ountain.

A man was trimming the hedge. He was a caretaker, and he saw the big cat
hide in the old iron fountain.

"That old cat thinks that she will hide in the old iron fountain and
catch a bird!" he said to himself. "She is the same cat that has been
catching birds around here all summer! What she needs is a good
dousing!"

The man laid down his clippers, and tiptoed along behind the hedge until
he came to a place where a little iron wheel stuck up out of the ground.
The man took hold of the little iron wheel and turned it just as quickly
as he could, and the water came rushing out of the old iron fountain,
and the big cat jumped first one way and then another, and whichever way
she sprang she spattered right into streams of cold water that squirted
all over her.

"Pstt! Pstt!" she said as she jumped out of the basin, and ran across
the nice green lawn, and hurried home.

When the big cat got home she shook herself and said: "That old iron
fountain is no good! It is a poor place to hide! I am as wet as a mop!
Who would ever have expected that old fountain to blow up like that?
General Scamp is letting his place run down so fast that I do not think
I will go over there any more! I will dry my fur, then I will go over
to the dump and catch a rat!"

When Robert Robin saw the big cat get wet in the old iron fountain, he
told the little robins never to go near that place. "That big cat got
very wet, and a little bird, like you, might drown!" he said.

Then, as it was getting towards night, Robert Robin led his family over
to the city park. He expected to get a room in the Bird House, but the
rooms were all taken, so Robert Robin and his family were forced to
sleep all night in a maple tree.

During the night a dense bank of fog rolled in from the lake, and the
black smoke of a factory chimney drifted through the park. The lights of
the city and the noise of the traffic kept Robert Robin's family awake
most of the night.

"I do not enjoy sleeping in a strange tree!" said Mrs. Robin, the next
morning.

"The fog and smoke were very bad!" said Robert Robin, "and those bright
lights made my eyes smart!"

Little Evelina had caught cold, Montgomery had hurt his toe, and the
other youngster birds were tired and not a bit pleasant, so when Mrs.
Robin said, "I would like to go back to our own basswood tree, and build
us a nice new nest, in the place where the old one was, then I could lay
four more eggs, and we would