of the cat.

Timmy Willie longed to be at home in his peaceful nest in a sunny bank.
The food disagreed with him; the noise prevented him from sleeping. In a
few days he grew so thin that Johnny Town-mouse noticed it, and
questioned him. He listened to Timmy Willie's story and inquired about
the garden. "It sounds rather a dull place? What do you do when it
rains?"

"When it rains, I sit in my little sandy burrow and shell corn and
seeds from my Autumn store. I peep out at the throstles and blackbirds
on the lawn, and my friend Cock Robin. And when the sun comes out again,
you should see my garden and the flowers--roses and pinks and
pansies--no noise except the birds and bees, and the lambs in the
meadows."

"There goes that cat again!" exclaimed Johnny Town-mouse. When they had
taken refuge in the coal-cellar he resumed the conversation; "I confess
I am a little disappointed; we have endeavoured to entertain you,
Timothy William."

"Oh yes, yes, you have been most kind; but I do feel so ill," said Timmy
Willie.

"It may be that your teeth and digestion are unaccustomed to our food;
perhaps it might be wiser for you to return in the hamper."

"Oh? Oh!" cried Timmy Willie.

"Why of course for the matter of that we could have sent you back last
week," said Johnny rather huffily--"did you not know that the hamper
goes back empty on Saturdays?"

So Timmy Willie said good-bye to his new friends, and hid in the hamper
with a crumb of cake and a withered cabbage leaf; and after much
jolting, he was set down safely in his own garden.

Sometimes on Saturdays he went to look at the hamper lying by the gate,
but he knew better than to get in again. And nobody got out, though
Johnny Town-mouse had half promised a visit.

The winter passed; the sun came out again; Timmy Willie sat by his
burrow warming his little fur coat and sniffing the smell of violets and
spring grass. He had nearly forgotten his visit to town. When up the
sandy path all spick and span with a brown leather bag came Johnny
Town-mouse!

Timmy Willie received him with open arms. "You have come at the best of
all the year, we will have herb pudding and sit in the sun."

"H'm'm! it is a little damp," said Johnny Town-mouse, who was carrying
his tail under his arm, out of the mud.

"What is that fearful noise?" he started violently.

"That?" said Timmy Willie, "that is only a cow; I will beg a little
milk, they are quite harmless, unless they happ