I was dreaming that
a monstrous Katydid was chasing me. And if you hadn't called to me I
don't know what would have happened.... I think," he added, "I must have
dined too heartily--on Katydids--last night."

The Hermit couldn't help looking a bit shocked. He had never approved of
Benjamin Bat, who prowled about at night when all respectable people
were at home and asleep. And as for over-eating, that was something the
Hermit wouldn't think of doing. But if he must choose between Benjamin
Bat and Bobby Bobolink for a neighbor, of the two the Hermit preferred
Benjamin Bat, because Benjamin was always asleep in the daytime, while
at night he never disturbed the Hermit's rest.

"I've come to ask a favor of you," Mr. Hermit Thrush explained. "Perhaps
you don't know there's a noisy nuisance hereabouts who calls himself
Bobby Bobolink?"

"I do," Benjamin Bat admitted. "But I've never seen him--nor even heard
him."

"Then you are a sound sleeper indeed," the Hermit observed. "He's always
a-jingling and a-jangling."

"That sounds as if he might be a bell," Benjamin Bat remarked.

"He's a bird," the Hermit explained. And then he proceeded to tell
Benjamin Bat how Mr. Crow and Jasper Jay had quarrelled because
Mr. Crow said that Bobby Bobolink couldn't beat Benjamin Bat in
a race, while Jasper Jay claimed that he could. "What I'd like
you to do is to have a race with Bobby Bobolink to-morrow," the
Hermit announced.

But Benjamin Bat shook his head.

"It doesn't interest me," he said. "Let Mr. Crow and Jasper Jay quarrel
all they want to!"

And before the Hermit had time to coax him to change his mind, Benjamin
Bat fell fast asleep. Nor could the Hermit rouse him again.

THE END

End of Project Gutenberg's The Tale of Bobby Bobolink, by Arthur Scott Bailey

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