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SLEEPY-TIME TALES

JOEL: Good-night.

(Trademark Registered)

TOM: Copyright trademark do not steal I already mailed it to myself.

THE TALE OF

CROW: Terrors!

GRUMPY

CROW: Or mild crankiness!

WEASEL

TOM: We's al what?

BY
ARTHUR SCOTT BAILEY

JOEL: Weasels are by Arthur Scott Bailey?
TOM: That's not as good as the time Beatrix Potter created kangaroos.

Author of
"TUCK-ME-IN TALES"

CROW: The official tales of Forrest Tucker!

(Trademark Registered)

TOM: Copyright trademark do not steal.

ILLUSTRATED BY

JOEL: Pictures! Your leading image source!

HARRY L. SMITH

CROW: CBS News.

NEW YORK

JOEL: Illustrated by Harry L Smith *and* New York?

GROSSET & DUNLAP

TOM: Wallace and Grosset?

PUBLISHERS
Made in the United States of America

CROW: o/` Made! In the USA! o/`

Copyright, 1920, BY
GROSSET & DUNLAP

JOEL: The tire people?

CONTENTS

TOM: Malcontents!

CHAPTER PAGE
I A Slim Rascal 1
II At the Old Stone Wall 5
III Master Robin's Lesson 9

CORW: A haiku!

IV Hunting a Hole 13

JOEL: Where the rain gets in ...

V Solomon Owl Interrupts 18
VI Mr. Meadow Mouse Escapes 23

CROW: A crossover with the _Tale of Mister Meadow Mouse_? Dare we hope?

VII Paddy Muskrat's Blunder 28
VIII The Dare 33

TOM: The Double Dare!
CROW: We do dare!

IX Saving His Feet 38

JOEL: For marriage!

X Ha! and Ha, Ha! 42

CROW: They say it's hard to understand old-time humor but I don't know, this makes sense to me.

XI A Long Race 46
XII Winning by a Trick 51
XIII Silly Mrs. Hen 56

TOM: Silly Mrs Hen sleeps in the park, shaves in the dark, trying to save paper.

XIV Grumpy Vanishes 60
XV The Great Mystery 64
XVI Guarding the Corncrib 69

CROW: Corncrib?

XVII Grumpy's Mistake 73
XVIII Pop! Goes the Weasel 78

TOM: I bet Arthur Scott Bailey wrote this whole book just for that chapter title.

XIX Hiding from Henry Hawk 83

JOEL: 'Enery the 'Awk, 'e is.

XX A Free Ride 88
XXI A New Suit 93
XXII Grumpy's Threat 98

CROW: Wait, we only spend five pages on the new suit?

XXIII A Bold Stranger 103
XXIV Fur and Feathers 107

TOM: Sounds like a New Wave band's big song.

XXV Peter Mink's Promise 112

JOEL: I knew a Peter Mink back in high school.

XXVI How Grumpy Helped 116

TOM: Did he slug someone? I bet he slugged someone.

ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING PAGE

JOEL: Oh, that'll make them easier to see.

Grumpy Weasel and Jimmy Rabbit Run a Race. Frontispiece

CROW: 'Tis piece, 'tis.

Master Robin Escapes From Grumpy Weasel. 10
Grumpy Nearly Catches Paddy Muskrat. 34
Grumpy Calls on Mrs. Hen. 50

TOM: [ Yelling ] Yo! Mrs Hen!

Grumpy Weasel Visits the Corncrib. 74

JOEL: Corncrib.

Sandy Chipmunk Runs from Grumpy Weasel. 98

TOM: Sounds like this book is all people avoiding Grumpy Weasel.

THE TALE OF GRUMPY WEASEL

CROW: What kind of animal do you suppose Grumpy is?
JOEL: Oh, he's a pronghorn antelope.
TOM: Named 'Weasel'?
JOEL: That's why he's grumpy.

I

TOM: I, Weasel.
JOEL: I M Weasel.
CROW: Eh.

A SLIM RASCAL

CROW: But a cute little dickens!

Old Mr. Crow

JOEL: [ Nudges CROW ]
CROW: WHat?

often remarked that if Grumpy Weasel
really wanted to be of some use in the world he would spend
his time at the sawmill filling knot holes in boards.

JOEL: It's a weird hill to die on, but Old Mr Crow's chosen it.
TOM: Who wants to be of use in the world? I want to play Animal Crossing and eat cheese.

"He's so slender," Mr. Crow would say,

ALL: How slender is he?

"that he can
push himself into a knot hole no bigger round than Farmer
Green's thumb."

JOEL: Huh.
CROW: Welp, guess that *is* slender.
TOM: Not going to match *any* celebrities on that one. Even Richard Dawson is like, really? You're leaving me with *that*?

Naturally it did not please old Mr. Crow

CROW: I don't know, I feel pretty indifferent about hearing this myself.

when Solomon
Owl went out of his way one day to tell him that he was sadly
mistaken.

TOM: Classic Solomon Owl, though.

For after hearing some gossip repeat Mr. Crow's
opinion Solomon Owl---the wise old bird---

CROW: [ As Solomon ] Bird? Oh, no, no, I'm a dikdik, my family married into the Owls is all.

had given several
long hoots and hurried off,

JOEL: Well, you want me to hoot I'll hoot but that's your business.

though it was broad daylight, to
set Mr. Crow right.

CROW: I tell you, I have no emotional investment in whether Grumpy Weasel should be filling knotholes down at the sawmill.

"The trouble---" Solomon explained when he had found
Mr. Crow on the edge of the woods---

TOM: Trouble? In River City?

"the trouble with your
plan to have Grumpy Weasel work in the sawmill is that he
wouldn't keep a knot hole filled longer than a jiffy.

JOEL: [ As Lum Edwards ] OK, Abner, I was sayin' Grumpy Weasel *could*, not ...
TOM: [ As Abner Peabody ] And another thing, Lum ...

It's
true that he can fit a very small hole.

CROW: Or one medium-size divot.
JOEL: A decent-sized pock mark.
TOM: Heck near any rilles.

But if you'd ever
watched him closely you'd know that he's in a hole and out
the other side so fast you can scarcely see what happens.

CROW: So the whole watching thing is pointless, right?
TOM: The *hole* watching thing.

He's entirely too active to fill the bill."

JOEL: No bill-filling. Try a Kyle or a Tom first.

Old Mr. Crow made a queer noise in his throat, which
showed that Solomon Owl had made him angry.

CROW: All I can imagine is doing that weird Picard laugh?

"I never said anything about Grumpy Weasel's filling
any bills," Mr. Crow spluttered.

TOM: Good, cause if you fill a bird's bill how can they talk?

"Knot holes were what I had
in mind.

JOEL: If they're not holes how can you fill them?

I've no doubt, though, that you'd like Grumpy Weasel
to fill your own bill."

TOM: [ As Solomon ] Wait, are you telling me to eat Grumpy Weasel? Dikdiks don't eat weasels! I'm pretty sure? Let me check my manual.

Now, if Solomon Owl had not tried more than once to
catch Grumpy Weasel perhaps Mr. Crow's retort wouldn't have
made him feel so uncomfortable.

JOEL: Oh, they got *history*.
CROW: Yeah, this is like Will Smith's slap only about weasels filling holes.

And muttering that he wished
when people spoke of his beak they wouldn't call it a bill,

JOEL: Maybe call it a william, show some respect?

and that Mr. Crow was too stupid to talk to,

TOM: OooooOOOh! Hey, Crow?
CROW: Shut up.

Solomon
blundered away into the woods.

JOEL: Bonk!
CROW: Ow ow owie ow ow who put a tree ---
JOEL: Crash!
CROW: My bills!

It was true, of course, that Grumpy Weasel was about
the quickest of all the furred folk in Pleasant Valley.

CROW: Also we're in Pleasant Valley.
TOM: Also the birds count as 'furred folk'.

Why,
you might be looking at him as he stopped for a moment on a
stone wall;

JOEL: It's your business, not mine.

and while you looked he would vanish before your
eyes.

TOM: *Your* eyes, maybe.

It was just as if he had melted away in an instant, so
quickly could he dart into a crevice between the stones.

JOEL: Weasels melt in your mouth, not in your stones.
TOM: What?

It was surprising, too, that he could whisk himself
out of sight so fast,

CROW: Is this some introvert-pride brag?

for his body was absurdly long. But if
he was long in one way he was short in another.

JOEL: Y'know if you have too much of one spatial dimension the others will shrink to balance out.

Yes! Grumpy
Weasel had the shortest temper of all the field- and
forest-folk throughout Pleasant Valley.

TOM: Short but deep. Dimensions again.

Even peppery Peter
Mink was not so short-tempered as he.

TOM: Boy, everybody's talking about Peter Mink these days.

So terrible tempered was Grumpy Weasel that whenever
the news flashed through the woods that he was out hunting,
all the small people kept quite still,

CROW: Well wait, if they were so small, then they'd compensate by being the widest beasts in town!

because they were
afraid. And even some of the bigger ones---a good deal bigger
than Grumpy Weasel himself---felt uneasy.

TOM: Not from his temper but from his tiresome political lectures.

So you can see whether or not Grumpy Weasel was
welcome.

JOEL: Uh ... yes?
TOM: I'm going to say 'no'?
CROW: I'm writing in 'The Beatles'.

[ End of Chapter One. To be continued ? ... ]

--
Joseph Nebus
Math Blog: https://nebusresearch.wordpress.com
Humor Blog: https://nebushumor.wordpress.com --------------------------------------------------------+---------------------

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