Return to Book IndexTHE TALE OF
TWO BAD MICE
BY
BEATRIX POTTER |
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- FREDERICK WARNE & CO., INC.
- NEW YORK
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- Copyright, 1904
- BY
- FREDERICK WARNE & Co.
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ONCE upon a time there was a very beautiful doll's
house; it was red brick with white windows, and it had real muslin curtains
and a front door and a chimney. |
It belonged to two Dolls called Lucinda and Jane;
at least it belonged to Lucinda, but she never ordered meals.
Jane was the Cook; but she never did any cooking, because the dinner had
been bought ready-made, in a box full of shavings. |
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There were two red lobsters, and a ham, a fish,
a pudding, and some pears and oranges.
They would not come off the plates, but they were extremely beautiful. |
One morning Lucinda and Jane had gone out for a
drive in the doll's perambulator. There was no one in the nursery, and it
was very quiet. Presently there was a little scuffling, scratching noise
in a corner near the fireplace, where there was a hole under the skirting-board.
Tom Thumb put out his head for a moment, and then popped it in again. |
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A minute afterwards Hunca Munca, his wife, put
her head out, too; and when she saw that there was no one in the nursery,
she ventured out on the oilcloth under the coal-box. |
The doll's house stood at the other side of the
fireplace. Tom Thumb and Hunca Munca went cautiously across the hearth-rug.
They pushed the front door - it was not fast. |
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Tom Thumb and Hunca Munca went up-stairs and peeped
into the dining-room. Then they squeaked with joy!
Such a lovely dinner was laid out upon the table! There were tin spoons,
and lead knives and forks, and two dolly-chairs - all so convenient! |
Tom Thumb set to work at once to carve the ham.
It was a beautiful shiny yellow, streaked with red.
The knife crumpled up and hurt him; he put his finger in his mouth.
"It is not boiled enough; it is hard. You have a try Hunca Munca." |
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Hunca Munca stood up in her chair, and chopped
at the ham with another lead knife.
"It's as hard as the hams at the cheesemonger's," said Hunca Munca. |
The ham broke off the plate with a jerk, and rolled
under the table.
"Let it alone," said Tom Thumb; "give me some fish, Hunca
Munca!" |
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Hunca Munca tried every tin spoon in turn; the
fish was glued to the dish.
Then Tom Thumb lost his temper. He put the ham in the middle of the floor,
and hit it with the tongs and with the shovel - bang, bang, smash, smash!
The ham flew all into pieces, for underneath the shiny paint it was made
of nothing but plaster! |
Then there was no end to the rage and disappointment
of Tom Thumb and Hunca Munca. They broke up the pudding, the lobsters, the
pears, and the oranges.
As the fish would not come off the plate, they put it into the red-hot crinkly
paper fire in the kitchen; but it would not burn either. |
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Tom Thumb went up the kitchen chimney and looked
out the top - there was no soot. |
While Tom Thumb was up the chimney, Hunca Munca
had another disappointment. She found some tiny canisters upon the dresser,
labeled "Rice," "Coffee," "Sago"; but when
she turned them upside down there was nothing inside except red and blue
beads. |
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Then those mice set to work to do all the mischief
they could - especially Tom Thumb! He took Jane's clothes out of the chest
of drawers in her bedroom, and he threw them out of the top-floor window.
But Hunca Munca had a frugal mind. After pulling half the feathers out of
Lucinda's bolster, she remembered that she herself was in want of a feather-bed. |
With Tom Thumb's assistance she carried the bolster
down-stairs and across the hearth-rug. It was difficult to squeeze the bolster
into the mouse-hole; but they managed it somehow. |
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Then Hunca Munca went back and fetched a chair,
a bookcase, a bird-cage, and several small odds and ends. The bookcase and
the bird-cage refused to go into the mouse-hole. |
Hunca Munca left them behind with the coal-box
and went to fetch a cradle. |
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Hunca Munca was just returning with another chair,
when suddenly there was a noise of talking outside upon the landing. The
mice rushed back to their hole, and the dolls came into the nursery. |
What a sight met the eyes of Jane and Lucinda!
Lucinda sat upon the upset kitchen stove and stared, and Jane leaned against
the kitchen dresser and smiled; but neither of them made any remark. |
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The bookcase and the birdcage were rescued from
under the coal-box; but Hunca Munca has got the cradle and some of Lucinda's
clothes. |
She also has some useful pots and pans, and several
other things. |
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The little girl that the doll's house belonged
to said: "I will get a doll dressed like a policeman!" |
But the nurse said: "I will set a mouse-trap!" |
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So that is the story of the two Bad Mice. But they
were not so very, very naughty after all, because Tom Thumb paid for everything
he broke.
He found a crooked sixpense under the hearth-rug; and upon Christmas Eve
he and Hunca Munca stuffed it into one of the stockings of Lucinda and Jane. |
And very early every morning - before anybody is
awake - Hunca Munca comes with her dust-pan and her broom to sweep the Dollies'
house!
THE END |
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