Still smiling, Mrs. Chipmunk went to the door again
with Sandy. And pretty soon they heard a long,
far-off wail.
“There!” he cried. “That’s
it! Don’t you hear it, Mother?”
“That—” Mrs. Chipmunk said—“that
is nothing but the whistle of an engine, way down
at the other end of Pleasant Valley.”
THE BROKEN EGG
Nuts and grains were what Sandy Chipmunk ate more
than anything else. But sometimes when he could
not find enough of those, or when he wanted a change
of food, he would eat almost any sort of berry, and
apples and pears as well. Tomatoes, too, he liked
once in a while. And he was very fond of sunflower
seeds. He would not refuse a fat insect, either,
if it flew his way. But these were not the only
dainties that Sandy thought good. There was something
else—something to be found in trees—for
which Sandy sometimes hunted. And before he came
home, after finding what he was looking for, he always
wiped his mouth with great care.
If you had ever seen him wiping his mouth like that,
you might have guessed that Sandy Chipmunk had been
eating birds’ eggs. And the reason he was
so careful to remove all signs of his feast was because
he did not want his mother to know what he had been
doing.
Now you have heard the worst there is to know about
Sandy Chipmunk.
To you it may seem odd that Mrs. Chipmunk did not
think it wrong to rob birds’ nests. And
now you know the worst about her.
Sandy’s mother liked eggs just as much as he
did. But her son was such a little fellow that
she was afraid he might get hurt climbing trees and
looking for eggs. She told him that some day some
bird might surprise him when he was enjoying a meal
of her eggs, and peck out one or two of his eyes.
“Keep away from the nests!” Mrs. Chipmunk
said.
But Sandy had had too many tastes of birds’
eggs. He simply couldn’t resist eating
a few eggs now and then. Of course, when he did
that he disobeyed his mother. And of course,
if she had known it she would have punished him.
As the spring days sped past, the birds that lived
in Farmer Green’s pasture grew very angry with
Sandy Chipmunk. You see, it was not long before
they discovered who it was that was robbing their nests
now and then.
“You’d better leave birds’ eggs
alone!” Mr. Crow warned him one day. “A
number of my friends have told me what they’re
going to do to you, if they catch you near their nests.”
But Sandy told Mr. Crow to keep his advice to himself.
“What about Farmer Green’s corn?”
Sandy asked the old gentleman. “I’ve
heard that Farmer Green is looking for you with a gun.”
Mr. Crow didn’t even answer him. He just
flew away. There were some things he didn’t
like to talk about.
That very afternoon Sandy Chipmunk spied a robin’s
nest in a tree not far from where he lived. And
in less time than it takes to tell it, he had climbed
the tree and run out on the limb where the nest rested.
