The Queen Bee and Other Nature Stories Part 9

"Hide me! Save me!" he cried. "The farmer's dog Trusty is after me."

"You can creep behind the hedge," said the burdock, "then I will hide you."

"You don't look to me much good for that job," said the hare, "but in time of need one must help oneself as one can." And so he got in safety behind the hedge.

"Now you may repay me by taking some of my seeds with you over into the cornfield," said the burdock; and it broke off some of its many heads and fixed them on the hare.

A little later Trusty came trotting up to the hedge.

"Here's the dog," whispered the burdock, and with one spring the hare leapt over the hedge and into the rye.

"Haven't you seen the hare, burdock?" asked Trusty. "I see I have got too old to go hunting. I am quite blind in one eye, and I have completely lost my scent."

"Yes, I have seen him," answered the burdock; "and if you will do me a service, I will show you where he is."

Trusty agreed, and the burdock fastened some heads on his back, and said to him,--

"If you will only rub yourself against the stile there in the cornfield, my seeds will fall off. But you must not look for the hare there, for a little while ago I saw him run into the wood."

Trusty dropped the burs on the field and trotted to the wood.

"Well, I've got _my_ seeds put out in the world all right," said the burdock, and laughed as if much pleased with itself; "but it is impossible to say what will become of the thistle and the dandelion, and the harebell and the poppy."

Spring had come round once more, and the rye stood high already.

"We are pretty well off on the whole," said the rye plants. "Here we stand in a great company, and not one of us but belongs to our own n.o.ble family. And we don't get in each other's way in the very least.

It is a grand thing to be in the service of man."

But one fine day a crowd of little poppies, and thistles and dandelions, and burdocks and harebells poked up their heads above ground, all amongst the flourishing rye.

"What does _this_ mean?" asked the rye. "Where in the world are _you_ sprung from?"

And the poppy looked at the harebell and asked, "Where do _you_ come from?"

And the thistle looked at the burdock and asked, "Where in the world have _you_ come from?"

They were all equally astonished, and it was an hour before they had explained. But the rye was the angriest, and when she had heard all about Trusty and the hare and the breeze she grew quite wild.

"Thank heaven, the farmer shot the hare last autumn," she said; "and Trusty, fortunately, is also dead, the old scamp. So I am at peace, as far as _they_ are concerned. But how dare the breeze promise to drop the seeds of the weeds in the farmer's cornfield?"

"Don't be in such a pa.s.sion, you green rye," said the breeze, who had been lying behind the hedge and hearing everything. "I ask no one's permission, but do as I like; and now I'm going to make you bow to me."

Then she pa.s.sed over the young rye, and the thin blades swayed backwards and forwards.

"You see," she said, "the farmer attends to his rye, because that is _his_ business. But the rain and the sun and I--we attend to all of you without respect of persons. To our eyes the poor weed is just as pretty as the rich corn."

The farmer now came out to look at his rye, and when he saw the weeds in the cornfield he scratched his head with vexation and began to growl.

"It's that scurvy wind that's done this," he said to Jack and Will, as they stood by his side with their hands in the pockets of their new trousers.

But the breeze flew towards them and knocked all their caps off their heads, and rolled them far away to the road. The farmer and the two boys ran after them, but the wind ran faster than they did.

It finished up by rolling the caps into the village pond, and the farmer and the boys had to stand a long time fishing for them before they got them out.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PREPARING for FLIGHT]

The Sparrow

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE SPARROW]

The swallow was in a bad temper. He sat on the roof close by the starlings' box and drooped his bill.

"There is not a fly left to chase," he whined piteously. "They are all gone, and I am _so_ hungry--_so_ hungry!"

"This morning I could not get a single worm," said the starling, and shook his head wisely.

The stork came strutting along, and stood on one leg in the ploughed field just outside the garden, and looked most melancholy.

"I suppose none of you have seen a frog?" he asked. "There isn't one down in the marsh, and I have not had any breakfast to-day."

Then the thrush flew up and perched on the roof of the starlings' box.

"How crestfallen you all are," he said. "What is the matter with you?"

"Ah," answered the starling, "there's nothing else the matter, only the leaves are beginning to fall off the trees, and the b.u.t.terflies and flies and worms are all eaten up."

"Yes, that is bad for you," said the thrush.

"Well, isn't it just as bad for you, you conceited creature?" said the swallow.

But the thrush piped gaily and shook his head.

"Not quite," he said. "I have always the fir trees, which don't lose their leaves; and I can live very many weeks yet on all the delicious berries in the wood."

"Let us stop squabbling," said the stork. "We had better consider together what we are to do."

"We can soon agree about that," answered the starling, "for we have no choice. We must _travel_. All my little ones can fly quite well now; we have been drilling every morning down in the meadow. I have already warned them that we shall be starting off one of these days."

The other birds thought this very sensible--all except the thrush, who thought there was no hurry. So they agreed to collect next day down in the meadow, and hold a grand review of the party that was to travel.

They flew off, each to his own quarters; but up under the roof sat the sparrow, who had heard all they had been saying.