The Adventures of Johnny Chuck | Page 3

been eating his own fat?" he gasped.
Johnny Chuck and Jimmy Skunk both laughed. "No," said Jimmy

Skunk, "he didn't eat it, but he lived on it just the same while he was
asleep all winter. Don't you see he hasn't got a particle of fat on him
now?"
"But how could he live on it, if he didn't eat it?" asked Peter, staring at
Johnny Chuck as if he had never seen him before.
Jimmy Skunk shrugged his shoulders. "Don't ask me. That is one of
Old Mother Nature's secrets; you'll have to ask her," he replied.
"And don't ask me," said Johnny Chuck, "for I've been asleep all the
time. My, but I'm hungry!"
"So am I!" said another voice. There was Reddy Fox grinning at them.
Johnny Chuck dove into the doorway of his house with Peter Rabbit at
his heels, for there was nowhere else to go. Jimmy Skunk just stood
still and chuckled. He knew that Reddy Fox didn't dare touch him.

III
THE SINGERS OF THE SMILING POOL
Mistress Spring was making everybody happy on the Green Meadows
and in the Green Forest and around the Smiling Pool. With her gentle
fingers she wakened one by one all the little sleepers who had spent the
long winter dreaming of warm summer days and not knowing anything
at all of rough, blustering Brother North Wind or Jack Frost. As they
wakened, many began to sing for joy. But the clearest, loudest singers
of all lived in the Smiling Pool.
It was a long time before Peter Rabbit and Johnny Chuck knew where
they lived. Every night just before going to bed, Johnny Chuck would
sit on his door-step just to listen, and as he listened somehow he felt
better and happier; and he always had pleasant dreams after listening to
the sweet singers of the Smiling Pool. Even after he had curled himself
up for the night deep down in his snug bedroom, he could hear those
sweet voices, and whenever he waked up in the night he would hear
them.
"Spring! Spring! Spring! Spring! Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful Spring!
So gentle, so loving, so sweet and so fair! Oh, who can be cross when
there's love in the air? Be happy! Be joyful! And join in our song And
help us to send the glad tidings along! Spring! Spring! Spring! Spring!
Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful Spring!"
When Johnny Chuck had first heard them, he had looked in all the tree-

tops for the singers, but not one could he see. Then he had thought that
they must be hidden in the bushes; but when he went to look, he found
that the sweet singers were not there. It was very mysterious. Finally he
asked Peter Rabbit if he knew who the sweet singers were and where
they were. Peter didn't know, but he was willing to try to find out. Peter
is always willing to try to find out about things he doesn't already know
about. So Johnny Chuck and Peter Rabbit started out to find the sweet
singers.
"I believe they are down in the old bulrushes around the Smiling Pool,"
said Peter Rabbit, as he stood listening with a hand behind one long
ear.
So over to the Smiling Pool they hurried. The nearer they got, the
louder became the voices singing:
"Spring! Spring! Spring! Spring! Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful
Spring!"
But look as they would, they couldn't see a single singer among the
brown bulrushes. It was very strange, very strange indeed! It seemed as
if the voices came right out of the Smiling Pool itself!
When Peter Rabbit made a little noise, as he hopped out on the bank
where he could look all over the Smiling Pool, the singing stopped.
After he had sat perfectly still for a little while, it began again. There
was no doubt about it this time; those voices came right out of the
water.
Johnny Chuck stared at Peter Rabbit, and Peter stared at Johnny Chuck.
Nobody was to be seen in the Smiling Pool, and yet there were those
voices--oh, so many of them--coming right out of the water.
"How can birds stay under water and still sing?" asked Johnny Chuck.
"Ho, ho, ho! Ha, ha, ha!"
Peter Rabbit and Johnny Chuck whirled around, to find Jerry Muskrat
peeping up at them from a hole in the bank almost under their feet.
[Illustration: "Ho, ho, ho! That's the best joke this spring!" shouted
Jerry Muskrat.]
"Ho, ho, ho! That's the best joke this spring!" shouted Jerry Muskrat,
and laughed until he had to hold his sides. "Birds under water! Ho, ho,
ho!"

IV

JOHNNY CHUCK FINDS OUT WHO THE SWEET SINGERS ARE
Johnny Chuck couldn't keep away from the Smiling Pool. No, Sir,
Johnny Chuck couldn't keep