Little Busybodies | Page 2

took pains to have in the book only such little
creatures as any one of us could see any day; although we hoped that
mothers and teachers would say, "At last, this is a book the children
and I can like and find useful!" or, "There, that will help as a
starting-point to tell about the bees and the flowers!" or, "This story
about the flies will teach the children what it means to be clean!"
Although, I say, we hoped all these things, yet our chief hope was that
we might give all sorts of children a good time.
So we put our spectacles on and looked very wise, and took a quantity
of ink on our pens and began to write. And we wrote and wrote and
wrote. And part of the time, while one of us was writing and hoping the
stories would be so interesting the children would want to write about
them, too, the other was drawing and labelling each sketch so plainly
that any child could understand it, even if the ears were quite where
they could not be expected to be, or there were more eyes than,
seemingly, one creature ought to have, or wings and legs served to
make music, as no sensible child could possibly guess.
And now we can't do better than wish you a good time before we say
good-bye. We wish you to enjoy all the frolics, to feel how jolly it is to
be out-of-doors in the woods and fields and lakes, climbing, canoeing,
picnicing, and swimming.
But still more, we hope that you will realize that more wonderful than
the most wonderful fairy story ever told is the marvel of the created life
of these little insects; we want you to come to know something of their
joys and troubles; we want you to learn how to be kind to them, and
how they may be useful to you; and we want you to find out for
yourselves the places they take in the great plan of creation.
In other words, we want you to think and feel about the lives of these
six-legged busybodies, and see for yourselves how much even a
butterfly can add to the interest and beauty of living. Does this seem a
little bit like a sermon? Well, you see, we forgot we had kept on our
spectacles so long, and somehow spectacles always turn into sermons.
Perhaps it is because both begin with the letter S.

And now this is all of our short word to the wise. We expect to make
each one of our books better than the last, and you can help us to do
this by writing any suggestions you may have. We shall be glad to hear
from children, big or little.
J. M. and J. M.
South Hadley, Massachusetts, January 27, 1909.

LITTLE BUSYBODIES
I
THE JOURNEY
"It will be stories all summer, won't it?" said Betty to her mother.
"Yes, dear."
"And hunting, too?" said Jimmie.
"Hunting with your new gun and hunting with your camera."
Jimmie unfastened the case of his new camera and looked in. What a
beautiful one it was, and what pictures he meant to take, and how the
camera would impress Ben Gile! Jimmie looked about proudly. He
knew no other boy in that whole great train had a camera like the one
his father had given him.
"Mother, when will it be lunch?" asked Betty.
"Luncheon so soon!"
"I'm as hungry as a bear," declared Jimmie.
"And hear Kitty mewing; she's hungry, too." Betty looked at the big
round basket, whose cover kept restlessly stirring.

"Did you leave something in the baggage-car for Max to eat?" Mrs.
Reece asked Jimmie.
"Yes, mum. It's one o'clock; can't we have something now?"
"As late as that! No wonder you chickens are hungry for--"
"Chicken!" squealed Betty.
"And ham sandwiches!" added Jimmie.
"And chocolate cake!"
"And root-beer!"
"And peppermints!"
"Ssh!" said Mrs. Reece, "or every one in the car will know what little
piggies you are. Ask Lizzie for the basket."
[Illustration: A. Outer wing of locust. B. Inner wing of locust. C.
Sideview of locust. a. Antenna. b. Simple eye. c. Compound eye. d.
Thorax. e. Abdomen. f. Breathing pore. g. Ear. D. Hind leg of locust.]
Every minute the air was growing cooler. The children could smell the
pine woods, and once in a while the train flashed by a great big sawmill,
or a lake set like a sapphire in the deep green of the forests. And the
hills were rolling nearer and nearer in great shadows. The children ate
their luncheon contentedly, looking out of the windows and thinking of
the mountains there would be to climb, the ponds, the streams to fish,
the pictures to take,