The Lion and the Puppy Page 4

  There, huddled beneath a bush, were his two children, crying with fright. Uncle Jacob’s faithful dog, who had protected them, was now being mauled savagely by a huge gray wolf. Without losing a moment, the old watchman took his axe and killed the wolf Then he seized the children in his arms and quickly ran home before other wolves could attack.

  The moment they were all safely inside the cottage, the door was bolted securely and the entire family sat down to supper. In his haste to save the children, however, the man had quite forgotten the brave old dog. And now, in the middle of the meal, there came a crying from behind the stout wooden door. Quickly unfastening the bolt, Uncle Jacob opened the door and there lay Old Bob, covered in blood and barely able to move.

  Uncle Jacob brought him indoors and the children ran for some water and food, but the old fellow would take neither. He just licked their hands gratefully Then, closing his tired brown eyes, he lay on his side and whimpered no more. The children thought he had fallen asleep. But, in truth, Old Bob was dead.

  WHY WOLVES ARE MEAN

  AND SQUIRRELS FRISKY

  A little red squirrel was skipping through the branches of a fir tree when — plop! — she fell right on the nose of a sleeping wolf

  In an instant the wolf was on his feet, fierce and bad-tempered, ready to eat the little pest who had disturbed him.

  But the squirrel begged, “Please spare me, Wolf, I did not mean to wake you.”

  To tell the truth, the wolf had just had his dinner and was not very hungry

  “All right,” he growled, “I’ll spare you this time. But on one condition: You must tell me something I’ve always wanted to know. What makes you squirrels so frisky? As for me, I’m always mean and miserable. Yet whenever I look at you, I see you playing and skipping, as though you hadn’t a care in the world.“

  “First let me go,” replied the squirrel, “then I’ll let you in on our secret“

  The wolf let her slip from his paws and the squirrel scampered to safety up a tree. From there she called down:

  “You’re always so miserable because you’re so mean; your meanness blackens your soul. We’re always merry because we’re kind and do nobody any harm.”

  THE ANTS

  One day I went to the pantry for jam. As I picked up a jar from the floor I noticed it was covered with tiny black ants. They were everywhere: running down the sides of the jar, around the rim, and even in the jam itself.

  Taking a spoon, I scooped out all the ants from the jam, brushed off the others from the jam jar, and placed it on the topmost shelf Next day when I entered the pantry I noticed the ants had crawled up to the shelf and were again swarming around the jam jar.

  This time I took down the jar, cleaned it once again, tied a string around the rim, and hung it from a hook in the celling. As I was leaving the pantry, I looked back at the jar and spotted one lone ant left on it: he was running fast around and around the jar.

  I waited to see what would happen.

  First the ant ran the length of the jar, seeming to examine all possibilities; then he ran along the string tied around the rim, up the string to the ceiling, and from the ceiling, he ran down the wall to the floor where a multitude of ants was waiting.

  And do you know what? That clever ant must have told his friends how he had climbed down from the jar. . . . For in no time at all, an entire column of ants marched up the wall to the ceiling and along the string to the jar — taking exactly the same route as the first ant.

  They’re clever insects, aren’t they?

  FROM AN ACORN

  GREW AN OAK TREE TALL

  One chill autumn morning, an old oak dropped an acorn. It rolled across the woodland path and came to rest beneath a hazel tree.

  The hazel was most displeased.

  “Don’t you have space enough beneath your own branches?” it snapped. “Why don’t you drop your acorns over there? I’ve hardly room for my saplings as it is!”

  “I have lived these two hundred years,” rumbled the old oak. “And the oakling that grows from my acorn will live just as long.”

  That made the hazel even angrier.

  “And what if I smother your dear oakling? Then he won’t last three days.”

  The oak did not reply Silently he bade his son grow big and strong.

  In the course of time, the acorn grew moist, burst its shell, and hooked one shoot into the soil, sending another climbing slenderly toward the sky.

  Defiantly the hazel blocked out the sun. Yet the oakling struggled on bravely, seeming to grow even stronger in the shade.

  A hundred years went by.

  The hazel has long since withered and died. Yet from the tiny acorn an oak tree has grown tall and strong, proudly spreading its leafy mantle high above the forest.