The Tale of Frisky Squirrel | Page 8

things to do--new places
to visit, new games, new tricks to play on other forest-people.

To be sure, Jimmy and Frisky did not always agree--but that is not
surprising, because their tastes were so different. For instance, there
was nothing that Frisky Squirrel liked better than a hickory nut, while
Jimmy Rabbit never would so much as touch one. But if anybody said
"cabbage" to Jimmy Rabbit he would have to stop playing and hurry to
Farmer Green's garden. You see how fond of cabbage Jimmy was.
There were other things, too, on which Frisky and Jimmy held different
views. They were forever disputing about ears and tails. Frisky Squirrel,
as you know, had a beautiful, long, bushy tail, and short little ears;
while Jimmy Rabbit had ears half as long as he was, and almost no tail
at all!
"Really, Frisky, you ought to have that tail of yours cut off," Jimmy
said one day. "It's terribly out of fashion to wear a tail so long as yours.
As a special favor, I'll be willing to cut it off for you, with a big pair of
shears that my mother has."
Frisky Squirrel was just a bit angry at this remark about his tail.
"What about your ears?" he asked. "Not one of the
forest-people--except rabbits--wears his ears so long as you do. I must
say that they look very queer. How'd you like to have me trim them for
you?"
"Tell you what we'll do," Jimmy Rabbit said. "I'll cut off your tail and
you'll cut off my ears. What do you say?"
Somehow or other, Frisky did not quite like the idea of losing his tail.
He was so used to having it that he was afraid he might miss it
dreadfully. And he even thought that he would rather keep it--even if it
was out of fashion.
But Jimmy Rabbit ran home to get his mother's shears. And when he
came back with them Frisky couldn't think of any good excuse for not
letting Jimmy cut off his tail for him. As Jimmy came hopping up with
the shears, Frisky Squirrel put out his paw.

"What do you want?" asked Jimmy.
"The shears!" Frisky said. "I'm going to trim your ears, you know."
"Oh--yes!" Jimmy answered. "But I thought of this first, you remember.
So I'll cut your tail off first. Then you'll have your turn--see?" He kept a
firm hold on the shears. And almost before Frisky knew what was
happening Jimmy had stepped behind him and had placed Frisky's tail
between the big shears.
"Will it hurt?" Frisky asked, as he looked behind him.
"It'll all be over in a jiffy," said Jimmy Rabbit.

XI
Jimmy Rabbit is too Late
It was just as Jimmy Rabbit had said. You remember that as he stood
behind Frisky Squirrel's back with his mother's big shears, all ready to
cut off Frisky's tail, he had told Frisky that "it would all be over in a
jiffy"?
Well, it was. But things didn't happen just as Jimmy Rabbit had
expected. He had taken a good, firm grip on the shears, and he was just
about to shut them upon Frisky's tail with a snap, when somebody
called Frisky's name. Frisky knew who it was right away. It was his
mother! And like most of us, when our mothers catch us doing
something we ought not to do, Frisky was so surprised and so startled
that he gave a great jump.
That jump was all that saved Frisky's tail. For just as Mrs. Squirrel
called, Jimmy Rabbit shut the shears together as hard as he could. But
Jimmy was too late. When Frisky jumped, his tail followed him, of
course. It whisked out from between the shears; and they closed upon
nothing at all.

"Now, that's too bad!" Jimmy exclaimed. He had been so interested in
what he was doing that he had never heard Mrs. Squirrel at all. "Come
back here and we'll try again."
The words were scarcely out of Jimmy Rabbit's mouth when he
received a terrific box on the ear. Now, it's bad enough for anybody to
have his ears boxed. But Jimmy's ears were so big that I dare say it hurt
him three times as much as it would have hurt anyone else. And it
surprised him, too. For he hadn't heard Mrs. Squirrel as she stole up
behind him. Anyhow, he ran off howling, taking his mother's shears
with him.
"That awful Rabbit boy!" Mrs. Squirrel said. "A moment more and he
would have cut off your beautiful tail--your best feature, too!"
"What's a feature, Mother?" Frisky asked.
"Why--your nose, and your eyes, and your ears--anything of that sort,"
Mrs. Squirrel said. "It makes me feel faint just to think what almost
happened."
"But