Mother West Wind "Where" StoriesBurgess, Thornton W. (Thornton Waldo)
General
Mother West Wind "Where" Stories
Burgess, Thornton W. (Thornton Waldo)
Animals -- Juvenile fiction
"Up he jumped and scampered away to cut some more and spread it out on
the rocks. Then he discovered that the pea vine which he spread in the
sun dried as he wanted it to, while any that happened to be left in the
shadow of a rock didn't dry so well. He had learned how to make hay. He
was the first hay-maker in the Great World. He soon had more than
enough for a bed, but he kept on making hay and storing it away just
for fun. Then came cold weather and all the green things died. There was
no food for Little Chief. He hunted and hunted, but there was nothing.
Then because he was so hungry he began to nibble at his hay. It tasted
good, very good indeed. It tasted almost as good as the fresh green
things. Little Chief's heart gave a great leap. He had food in plenty!
He had nothing to worry about, for his hay would last him until the
green things came again, as come they would, he felt sure.
"And so it proved. And that is how Little Chief the Pika learned to make
hay while the sun shone in the days of plenty. He taught his children
and they taught their children, and Little Chief of today does it just
as his great-great-ever-so-great-grand-daddy did. I don't see why you
don't do the same thing, Peter. You would make me a great deal finer
dinner if you did."
"Perhaps that is the reason I don't," replied Peter with a grin.
[Illustration: "Little Chief's father taught him how to
make hay." _Page 67._]
VI
WHERE GLUTTON THE WOLVERINE GOT HIS NAME
Glutton the Wolverine is a dweller in the depths of the Great Forests of
the Far North, and it is doubtful if Peter Rabbit would ever have known
that there is such a person but for his acquaintance with Honker the
Goose, who spends his summers in the Far North, but each spring and fall
stops over for a day or two in a little pond in the Green Forest, a pond
Peter often visits. This acquaintance with Honker and Peter's
everlasting curiosity have resulted in many strange stories. At least
they have seemed strange to Peter because they have been about furred
and feathered people whom Peter has never seen. And one of the strangest
of these is the story of how Glutton the Wolverine got his name.
Of course you know what a glutton is. It is one who is very, very, very
greedy and eats and eats as if eating were the only thing in life worth
while. It is one who is all the time thinking of his stomach. No one
likes to be called a glutton. So when Honker the Goose happened to
mention Glutton, it caused Peter to prick up his ears at once.
"Who's a glutton?" he demanded.
"I didn't say any one was a glutton," replied Honker. "I was speaking of
Glutton the Wolverine who lives in the Great Forests of the Far North,
and whom everybody hates."
"Is Glutton his name?" asked Peter, wrinkling his brows in perplexity,
for it seemed a very queer name for any one.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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