Exciting Adventures of Mister Robert Robin | Page 7

Then the farmer's wife said: "Do not tease the kitty, Donald!"
But Donald had not been taught to do as he was told, so he blew the
whistle again and again and chased the Maltese cat across the lettuce
bed, and over two rows of radishes.
The farmer's wife shouted, "Donald! Donald!" but Donald kept blowing
the tin whistle and following the Maltese cat, but the next thing he
knew the farmer's wife took his tin whistle away from him.
Donald was so angry that he jumped right up and down on the celery
plants, and the farmer's wife said, "Look here! Young man!" and shook
Donald until he looked like a jumping jack, and Donald was so
surprised to think that anyone would dare shake him that he stopped
right where he was, and then the farmer's wife said to him:
"Now, young man! You may as well know at the very start that if you
want to be a bad little boy you will have a tough row to hoe, but if you
want to mend your ways and be a nice little boy, things will be
different! I thought I might as well make that plain to you now as

later!"
Then Donald wiped his eyes on the farmer's wife's apron, and helped
her weed two whole rows of carrots, and the big Maltese cat went to
sleep under the gooseberry bush, and Robert Robin flew back to the
woods and told Mrs. Robin that the farmer had a new cat and that the
farmer's wife had a new baby that didn't like cats.
CHAPTER III
ROBERT ROBIN AND WIDOW BLUNT'S STUFFED OWL
It was a dismal, rainy day. Long before morning, the storm had begun,
and when the faint light had at last dawned in the east, the rain still
pattered down on the leaves of Mister Robert Robin's big basswood
tree, and fell in great drops from their tips. Robert Robin did not like
the weather. He had not even sung his "Hurry up!" song, and the rain
had pelted down so furiously that his every feather was wet, and he was
soaked to his shivering skin.
Mrs. Robin was afraid that the raindrops would fall inside the nest and
wet the eggs, so she kept her wings spread out so far that her shoulders
ached.
"It is very uncomfortable, sitting in this cramped position!" she said to
Robert Robin. "I am afraid that I will get the rheumatism in my joints!"
"Let me cover the eggs for you!" said Robert Robin.
"With your feathers all wet?" exclaimed Mrs. Robin. "I am trying to
keep the eggs dry and warm!"
"Let me try it once!" said Robert Robin.
"No! Thank you, dear! your intentions are good, but you are so clumsy
you would be almost sure to break one of the eggs, and to-day is the
day they will hatch!"

"I wish that it would stop raining!" said Robert Robin.
"Why not sing your 'Dry Weather' song?" asked Mrs. Robin. "The rain
might stop coming if it heard you singing your 'Dry Weather' song!"
"I only sing my 'Dry Weather' song when the weather is dry!" answered
Robert Robin. "Still I would do almost anything to make this rain stop
coming down!"
So Robert Robin flew up to the top of his big basswood tree to sing his
"Dry Weather" song, in the rain.
Mister Jim Crow was sitting in his tall hemlock tree. He was wishing
that the rain would stop falling, for he was as wet as water could make
him. From over the tops of the tall forest trees came the sound of
Robert Robin singing his "Dry Weather" song:
"Dry up the crick! Dry up the crick! Dry up the beetles! Dry up the
beetles! Dry up the crick!"
"Ha! Ha! Ha!" laughed Jim Crow. "That funny Robert Robin is singing
his 'Dry Weather' song! He is saying 'dry up the crick!'--he means
'creek' of course, but could anything be funnier than that wet bird
sitting in the rain, and singing about dry weather? The creek is roaring
down through the sheep pasture, like a yellow river! 'Dry up the crick!'
Ha! Ha! Ha!" and Jim Crow laughed so hard that he forgot all about
being wet.
"Dry up the crick!" screamed Robert Robin over and over again, until
he was too tired to sing any more. Then he perched near Mrs. Robin
and said, "I sang it seven times, but the rain is coming down harder
than ever!"
"Well! You did your best, dear!" said Mrs. Robin. "It isn't your fault if
it rains," and she could smell his feathers, they were so wet.
Suddenly the sky grew lighter, and with a roar that shook the earth a
mighty wind swept through