Among the Farmyard PeoplePierson, Clara Dillingham
History
Among the Farmyard People
Pierson, Clara Dillingham
Animals -- Juvenile fiction; Children's stories; Farm life -- Juvenile fiction; Natural history -- Juvenile fiction
"A Weasel bit me in the night, sir. But it doesn't hurt so much as it
did before I came to see you. Perhaps the pasture is a better place for
lame legs than the farmyard." He didn't know that it was because he was
trying to make somebody else happy that he felt so much better, yet that
was the reason.
The Blind Horse and the Duckling became very fond of each other and had
a fine time. The Horse told stories of his Colthood, and of the things
he had seen in his travels before he became blind. And the Duckling told
him what the other farmyard people were doing, and about the soft,
fleecy clouds that drifted across the blue sky. When the mother Duck
came to look for him, the little fellow was much surprised. "Didn't you
go to the brook?" he asked.
"Yes," said his mother, with a smile. "We have been there all the
morning. Don't you see how high the sun is?"
"Why-ee!" said the Duckling. "I didn't think I had been here long at
all. We've been having the nicest time. And I'm coming again, am I not?"
He asked this question of the Blind Horse.
"I wish you would come often," answered the Blind Horse. "You have given
me a very pleasant morning. Good-bye!"
The mother Duck and her son waddled off together. "How is your leg?"
said she.
"I forgot all about it until I began to walk," answered the Duckling.
"Isn't that queer?"
"Not at all," said his mother. "It was because you were making somebody
else happy. 'When you don't know what to do, help somebody.'"
THE FUSSY QUEEN BEE
In a sheltered corner of the farmyard, where the hedge kept off the cold
winds and the trees shaded from hot summer sunshine, there were many
hives of Bees. One could not say much for the Drones, but the others
were the busiest of all the farmyard people, and they had so much to do
that they did not often stop to visit with their neighbors.
In each hive, or home, there were many thousand Bees, and each had his
own work. First of all, there was the Queen. You might think that being
a Queen meant playing all the time, but that is not so, for to be a
really good Queen, even in a Beehive, one must know a great deal and
keep at work all the time. The Queen Bee is the mother of all the Bee
Babies, and she spends her days in laying eggs. She is so very precious
and important a person that the first duty of the rest is to take care
of her.
The Drones are the stoutest and finest-looking of all the Bees, but they
are lazy, very, very lazy. There are never many of them in a hive, and
like most lazy people, they spend much of their time in telling the
others how to work. They do not make wax or store honey, and as the
Worker Bees do not wish them to eat what has been put away for winter,
they do not live very long.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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