got there. Suppose he was trying
to fly, and couldn't. Tell us how it was, old man."

"Can he talk?"

"Talk!" said the eagle. "Of course he can talk. And he can tell
stories, too, I warrant you. So, if you like, you may keep him to tell
you stories."

"Oh, wont that be nice! Tell us a story, right off," they all screamed,
jerking the old man down into the nest.

"But it's so dirty here," said he, looking around, with his nose turned
up a little. "Let me sit on the edge of the nest, wont you?--and I'll
tell you all the stories you want."

"You'll fall over.".

"Oh no, I wont. I'll hold on with my cane and my legs. Now just shut
your beaks, so you wont look so savage, and listen."

So the old man perched himself on the edge of the nest. The eaglets
took hold of his coat with their beaks, to keep him from falling; and
he told them the story of "Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves"; and when
that was ended, another, and then another.

He didn't eat much supper that night, for they hadn't any convenience
for cooking. And he didn't sleep well, either, for whenever one of the
eaglets woke up in the night, it always pinched him with its beak, to
make sure he was there. So he resolved to get away as soon as he could.

But he didn't seem to have any chance; so there he stayed and told
stories till he longed to wring the necks of the gaping birds that kept
asking him for more.

Now, all this time the cow had been getting more and more nervous.
Every day she thought of the poor old man and his meek little legs and
his sweet old smile, and just how his coat-tails looked as he went up;
till at last she laid her head down on a tuft of grass by the brook,
and cried--regularly boo-hooed.

Having thus relieved her feelings, she became calm, and, rising, said:

"I'll go to his house and find out how and where he is, if I can."

So off she started. But the house was shut up, and there was no one
there except the cat.

Very much frightened the cat was, too, when the cow pushed up the
pantry window with her horns, and bellowed:

"Where's your master?"

"I don't know," said the cat, retreating to a far corner, with his back
up. "I haven't set eyes on him since last Sunday."

"Oh dear!" sighed the cow, dropping the window with a crash that broke
out two of the panes of glass. "What shall I do?"

[Illustration: "THE POOR OLD MAN WAS UP IN THE AIR."]

"What's the matter with you?--and what do you want of the old man?"
asked T