklace about her pretty little neck. And the little Malay maidens love her very dearly because she was once a girl like them.

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SISTER HEN AND THE CROCODILE

THE Crocodile is one of the hungriest bodies that ever lived. When he is looking for a dinner he will eat almost anything that comes within reach. Sometimes the greedy fellow swallows great stones and chunks of wood, in his hurry mistaking them for something more digestible. And when he is smacking his great jaws over his food he makes such a greedy, terrible noise that the other animals steal away nervously and hide until it shall be Master Crocodile's sleepy-time. He is too lazy to waddle in search of a dinner far from the river where he lives. But any animal or even a man-swimmer had best be careful how he ventures into the water near the Crocodile's haunts. For what seems to be a greenish-brown, knobby log of wood floating on the water, has little bright eyes which are on the lookout for anything which moves. And below the water two great jaws are ready to open and swallow in the prey of Mr. Hungry-Mouth.

But no matter how hungry the Crocodile may be, he will not touch the Hen, even if she should venture into his very jaws; at least, that is what the Black Men of the Congo River will tell you. And surely, as they are the nearest neighbors of the big reptile they ought to know if any one does. Now this is the story which they tell to explain why the Crocodile will not eat the Hen.

Once upon a time there was a Hen, a common, plump, clucky mother Hen, who used every day to go down to the river and pick up bits of food on the moist banks, where luscious insects were many. She did not know that this Congo River was the home of the Crocodile, the biggest, fiercest, scaliest, hungriest Crocodile in all Africa. But one day when she went down to the water as usual she hopped out onto what looked like a mossy log, saying to herself:—

"Aha! This is a fine old timber-house. It is full of juicy bugs, I know. I shall have a great feast!"

Tap-tap! Pick-pick! The Hen began to scratch and peck upon the rough bark of the log, but Oh dear me! suddenly she began to feel very seasick. The log was rolling over! The log was teetering up on end like a boat in a storm! And before she knew what was really happening the poor Hen found herself floundering in