The Adventures of Jerry Muskrat | Page 5

Brown's boy.
The first place Farmer Brown's boy visited was Jerry Muskrat's old log.
Very cautiously he peeped over the edge of the bank. The trap was
gone!
"Hurrah!" shouted Farmer Brown's boy. He was very much excited, as
he caught hold of the end of the chain, which fastened it to the old log.
He was sure that at last he had caught Jerry Muskrat. When he pulled
the trap up, it was empty. Between the jaws were a few hairs and a little
bit of skin, which Jerry Muskrat had left there when he sprung the trap
with his tail.
Farmer Brown's boy was disappointed. "Well, I'll get him to-morrow,
anyway," said he to himself. Then he went on to his next trap; it was
nowhere to be seen. When he pulled the chain he was so excited that he
trembled. The trap did not come up at once. He pulled and pulled, and
then suddenly up it came, all covered with mud. In it was one little
claw from Little Joe Otter. Very carefully Farmer Brown's boy set the
trap again. If he could have looked over in the bulrushes and have seen
Little Joe Otter and Billy Mink and Jerry Muskrat watching him and
tickling and laughing, he would not have been so sure that next time he
would catch Little Joe Otter.
All around the Smiling Pool and then up and down the Laughing Brook
Farmer Brown's boy tramped, and each trap he found sprung and buried
in the mud. He had stopped whistling by this time, and there was a
puzzled frown on his freckled face. What did it mean? Could some
other boy have found all his traps and played a trick by springing all of
them? The more he thought about it, the more puzzled he became. You
see, he did not know anything about the busy day the Minks and the
Otters and the Muskrats and the Coons had spent the day before.

Old Grandfather Frog, sitting on his big green lily-pad, smoothed down
his white and yellow waistcoat and winked up at jolly, round, red Mr.
Sun as Farmer Brown's boy tramped off across the Green Meadows.
"Chugarum!" said Grandfather Frog, as he snapped up a foolish green
fly. "Much good it will do you to set those traps again!"
Then Grandfather Frog called to Billy Mink and sent him to tell all the
other little people of the Smiling Pool and the Laughing Brook that
they must hurry and spring all the traps again as they had before.
This time it was easy, because they knew just where the traps were, so
all day long they dropped sticks and stones into the traps and once
more sprung them. Then they prepared for a grand feast of the good
things to eat which Farmer Brown's boy had left, scattered around the
traps.
CHAPTER VII
: Jerry Muskrat Makes A Discovery
The beautiful springtime had brought a great deal of happiness to the
Smiling Pool, as it had to the Green Meadows and to the Green Forest.
Great-Grandfather Frog, who had slept the long winter away in his own
special bed way down in the mud, had waked up with an appetite so
great that for a while it seemed as if he could think of nothing but his
stomach. Jerry Muskrat had felt the spring fever in his bones and had
gone up and down the Laughing Brook, poking into all kinds of places
just for the fun of seeing new things. Little Joe Otter had been more full
of fun than ever, if that were possible. Mr. and Mrs. Redwing had come
back to the bulrushes from their winter home way down in the warm
Southland. Everybody was happy, just as happy as could be.
One sunny morning Jerry Muskrat sat on the Big Rock in the middle of
the Smiling Pool, just thinking of how happy everybody was and
laughing at Little Joe Otter, who was cutting up all sorts of capers in
the water. Suddenly Jerry's sharp eyes saw something that made him
wrinkle his forehead in a puzzled frown and look and look at the

opposite bank. Finally he called to Little Joe Otter.
"Hi, Little Joe! Come over here!" shouted Jerry.
"What for?" asked Little Joe, turning a somersault in the water.
"I want you to see if there is anything wrong with my eyes," replied
Jerry.
Little Joe Otter stopped swimming and stared up at Jerry Muskrat.
"They look all right to me," said he, as he started to climb up on the Big
Rock.
"Of course they look all right," replied Jerry, "but what I want to know
is if they see all right. Look over at that bank."
Little Joe Otter looked over at