Blacky’s heart beat fast with excitement as
he drew near that old tumble-down nest. Would
those two big white eggs be there? Perhaps there
would be three! The very thought made him flap
his wings a little faster. A few more wing strokes
and he would be right over the tree. How he
did hope to see those eggs! He could almost see
into the nest now. One stroke! Two strokes!
Three strokes! Blacky bit his tongue to keep
from giving a sharp caw of disappointment and surprise.
There were no eggs to be seen. No, Sir, there
wasn’t a sign of eggs in that old nest.
There wasn’t because — why, do you
think? There wasn’t because Blacky looked
straight down on a great mass of feathers which quite
covered them from sight, and he didn’t have to
look twice to know that that great mass of feathers
was really a great bird, the bird to whom those eggs
belonged.
Blacky didn’t turn to come back as he had planned.
He kept right on, just as if he hadn’t seen
anything, and as he flew he shivered a little.
He shivered at the thought of what might have happened
to him if he had tried to steal those eggs the day
before and had been caught doing it.
“I’m thankful I knew enough to leave them
alone, " said he. “Funny I never once
guessed whose eggs they are. I might have known
that no one but Hooty the Horned Owl would think of
nesting at this time of year. And that was Mrs.
Hooty I saw on the nest just now. My, but she’s
big! She’s bigger than Hooty himself!
Yes, Sir, it’s a lucky thing I didn’t
try to get those eggs yesterday. Probably both
Hooty and Mrs. Hooty were sitting close by, only they
were sitting so still that I thought they were parts
of the tree they were in. Blacky, Blacky, the
sooner you forget those eggs the better.”
Some things are best forgotten As soon as they are
learned. Who never plays with fire Will surely
not get burned.
Now when Blacky the Crow discovered that the eggs
in the old tumble-down nest of Redtail the Hawk in
a lonesome corner of the Green Forest belonged to
Hooty the Owl, he straightway made the best of resolutions;
he would simply forget all about those eggs.
He would forget that he ever had seen them, and he
would stay away from that corner of the Green Forest.
That was a very wise resolution. Of all the
people who live in the Green Forest, none is fiercer
or more savage than Hooty the Owl, unless it is Mrs.
Hooty. She is bigger than Hooty and certainly
quite as much to be feared by the little people.
