The Project Gutenberg EBook of Old Granny Fox, by Thornton W. Burgess

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Title: Old Granny Fox

Author: Thornton W. Burgess

Release Date: January, 2004 [EBook #4980]
Posting Date: April 23, 2009

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OLD GRANNY FOX ***

Produced by Kent Fielden

OLD GRANNY FOX

By Thornton W. Burgess

CHAPTER I: Reddy Fox Brings Granny News

Pray who is there who would refuse
To bearer be of happy news?
--Old Granny Fox.

Snow covered the Green Meadows and the Green Forest, and ice bound the
Smiling Pool and the Laughing Brook. Reddy and Granny Fox were hungry
most of the time. It was not easy to find enough to eat these days, and
so they spent nearly every minute they were awake in hunting. Sometimes
they hunted together, but usually one went one way, and the other went
another way so as to have a greater chance of finding something. If
either found enough for two, the one finding it took the food back to
their home if it could be carried. If not, the other was told where to
find it.

For several days they had had very little indeed to eat, and they were
so hungry that they were willing to take almost any chance to get a good
meal. For two nights they had visited Farmer Brown's henhouse, hoping
that they would be able to find a way inside. But the biddies had been
securely locked up, and try as they would, they couldn't find a way in.

"It's of no use," said Granny, as they started back home after the
second try, "to hope to get one of those hens at night. If we are going
to get any at all, we will have to do it in broad daylight. It can
be done, for I have done it before, but I don't like the idea. We are
likely to be seen, and that means that Bowser the Hound will be set to
hunting us."

"Pooh!" exclaimed Reddy. "What of it? It's easy enough to fool him."

"You think so, do you?" snapped Granny. "I never yet saw a young Fox
who didn't think he knew all there is to know, and you're just like the
rest. When you've lived as long as I have you will have learned not to
be quite so sure of your own opinions. I grant you that when there is no
s