Penguin Books Ltd, Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England
Viking Penguin Inc., 40 West 23rd Street, New York,
New York 10010, U.S.A.
Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood, Victoria, Australia
Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 2801 John Street, Markham,
Ontario, Canada L3R 1B4
Penguin Books (N.Z.) Ltd, 182-190 Wairau Road, Auckland
10, New Zealand
First published 1910
This impression 1985
Universal Copyright Notice:
Copyright (C) 1910 by Frederick Warne & Co.
Copyright in all countries signatory to the Berne
Convention
All rights reserved. Without
limiting the rights under copyright reserved
above, no part of this publication may be
reproduced, stored in or introduced into
a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any
form or by any means (electronic, mechanical,
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of this book.
Printed and bound in Great Britain by
William Clowes Limited, Beccles and London
[Illustration: Mrs. Tittlemouse at the Door]
Once upon a time there was a wood-mouse, and her name
was Mrs.
Tittlemouse.
She lived in a bank under a hedge.
Such a funny house! There were yards and yards
of sandy passages, leading to storerooms and nut-cellars
and seed-cellars, all amongst the roots of the hedge.
[Illustration: In the pantry]
[Illustration: In bed]
There was a kitchen, a parlour, a pantry, and a larder.
Also, there was Mrs. Tittlemouse’s bedroom,
where she slept in a little box bed!
Mrs. Tittlemouse was a most terribly tidy particular
little mouse, always sweeping and dusting the soft
sandy floors.
Sometimes a beetle lost its way in the passages.
“Shuh! shuh! little dirty feet!” said
Mrs. Tittlemouse, clattering her dust-pan.
[Illustration: Shooing a beetle]
[Illustration: A ladybird]
And one day a little old woman ran up and down in
a red spotty cloak.
“Your house is on fire, Mother Ladybird!
Fly away home to your children!”
Another day, a big fat spider came in to shelter from
the rain.
“Beg pardon, is this not Miss Muffet’s?”
“Go away, you bold bad spider! Leaving
ends of cobweb all over my nice clean house!”
[Illustration: Spider]
[Illustration: Out the window]
She bundled the spider out at a window.
He let himself down the hedge with a long thin bit
of string.
Mrs. Tittlemouse went on her way to a distant storeroom,
to fetch cherry-stones and thistle-down seed for dinner.
All along the passage she sniffed, and looked at the
floor.
