Mother West Wind Where Stories | Page 5

did Brer Rat, in huntin' for the longest and sharpest thorns and in cuttin' the branches on which they grew. These he carried to his house and piled them around it and on it until it had become a great pile with sharp thorns stickin' out in every direction, and the hungriest of the big people of the forest passed it at a respectful distance.
"When Brer Rat had all the thorns he needed and more, he began to collect other things and added these to his pile. Yo' see, he had found that it was great fun to collect things; to find the queerest things he could and bring them home and look at them and wonder about them. So little by little his house became a sort of junk shop, the very first one in all the Great World. Bright stones and shells, bones, anything that caught his bright eyes and pleased them, he brought home. When he was tired of huntin' fo' food or more strange things he would sit and gloat over his treasures and play with them. And then the first thing he knew he had a name. Yes, Suh, he had a name. He was called Miser.
"Of course Brer Miser hadn't lived ve'y long befo' he found out that one law of the Great World was that things belonged to whoever could get them and keep them. He saw that some thought themselves ve'y smart when they stole from their neighbors. Brer Miser didn't like this at all. He was ve'y, ye'y honest, was Brer Miser. Perhaps he wasn't really much tempted, not fo' a long time anyway.
"But at last came a time when he was tempted. Quite by accident he found one of Mr. Squirrel's storehouses. In it were some nuts different from any he ever had seen befo'. 'Brer Squirrel won't mind if Ah taste just one,' said he, and did it. It tasted good; it tasted ve'y good indeed. Brer Miser began to wish he had some nuts like those. When he got home he couldn't think of anything but how good those nuts tasted. He knew that all he had to do was to watch until Brer Squirrel was away and then go he'p hisself. He knew that was just what any of his neighbors would do in his place. But Brer Miser couldn't make it seem just right any way he looked at it. He was too honest, was Brer Miser, to do anything like that.
"He was sitting staring at his treasures but thinking about those nuts when an idea popped into his head, an idea that made him smile until Ah reckons he most split his cheeks. 'Ah knows what Ah'll do,' said he. 'Ah'll just he'p mahself to some of those nuts and Ah'll leave something of mine in place of them. That's what Ah'll do.'
"And that's what he did do. He picked out a bright shell of which he was very fond and he left it in Brer Squirrel's storehouse to pay fo' the nuts that he took. After that he always helped himself to anything he wanted, but he always left something to pay fo' it. It wasn't long befo' his neighbors found out what he was doing, and then they called him Miser the Trade Rat. Whenever anybody found something he didn't want hisself, he took it to the little junk shop of Miser the Trade Rat and traded it fo' something else, or left it where Miser would find it, knowing that Miser would leave something in its place.
"And it's been just so with Miser's family ever since. There is one Rat who is a credit to his family instead of a disgrace," concluded Ol' Mistah Buzzard.

III
WHERE YAP-YAP THE PRAIRIE DOG USED HIS WITS
Peter Rabbit had just had a great fright. He is used to having great frights, but this time it was a different kind of a fright. It was not for himself that he had been afraid but for one of his old friends and neighbors. Now that it was over, Peter drew a little breath of sheer relief.
You see it was this way: Peter had started over for a call on Johnny Chuck. When he reached Johnny Chuck's house he found no one at home. At first he thought he would go look for Johnny, for he knew that Johnny must be somewhere near, as he never goes far from his own doorstep. Then he changed his mind and decided to wait for Johnny to return. So he stretched himself out in some tall grass beside Johnny Chuck's house, intending to jump out and give Johnny a scare when he came home. Hardly had he settled himself when he heard Johnny coming, and he knew by the sounds that Johnny was