Mother Stories | Page 4

the hay with her three little
kittens, she told them that a barn was the best place after all to raise
children.
And she never afterwards changed her mind.

FLEET WING AND SWEET VOICE MOTTO FOR THE MOTHER
_Make the home-coming sweet! The gladness of going, The pleasure of

knowing Will not be complete Unless, at the ending, The
home-coming's sweet.
Make the home-coming sweet! No fear of the straying, Or dread of the
staying Of dear little feet, If always you're making The home-coming
sweet_.
Mother and Father Pigeon lived with their two young pigeons in their
home, built high on a post in the king's barnyard. Every bright morning
they would fly away through the beautiful sunshine wherever they
pleased, but, when evening came, they were sure to come to the
pigeon-house again.
One evening, when they were talking together in their sweet, cooing
way, Mother Pigeon said:--
"We each have a story to tell, I know; so let each one take his turn, and
Father Pigeon begin."
Then Father Pigeon said:--
"To-day I have been down to the shining little stream that runs through
the wood. The green ferns grow on either side of it, and the water is
cool, cool, cool! for I dipped my feet into it, and wished that you all
were there."
"I know the stream," cooed Mother Pigeon. "It turns the wheels of the
mills as it hurries along, and is busy all day on its way to the river."
"To-day I have talked with the birds in the garden," said Sweet Voice,
one of the young pigeons, "the thrush, the blackbird, and bluebird, and
all. They sang to me and I cooed to them, and together we made the
world gay. The bluebird sang of the sunshine, and the blackbird of the
harvest; but the thrush sang the sweetest song. It was about her nest in
the tree."
"I heard you all," said Fleet Wing, the other young pigeon; "for I sat
and listened on the high church tower. I was so high up, there, that I
thought I was higher than anything else; but I saw the great sun shining
in the sky, and the little white clouds, like sky pigeons, sailing above
me. Then, looking down, I saw, far away, this white pigeon-house; and
it made me very glad, for nothing that I saw was so lovely as home."
"I never fly far away from home," said Mother Pigeon, "and to-day I
visited in the chicken yard. The hens were all talking, and they greeted
me with 'Good morning! Good morning!' and the turkey gobbled 'Good
morning!' and the rooster said 'How do you do?' While I chatted with

them a little girl came out with a basket of yellow corn, and threw some
for us all. When I was eating my share, I longed for my dear ones. And
now good night," cooed Mother Pigeon, "it is sleepy time for us all."
"Coo, coo! Good night!" answered the others; and all was still in the
pigeon-house.
Now over in the palace, where the king, and queen, and their one little
daughter lived, there was the sound of music and laughter; but the
king's little daughter was sad, for early the next morning her father, the
king, was to start on a journey, and she loved him so dearly that she
could not bear to have him leave her.
The king's little daughter could not go out in the sunshine like Sweet
Voice and Fleet Wing, but lay all day within the palace on her silken
cushions; for her fine little feet, in their satin slippers, were always too
tired to carry her about, and her thin, little face was as white as a
jasmine flower.
The king loved her as dearly as she loved him; and when he saw that
she was sad, he tried to think of something to make her glad after he
had gone away. At last he called a prince, and whispered something to
him. The prince told it to a count, and the count to a
gentleman-in-waiting.
The gentleman-in-waiting told a footman, and the footman told
somebody else, and at last, the boy who waited on the cook heard it.
Early next morning he went to the pigeon-house, where Mother and
Father Pigeon and their two young pigeons lived; and putting his hand
through a door, he took Sweet Voice and Fleet Wing out, and dropped
them into a basket.
Poor Sweet Voice, and Fleet Wing! They were so frightened that they
could not coo! They sat very close to each other in the covered basket,
and wondered when they would see their mother and father and home
again.
All the time, as they sat close together in the basket and wondered, they
were