the house-mouse went about quietly, minding her business.
she lived in the forester's house that lay just on the skirt of the forest, so that there were woods on one side and fields on the other. she had a comfortable home behind the wainscot in the forester's dining-room, right under the window. and the window looked out on the woods; and then down at the bottom of the wall there was a very tiny hole, which the house-mouse was just able to squeeze through, so that she could slip into the woods and home again whenever she pleased.
in this way, the house-mouse had a very enjoyable time; and she had a good time also with regard to the people she lived with. true, the forester was a grumpy sort of man, who could not hear the word "mouse" mentioned without flying into a rage. but he was a very old man and the house was managed by his daughter. she never forgot the house-mouse; and this came of a meeting that once took place between the two. one morning, you must know, the young lady went to the sideboard to get out the sugar for her father's coffee. and there sat the mouse in the sugar-basin. she had forgotten the time and gone to sleep. and there she was!
of course, she was terribly frightened; and it was worse still when the girl put out her hand over the sugar-basin, as if to catch her:
"so there you are, mousie!" she said. "i thought it was you that was after my sugar! apart from that, you're a nice little thing. but you needn't go shaking so terribly in your little grey shoes, for, i assure you, i have not the least intention of doing you any harm. perhaps you have little children, who would starve if you didn't come home to them. so i'll let you go. but, on the other hand, it will never do for you to go stealing our sugar. so, when you get down to the floor, run straight to your hole. i don't know where it is, but, when i find out, i will put a piece of sugar on the floor outside it, every evening before i go to bed. and then i will look for the hole through which you got into the sideboard and stop it up; and then we shall be friends."
when she had made this speech, which was much handsomer than the speeches which mice are accustomed to hear from human beings, she put the terrified mouse down on the floor. the mouse at once scudded across the room and disappeared in her hole under the wainscoting.
"so that's where you live," said the forester's daughter. "that's all right. now you will see i shall remember my promise."
in the evening she put a lump of sugar there and she did so every evening before she went to bed. and, every morning, the mouse had fetched the sugar. and, when, one day, she heard a squeaking behind the wainscot, she guessed that the little mouse had now got children; and, from that day, she put two lumps of sugar for her every evening.
the mouse, therefore, could not complain of the people she lived with and no more she did. add to this that the only cat that the forester's house contained was an enormous old ginger tom who could no longer either see or hear. he had been there in the forester's wife's day. she was dead now. and, as she had been fond of him, he was allowed to live and eat the bread of charity in the forester's house, though he was no longer of the least use. and, as he could not tolerate other and younger cats, there was no other cat in the place, which of course was a great source of joy to the mouse, who often ran right under the old ginger tomcat's nose, without his noticing her.
