It's Monday.

Chapter 07: Reading Rots the Mind

ALTHOUGH the new Folks may not have realized it, they were very decidedly on probation for the next few days. All day small bright eyes in the long grass watched their every movement, small ears were cocked to hear their every word. On the very first morning Father and Uncle Analdas decided to try out the Cat, whose name, they had learned, was Mr. Muldoon. He was lying on the front step in the bright sunlight, surveying his new surroundings, when Father hopped across the front lawn, only a few feet away. Mr. Moldoon merely eyed him indolently and continued to survey the landscape. Uncle Analdas then tried, and although he did not kick him in the face as he had threatened, he did run close enough to threw some dirt on him. The old Cat shook it off, yawned, and went to sleep. Emboldened by this, Willie Fieldmouse and several of his cousins gathered around in a semicircle, jeering and making faces. They hopped up and down and sang insultingly: Mr. Muldoon Is a raccoon, Phew! Phew! Phew! But Mr. Muldoon just put a paw over his ear and continued to slumber. "Shucks," grunted Uncle Analdas, "he couldn't danger nobody." Father of course was eager to discover if the newcomers were truly gentlefolk, for he laid great store by good manners and breeding. It was not until late afternoon, however, that an opportunity offered. The Folks had gone out in the car, so Father with a few of his friends waited patiently beside the drive until their return. As the car rumbled up the driveway he skipped across, directly in front of the oncoming wheels. The Man slammed on his brakes and came to a full stop. Then he and the Lady both raised their hats and recited in unison, "Good evening, sir, and good luck to you," replaced their hats, and drove on, slowly and carefully. Father was tremendously pleased. "Now there," he announced to the other Animals, "there is real gentility and good breeding for you. Not that I wish to cast aspersions on the manners of the Folk of this, my adopted State, but I must say that this is the first time since my residence here that I have encountered this pleasant and considerate custom which, where I was reared, is universally observed. Now down in the Bluegrass - "Oh, you and your bluegrass," snorted Phewie. "I ain't interested in their manners. What I'm interested in is their garbidge." "You will find, Phewie," said Father with some heat, "that good breeding and good garbage go hand in hand." Their argument was interrupted by the pipe-smell which always preceded the Man. He was coming down the drive carrying a neat wooden sign fastened to a stake, a crowbar, a hammer, and various other implements. They all watched intently while he proceeded to erect the sign just inside the driveway entrance. "What's it say, Georgie? Read it off to me," whispered Uncle Analdas. "Seem to've mislaid them dingblasted spectacles.' Little Georgie spelled it out. "It says. Please-drive-carefully-on-accountof-Small-Animals." "Well now! I calls that real nice," admitted Uncle Analdas. "Your maw will certainly be pleased to hear about that, Georgie. Please drive careful account o' Small Animals.. Yes sir, that's real thoughtful." In various other ways the new Folks soon began to measure up to the high standards which the Little Animals had set for nice people. To a group of cronies gathered on the hillside the Gray Fox cited an incident which had heightened his approval. "Real sensible, knowledgeable Folks they seem to be," he said. "Quiet-like and friendly. Why just yesterday afternoon late I was prospecting around, sort of smelled chicken frying. I guess, and I came through that little walledin garden where the benches are. I wasn't paying much attention, and he, the Man, wasn't smoking his pipe or I'd have known he was around, when first thing I knew there I was right in front of him, face to face you might say. He was reading a book and he looked up, and what do you suppose he did? Nothing, that's what. He just sat there and looked at me, and I stood there and looked at him, and then he said, 'Oh, hello,' and went back to reading his book, and I went on about my business. Now that's the sort of Folks is Folks." "And her," grunted Porkey, nodding approvingly. "Any of you hear that ruckus went on the other afternoon? Well, sir, I was pokin' around out there in the field, careless-like too, I guess, way out in the open and too early in the day, when all of a sudden that there biggest Dog from Down-to-the-Crossroads was right on me. 'Course I wasn't scared but I was in a bad fix, not havin' nothin' to get my back against, so I just rares up and dares him to come on and git it. He's wearin' a couple of rips on his nose already I gave him two-three years ago, so he dassent come in, but starts circlin', tryin' to git behind me. And there he is, a-bellerin' and a-roarin' and a-rushin', when she steps out of the garden where she'd been a workin', with a rock in her hand the size of a mushmelon. "She takes a good look at the situation, she sets her feet solid, and then she hauls off and wham she lets him have it! Right in the ribs it took him, and man, man! the yawp that Mongrel let out you could have heard clear over to Charcoal Hill!" "You could," Father agreed. "I did. It just happened I was visiting our daughter Hazel at her Charcoal Hill residence that very afternoon and heard the howls with the utmost distinctness -and no little pleasure." "And what did she do?" Porkey went on. "Why she just dusts her hands, looks at me calm as you please, and grins and says, 'Why don't you keep your eyes open, stupid?' and goes back to her diggin'. Now I ain't never lived in no bluegrass region, so I don't know nothin' about aristocrats and gentilities and them things, but what I hold is this-and I dare anybody to contradict it - " he pounded the earth and glared belligerently around the small circle- "I hold that anybody can heave a rock like that is a Lady!" Then there was the slight argument about Porkey's burrow. Slight, perhaps, in the eyes of Folks, but of great significance to the Animals. Louie Kernstawk was rebuilding the stone wall where Porkey's burrow lay. When he came near the entrance the Man had said, "Let's just leave that piece of wall. Mr. Kernstawk; there's a woodchuck living under there and we really shouldn't disturb him. "Leave it?" exclaimed Louie, astonished. "Why- you can't leave that Groundhog live there. He'll just ruin your garden. I was figurin' on bringing up my shotgun and getting him tomorrow." "No. No shooting," said the Man firmly. "I could set a trap for him," Louie suggested. "No. No traps." The Lady spoke just as firmly. Louie scratched his head in puzzlement. "Well, of course it's your place and if that's the way you want it, okay," he said, "but it's going to look awful funny, that old tumble- down hunk of wall right in the middle of this new built- up one." "Oh, I guess it will be all right." The Man laughed as they moved on. Louie was still scratching his head when Tim McCrath wandered over. "What did I tell you about folks that read books too much?" Tim demanded. "Makes 'em queer, that's what it does. Why here's these people, as nice, pleasant- spoken people as you could want - but queer. Only yesterday I was telling them they'd have to get rid of these here moles. Said I'd bring up a couple of my traps and set 'em, and she set quick, just like she set to you, 'No. No traps. So I sez I'd got some good poison I could put out and he sez, 'No. No poison." "'Well how in thunder then, I sez, can I make you a halfway decent lawn with them there moles rootin' around into it?' And what do you suppose he sez to that? 'Oh, just keep a-rollin' it down,' he sez, 'just keep rollin' it and they'll git discouraged.' Discouraged, mind you!" Tim snorted. "Sez he read it in a book. "And then, only this morning," he went on, "I was telling them they'd ought to build a fence around that garden. 'Why, you can't never have no garden here, I sez, without you have a fence around it. This here Hill is full of Animals; Rabbits, Groundhogs, Raccoons, Deer, Pheasants, Skunks, and all.' And what do you suppose she sez to that?" "I couldn't imagine," answered Louie. "You couldn't," said Tim. "'We like'em,' she sez. 'They're so beautiful,' she sez. Beautiful, mind you! 'And they must he hungry too,' sez she. "'You're right, ma'am,' I sez. 'They're hungry all right, as you'll learn to your sorrow,' I sez, 'when them vegetables come up. "And then he chips in, the man. 'Oh, I guess we'll get along all right with 'em,' sez he.'I think there'll be enough for all of us -' us, mind you. 'That's why we planned the garden so big,' he sez. Tim shook his head sadly. "Seems a shame, nice folks too, pleasant-spoken and all - but queer. Nuts, some might say. Comes of readin' books too much, I guess. Grandpa had the right of it. 'Readin' rots the mind,' he used to say Louie picked up his hammer and split a stone neatly. "Nice folks, though," he said. "Seems too bad." Willie Fieldmouse was sent to observe the new Folks each evening; not in any spirit of impertinent prying, of course, but naturally the Little Animals were interested in knowing what things were being planned for the Hill, for after all, it was their Hill. There was a rainwater barrel near the living-room window, and by climbing to the top of this Willie was able to jump to the window sill. Although the evenings were still cool and a fire crackled on the hearth, the window was usually opened slightly. Seated in a dark shadow on the sill, he could safely observe the Folks and listen to their garden plans. Tonight, surrounded by a sea of catalogs, they had been making out their lists of seeds and plants. Willie had tried very hard to remember them all and was now making his report. Seated outside the rabbit burrow, Mother, Father, Uncle Analdas, Phewie, Porkey, and several others all listened intently. 'There's radishes," Willie recited, ticking them off on his claws, "carrots, peas, beans - snap and lima- lettuce - "Peavine and lettuce soup," sighed Mother happily. "Corn, spinach, kale, turnips, kohl-rabi, broccoli - "Don't hold with them foreign vittles," Uncle Analdas grumbled, but was hushed by Mother, and Willie went on. "Celery, rhubarb, potatoes, tomatoes, peppers, cabbage - red and white - cauliflower, raspberries - black and red - strawberries, melons, asparagus-and that's all I can remember-oh yes, cucumbers and squash." A happy buzz of excitement swept over the gathering as Willie finished his report and took a deep breath. The conversation soon merged into a series of arguments as to which families should have which vegetables, but quieted down when Father rose and rapped for attention. "As you well know," he said firmly, "it has always been our custom here on the Hill to settle all such questions on Dividing Night, which falls this year, I believe, on May 26. On that evening we shall, as usual, gather at the garden and allot to each Animal and his family those vegetables to which they are entitled by rule and taste." "Where do I come in?" Uncle Analdas demanded. "I'm just a-visitin' here." ''As our house guest," answered Father, "you will of course receive the customary allotment." "Gumdinged right I will," said Uncle Analdas.