Then he took a piece of the root and a sprig and flew back to show the
King. Solomon smiled and said: "You did the best you could, but you have
marked the wrong root. Listen! This is not the golden chime, but the
chime of silver bells."
That is the story of it and that is why it has ever since been called
the False Solomon Seal.
FOOTNOTE:
[A] Some, like the Turkey-buzzards, have not yet been heard to sing, but
I believe they do.
THINGS TO SEE IN SUMMERTIME
[Illustration: The Brownie and the Mouse-bird]
Things to See in Summertime
TALE 17
How the Mouse-bird Made Fun of the Brownie
Once there was a conceited Brownie, who thought he could do more things
and do them better than any other of his people. He had not tried yet,
for he was very young, but he said he was going to do them some day!
One morning a sly old Brownie, really making fun of him, said: "Why
don't you catch that Phoebe-bird? It is quite easy if you put a little
salt on his tail." Away went Smarty Brownie to try. But the Phoebe would
not sit still, and the Brownie came back saying: "He bobbed his tail so,
the salt would not stay on."
"Well," said the sly old Brownie, "there is a little Mouse-bird whose
tail never bobs. You can easily catch him, for you see, he does not even
fly, but crawls like a mouse up the tree," and he pointed to a little
brown Creeper. By this time the young Brownie knew that the others were
laughing at him, so he said rather hotly, "I'll just show you right
now."
He took an acorn cup full of salt, and went after the Mouse-bird. It was
at the bottom of the big tree, creeping up, round and round, as if on a
spiral staircase, and the Brownie began to climb in the same way. But
every little while the climber had to stop and rest. This had strange
results, for there is a law in Brownie land, that wherever one of the
little people stops to sit down, or rest, a toadstool must spring up for
him to sit on. So the track of the Brownie up the trunk became one long
staircase of toadstool steps, some close, some far apart, but each
showing where the Brownie had rested. They came closer together toward
the top where the Brownie had got tired, but he was coming very near to
the Creeper now. He got his pinch of salt all ready, as his friends down
below kept calling and jeering: "Now you've got him, now is your
chance." But just as he was going to leap forward and drop the salt on
its tail, the Creeper gave a tiny little laugh like "_Tee-tee-tee_,"
spread its wings, for it could fly very well, and sailed away to the
bottom of the next tree to do the spiral staircase all over again, while
Smarty Brownie was so mad that he jumped to the ground and hid away from
his friends for two days. When he came back he did not talk quite so
much as he used to. But to this day you can see the staircase of
toadstools on the tree trunks where the Brownie went up.
TALE 18
The Pot-herb that Sailed with the Pilgrims
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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