“What is that?” said the Country Mouse.  The City Mouse just whispered, “Sh!” and ran as fast as he could to the hole.  The Country Mouse ran after, you may be sure, as fast as he could.  As soon as they were out of danger the City Mouse said, “That was the old Cat; she is the best mouser in town,—­if she once gets you, you are lost.”

“This is very terrible,” said the little Country Mouse; “let us not go back to the cupboard again.”

“No,” said the City Mouse, “I will take you to the cellar; there is something specially fine there.”

So the City Mouse took his little friend down the cellar stairs and into a big cupboard where there were many shelves.  On the shelves were jars of butter, and cheeses in bags and out of bags.  Overhead hung bunches of sausages, and there were spicy apples in barrels standing about.  It smelt so good that it went to the little Country Mouse’s head.  He ran along the shelf and nibbled at a cheese here, and a bit of butter there, until he saw an especially rich, very delicious-smelling piece of cheese on a queer little stand in a corner.  He was just on the point of putting his teeth into the cheese when the City Mouse saw him.

“Stop! stop!” cried the City Mouse.  “That is a trap!”

The little Country Mouse stopped and said, “What is a trap?”

“That thing is a trap,” said the little City Mouse.  “The minute you touch the cheese with your teeth something comes down on your head hard, and you’re dead.”

The little Country Mouse looked at the trap, and he looked at the cheese, and he looked at the little City Mouse.  “If you’ll excuse me,” he said, “I think I will go home.  I’d rather have barley and grain to eat and eat it in peace and comfort, than have brown sugar and dried prunes and cheese,—­and be frightened to death all the time!”

So the little Country Mouse went back to his home, and there he stayed all the rest of his life.

FOOTNOTES: 

[13] The following story of the two mice, with the similar fables of The Boy who cried Wolf, The Frog King, and The Sun and the Wind, are given here with the hope that they may be of use to the many teachers who find the over-familiar material of the fables difficult to adapt, and who are yet aware of the great usefulness of the stories to young minds.  A certain degree of vividness and amplitude must be added to the compact statement of the famous collections, and yet it is not wise to change the style-effect of a fable, wholly.  I venture to give these versions, not as perfect models, of course, but as renderings which have been acceptable to children, and which I believe retain the original point simply and strongly.

LITTLE JACK ROLLAROUND[14]