Atondido Stories
noticing every little thing which could shew him where they had
passed by, came one day into the barley-field. He spied the path
directly and cried, "Ha! ha! Some wild animal has been here; not
a very big one; let's have a look for the footprints!" So he stooped
down to the ground, and very soon saw the marks of pussy's
feet. "A cat, I do believe," he said to himself, "spoiling the barley
she doesn't want to eat herself. I'll soon pay her out." The hunter
waited until the evening lest the creature should see what he
was going to do, and then in the twilight he set snares all over
the barley-field. A snare, you know, is a string with a slip-knot at
the end of it; and if an animal puts his head or one of his paws
into this slip-knot and goes on without noticing it, the string is
pulled tight and the poor creature cannot get free.
Exactly what the hunter expected happened. The cat came as
usual to watch for the mouse, and caught sight of him running
across the end of the path. Puss dashed after him; and just as she
thought she really had got him this time, she found herself
caught by the neck, for she had put her head into one of the
snares. She was nearly strangled and could scarcely even mew.
The mouse was so close that he heard the feeble mew, and in a
terrible fright, thinking the cat was after him, he peeped through
the stems of the barley to make sure which way to run to get
away from her. What was his delight when he saw his enemy in
such trouble and quite unable to do him any harm!
Now it so happened that the owl and the lizard were also in
the barley-field, not very far away from the cat, and they too saw
the distress their hated enemy was in. They also caught sight of
the little mouse peeping through the barley; and the owl thought
to himself, "I'll have you, my little friend, now puss cannot do
me any harm," whilst the lizard darted away into the sunshine,
feeling glad that the cat and the owl were neither of them now
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