LESSON X.
Reading edition
MISS MUFFET AND FLUFFY.
1. Nobody knows where Miss Muffet came from. She walked into the kitchen one day and took her place by the warm fire, and she has been with us ever since.
2. Miss Muffet is a yellow-and-white cat. She is very quiet; but she likes fun for all that, and many a play the children have had with her.
3. When pussy had been with us about a year, we found her one bright May morning under the hedge in the garden with four tiny little kittens.
4. We got a basket and made a nice bed for them, and took them into the house. They grew up to be playful kittens; but one day poor Tinykins fell into a tub of water and was drowned.
5. We liked Fluffy the best; she looked so wise and would do such queer things. We found her one day sitting in front of a large open book, and looking for all the world like a girl learning her lessons.
6. At other times she would sit all alone as if she were thinking over some very serious matter.
7. One day we found them all in the barn, where pussy had gone to teach them to hunt mice.
8. We found that Miss Muffet had caught a mouse, and put it before the kitties, and Fluffy was just ready to pounce upon it as we came in. We gave a great shout; two of the kittens sprang back to their mother, and one rushed head first into a large boot that lay in one corner, and the mouse got away. Here is the story in verse:
FLUFFY AND THE MOUSE.
1. “Once there was a little Kittie Whiter than snow; In a barn she used to frolic, Long time ago. 2. “In the barn a little Mousie Ran to and fro; For she heard the Kittie coming, Long time ago. 3. “Two black eyes had little Kittie, Black as a sloe; And they spied the little Mousie, Long time ago. 4. “Four soft paws had little Kittie, Paws soft as dough; And they caught the little Mousie Long time ago. 5. “Nine sharp teeth had little Kittie, All in a row; And they bit the little Mousie Long time ago. 6. “When the teeth bit little Mousie Mousie cried ‘Oh!’ But she got away from Kittie, Long time ago.”
The Old House-dog.