The Rescue Of The Canary Bird
:
Daddy's Bedtime Bird Stories
"I am going to tell you a really true story," said daddy, "something
which happened to-day. I was walking along a rather poor part of the
city when I saw a number of children gathered in a group in a little
side yard of a tenement house. The children were screaming to one boy:
'Oh, catch him! Don't let the awful cat get him!'"
"Oh, was it a bird?" asked Jack eagerly.
"Yes," replied daddy; "i
was a bird, but not just the usual kind of
bird that is seen around city streets, for only the sparrows like the
noise of a city. Most birds like the woods and the country, where they
can have homes in the trees and can sing all day long.
"But this was a tame yellow canary who had flown out of an open window
to pick up some goodies he saw on the ground, and a cat was after him."
"Did they get him from the cat?" asked Evelyn eagerly, for she was
devoted to animals and perhaps especially to birds.
"Yes," answered daddy; "the little boy succeeded in rescuing him, but
the poor canary had been so frightened that his little heart was
beating, oh, so fast, and the children were afraid he was not going to
live.
"They all followed the little boy who had caught the canary just in
time into the tenement house. The cat had knocked several feathers
from the bird's tail.
"Another child told me the canary belonged to a little girl who lived in
the tenement. He asked me to follow, too, for he said that the little
girl had trouble with her back and had to lie flat all the time. She
loved visitors, for so much of the time she was lonely. Her mother was
poor and out all day sewing, so the little girl's only companion was the
canary, who would sing for hours and hours. He seemed to know he must
keep her cheered up.
"So along I went too. We climbed some stairs until we came to a dingy
room where on a cot by the window lay a little girl about eight years
old. She had big dark eyes, and when I saw her her cheeks were bright
red from all the excitement.
"All her friends had gathered around, each giving her a special
description of how the bird had been rescued. She was smiling with joy
and watching the bird, who was now busily engaged nibbling at a little
piece of apple which had been given him. Before long he began to sing,
oh, so joyously, for he knew he was once more back in his happy home,
where he would take good care to stay in the future.
"I told the little girl of my Jack and Evelyn, and she said she wanted
to see you both. Shall we all go to see her and her little bird some
day?"
"We'd love to!" cried Jack and Evelyn delightedly.