 | The Roly-Poly Pudding |  |
THE
ROLY-POLY PUDDING
ONCE upon a time there was an old
cat, called Mrs. Tabitha Twitchit,
who was an anxious parent. She used to
lose her kittens continually, and whenever
they were lost they were always in mischief!
On baking day she determined to shut
them up in a cupboard.
She caught Moppet and Mittens, but she
could not find Tom.
[Description: Text Page.]
Mrs. Tabitha went up and down all over
the house, mewing for Tom Kitten. She
looked in the pantry under the staircase,
and she searched the best spare bedroom
that was all covered up with dust sheets.
She went right upstairs and looked into the
attics, but she could not find him anywhere.
It was an old, old house, full of
cupboards and passages. Some of the walls
were four feet thick, and there used to be
queer noises inside them, as if there might
be a little secret staircase. Certainly there
were odd little jagged doorways in the
wainscot, and things disappeared at night—
especially cheese and bacon.
Mrs. Tabitha became more and more
distracted, and mewed dreadfully
[Description: Watercolor of Mrs. Tabitha Twitchit, the cat, dressed in an apron standing next to a window and curtain and stair-rail]
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Moppet and Mittens, kittens, peeking out from behind a door.]
While their mother was searching the
house, Moppet and Mittens had got into
mischief.
The cupboard door was not locked, so
they pushed it open and came out.
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of the kittens, Moppet and Mittens, getting into pie dough.]
They went straight to the dough which
was set to rise in a pan before the fire.
They patted it with their little soft paws
—“Shall we make dear little muffins?” said
Mittens to Moppet
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of a frightened Moppet kitten jumping into a barrel. We see her tail and back leg.]
But just at that moment somebody
knocked at the front door, and Moppet
jumped into the flour barrel in a fright
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Mittens, the kitten, hiding in an empty jar next to milk pans. We see her tail.]
Mittens ran away to the dairy, and hid
in an empty jar on the stone shelf where
the milk pans stand.
[Description: Text Page.]
The visitor was a neighbor, Mrs. Ribby;
she had called to borrow some yeast.
Mrs. Tabitha came downstairs mewing
dreadfully—“Come in, Cousin Ribby, come
in, and sit ye down! I'm in sad trouble,
Cousin Ribby,” said Tabitha, shedding
tears. “I've lost my dear son Thomas; I'm
afraid the rats have got him.” She wiped
her eyes with an apron.
“He's a bad kitten, Cousin Tabitha; he
made a cat's cradle of my best bonnet last
time I came to tea. Where have you looked
for him?”
“All over the house! The rats are too
many for me. What a thing it is to have an
unruly family!” said Mrs. Tabitha Twitchit.
[Description: Watercolor of Cousin Ribby with bonnet and basket standing at the open door. She is a cat.]
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Cousin Ribby, the cat, with umbrella looking for rats.]
“I'm not afraid of rats; I will help you
to find him; and whip him too! What is
all that soot in the fender?”
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Tabitha Twitchit worrying over Moppet and Mittens, she is sitting in a rocking chair.]
“The chimney wants sweeping—Oh, dear
me, Cousin Ribby—now Moppet and Mittens
are gone!”
“They have both got out of the cup-
board!”
[Description: Watercolor of Cousin Ribby and Tabitha Twitchit holding a candle and looking in a trunk for rats]
[Description: Text Page.]
Ribby and Tabitha set to work to search
the house thoroughly again. They poked
under the beds with Ribby's umbrella, and
they rummaged in cupboards. They even
fetched a candle, and looked inside a clothes
chest in one of the attics. They could not
find anything, but once they heard a door
bang and somebody scuttered downstairs.
“Yes, it is infested with rats,” said
Tabitha tearfully, “I caught seven young
ones out of one hole in the back kitchen,
and we had them for dinner last Saturday.
And once I saw the old father rat—an
enormous old rat, Cousin Ribby. I was
just going to jump upon him, when he
showed his yellow teeth at me and whisked
down the hole.”
“The rats get upon my nerves, Cousin
Ribby,” said Tabitha.
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Ribby and Tabitha, the cats, looking for rats with an umbrella.]
Ribby and Tabitha searched and searched.
They both heard a curious roly-poly noise
under the attic floor. But there was nothing
to be seen.
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Ribby finding Moppet, the kitten, in the barrel.]
They returned to the kitchen. “Here's
one of your kittens at least,” said Ribby,
dragging Moppet out of the flour barrel.
[Description: Text Page.]
They shook the flour off her and set her
down on the kitchen floor. She seemed to
be in a terrible fright.
“Oh! Mother, Mother,” said Moppet,
“there's been an old woman rat in the
kitchen, and she's stolen some of the
dough!”
The two cats ran to look at the dough
pan. Sure enough there were marks of
little scratching fingers, and a lump of
dough was gone!
“Which way did she go, Moppet?”
But Moppet had been too much frightened
to peep out of the barrel again.
Ribby and Tabitha took her with them
to keep her safely in sight, while they went
on with their search.
[Description: Watercolor of an old woman rat with apron holding a dish full of stolen dough.]
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of cats and kittens: Ribby, Tabitha, and Moppet looking scared]
They went into the dairy.
The first thing they found was Mittens,
hiding in an empty jar
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Mittens, the kitten (cat) tumbling out of the jar.]
They tipped up the jar, and she scrambled
out.
“Oh, Mother, Mother!” said Mittens—
[Description: Watercolor of old man rat with green petticoat stealing a pat of butter on a dish]
[Description: Text Page.]
“Oh! Mother, Mother, there has been an
old man rat in the dairy—a dreadful 'normous
big rat, Mother; and he's stolen a pat
of butter and the rolling-pin.”
Ribby and Tabitha looked at one another.
“A rolling-pin and butter! Oh, my poor
son Thomas!” exclaimed Tabitha, wringing
her paws.
“A rolling-pin?” said Ribby. “Did we
not hear a roly-poly noise in the attic when
we were looking into that chest?”
Ribby and Tabitha rushed upstairs again.
Sure enough the roly-poly noise was still
going on quite distinctly under the attic
floor
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of John Joiner, the dog, holding a basket in his mouth.]
“This is serious, Cousin Tabitha,” said
Ribby. “We must send for John Joiner at
once, with a saw.”
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Tom Kitten, the cat, peeking from behind the door jamb]
Now this is what had been happening to
Tom Kitten, and it shows how very unwise
it is to go up a chimney in a very old house,
where a person does not know his way, and
where there are enormous rats.
[Description: Text Page.]
Tom Kitten did not want to be shut up
in a cupboard. When he saw that his
mother was going to bake, he determined
to hide.
He looked about for a nice convenient
place, and he fixed upon the chimney.
The fire had only just been lighted, and
it was not hot; but there was a white choky
smoke from the green sticks. Tom Kitten
got upon the fender and looked up. It was
a big old-fashioned fireplace.
The chimney itself was wide enough inside
for a man to stand up and walk about.
So there was plenty of room for a little
Tom Cat
[Description: Watercolor of Tom Kitten, the cat, in blue coat looking up the chimney he is about to climb into.]
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Tom Kitten, the cat, ascending the chimney, we see his tail over the fire.]
He jumped right up into the fireplace,
balancing himself upon the iron bar where
the kettle hangs.
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Tom Kitten, the cat, sitting on a ledge above the fire in the chimney]
Tom Kitten took another big jump off
the bar, and landed on a ledge high up
inside the chimney, knocking down some
soot into the fender.
[Description: Watercolor of chimney with sparrows and a nice rural pastoral landscape]
[Description: Text Page.]
Tom Kitten coughed and choked with the
smoke; he could hear the sticks beginning
to crackle and burn in the fireplace down
below. He made up his mind to climb right
to the top, and get out on the slates, and
try to catch sparrows.
“I cannot go back. If I slipped I might
fall in the fire and singe my beautiful tail
and my little blue jacket.”
The chimney was a very big old-fashioned
one. It was built in the days when
people burnt logs of wood upon the hearth.
The chimney stack stood up above the
roof like a little stone tower, and the daylight
shone down from the top, under the
slanting slates that kept out the rain.
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Tom Kitten crawling up the chimney]
Tom Kitten was getting very frightened!
He climbed up, and up, and up
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Tom Kitten amidst soot.]
Then he waded sideways through inches
of soot. He was like a little sweep himself.
[Description: Text Page.]
It was most confusing in the dark. One
flue seemed to lead into another.
There was less smoke, but Tom Kitten
felt quite lost.
He scrambled up and up; but before he
reached the chimney top he came to a place
where somebody had loosened a stone in
the wall. There were some mutton bones
lying about—
“This seems funny,” said Tom Kitten.
“Who has been gnawing bones up here in
the chimney? I wish I had never come!
And what a funny smell! It is something
like mouse; only dreadfully strong. It
makes me sneeze,” said Tom Kitten.
[Description: Watercolor of Tom Kitten in blue coat coming across bones in the chimney]
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Tom Kitten's tail as he squeezes through a nook or cranny in the wall]
He squeezed through the hole in the wall,
and dragged himself along a most uncomfortably
tight passage where there was
scarcely any light.
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of the attic and skirting board]
He groped his way carefully for several
yards; he was at the back of the skirting-
board in the attic, where there is a little
mark * in the picture.
[Description: Watercolor of Tom Kitten rolling in rags and Mr. Sam Whiskers, the rat, looking at him.]
[Description: Text Page.]
All at once he fell head over heels in the
dark, down a hole, and landed on a heap of
very dirty rags.
When Tom Kitten picked himself up and
looked about him—he found himself in a
place that he had never seen before, although
he had lived all his life in the house.
It was a very small stuffy fusty room,
with boards, and rafters, and cobwebs, and
lath and plaster.
Opposite to him—as far away as he could
sit—was an enormous rat.
“What do you mean by tumbling into
my bed all covered with smuts?” said the
rat, chattering his teeth.
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Tom Kitten sitting up in the rats' nest]
“Please sir, the chimney wants sweeping,”
said poor Tom Kitten.
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Sam Whiskers calling his wife, Anna Maria, the woman rat peeking in.]
“Anna Maria! Anna Maria!” squeaked
the rat. There was a pattering noise and
an old woman rat poked her head round a
rafter.
[Description: Text Page.]
All in a minute she rushed upon Tom
Kitten, and before he knew what was happening—
His coat was pulled off, and he was rolled
up in a bundle, and tied with string in very
hard knots.
Anna Maria did the tying. The old rat
watched her and took snuff. When she had
finished, they both sat staring at him with
their mouths open.
“Anna Maria,” said the old man rat
(whose name was Samuel Whiskers),—
“Anna Maria, make me a kitten dumpling
roly-poly pudding for my dinner.”
“It requires dough and a pat of butter,
and a rolling-pin,” said Anna Maria,
considering Tom Kitten with her head on one
side.
[Description: Watercolor of Anna Maria, the rat, tying Tom Kitten up as Sam Whiskers watches.]
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of the tied Tom Kitten]
“No,” said Samuel Whiskers, “make it
properly, Anna Maria, with breadcrumbs.”
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Anna Maria and Sam Whiskers, the rats.]
“Nonsense! Butter and dough,” replied
Anna Maria.
[Description: Watercolor of Sam Whiskers with the rolling pin on the carpet]
[Description: Text Page.]
The two rats consulted together for a
few minutes and then went away.
Samuel Whiskers got through a hole in
the wainscot, and went boldly down the
front staircase to the dairy to get the
butter. He did not meet anybody.
He made a second journey for the rolling-
pin. He pushed it in front of him with
his paws, like a brewer's man trundling a
barrel.
He could hear Ribby and Tabitha talking,
but they were busy lighting the candle to
look into the chest.
They did not see him.
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Anna Maria, the rat, peeking behind a shutter and some geraniums are in the foreground.]
Anna Maria went down by way of the
skirting-board and a window shutter to the
kitchen to steal the dough.
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Anna Maria, the rat, borrowing some dough and a small saucer.]
She borrowed a small saucer, and scooped
up the dough with her paws.
She did not observe Moppet.
[Description: Text Page.]
While Tom Kitten was left alone under
the floor of the attic, he wriggled about and
tried to mew for help.
But his mouth was full of soot and cob-
webs, and he was tied up in such very tight
knots, he could not make anybody hear him.
Except a spider, which came out of a
crack in the ceiling and examined the knots
critically, from a safe distance.
It was a judge of knots because it had a
habit of tying up unfortunate blue-bottles.
It did not offer to assist him.
Tom Kitten wriggled and squirmed until
he was quite exhausted.
[Description: Watercolor of Tom Kitten, the cat, tied up with string and struggling to get free.]
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Anna Maria and Sam Whiskers, the rats, spreading butter on the cat, Tom Kitten, to make him into a dumpling.]
Presently the rats came back and set to
work to make him into a dumpling. First
they smeared him with butter, and then they
rolled him in the dough.
“Will not the string be very indigestible,
Anna Maria?” inquired Samuel Whiskers.
[Description: Text Page with black and white illustration of Anna Maria and Sam Whiskers, the rats, spreading the dough around Tom Kitten, the cat.]
Anna Maria said she thought that it was
of no consequence; but she wished that Tom
Kitten would hold his head still, as it
disarranged the pastry. She laid hold of his
ears.
[Description: Watercolor of Anna Maria and Sam Whiskers, the rats, rolling the dough over Tom Kitten, the cat, with a rolling pin.]
[Description: Text Page.]
Tom Kitten bit and spat, and mewed and
wriggled; and the rolling-pin went roly-
poly, roly; roly, poly, roly. The rats each
held an end.
“His tail is sticking out! You did not
fetch enough dough, Anna Maria.”
“I fetched as much as I could carry,”
replied Anna Maria.
“I do not think”—said Samuel Whiskers,
pausing to take a look at Tom Kitten—“I
do not think it will be a good
pudding. It
smells sooty.”
Anna Maria was about to argue the point,
when all at once there began to be other
sounds up above—the rasping noise of a
saw; and the noise of a little dog, scratching
and yelping!
[Description: Black and white illustration of Anna Maria and Sam Whiskers, the rats, dropping the rolling pin on Tom Kitten, the cat because they hear something.]
The rats dropped the rolling-pin, and
listened attentively.
“We are discovered and interrupted,
Anna Maria; let us collect our property,—
and other people's,—and depart at once.”
“I fear that we shall be obliged to leave
this pudding.”
[Description: Black and white illustration of Sam Whiskers, the rat, running to get away.]
“But I am persuaded that the knots would
have proved indigestible, whatever you may
urge to the contrary.”
“Come away at once and help me to tie up
some mutton bones in a counterpane,” said
Anna Maria. “I have got half a smoked
ham hidden in the chimney.”
[Description: Black and white illustration of John the Joiner, a dog, reaching through the floor to find Tom Kitten, the cat, rolled in dough with a rolling pin next to him]
So it happened that by the time John
Joiner had got the plank up—there was nobody
under the floor except the rolling-pin
and Tom Kitten in a very dirty dumpling!
[Description: Black and white illustration of John the Joiner, a dog, reaching through the floor and his carpentry tools, a saw, and hammer, can be seen too]
But there was a strong smell of rats; and
John Joiner spent the rest of the morning
sniffing and whining, and wagging his tail,
and going round and round with his head in
the hole like a gimlet.
[Description: Watercolor of all the cats, Ribby, John the Joiner, a dog, and Moppet and Mittens watching Miss Thatchit scrub the butter and dough off of Tom Kitten in a wash basin.]
[Description: Text Page.]
Then he nailed the plank down again, and
put his tools in his bag, and came downstairs.
The cat family had quite recovered. They
invited him to stay to dinner.
The dumpling had been peeled off Tom
Kitten, and made separately into a bag pudding,
with currants in it to hide the smuts.
They had been obliged to put Tom Kitten
into a hot bath to get the butter off.
John Joiner smelt the pudding; but he
regretted that he had not time to stay to
dinner, because he had just finished making
a wheel-barrow for Miss Potter, and she
had ordered two hen-coops.
[Description: Text Page.]
And when I was going to the post late in
the afternoon—I looked up the lane from
the corner, and I saw Mr. Samuel Whiskers
and his wife on the run, with big bundles
on a little wheel-barrow, which looked very
like mine.
They were just turning in at the gate to
the barn of Farmer Potatoes.
Samuel Whiskers was puffing and out of
breath. Anna Maria was still arguing in
shrill tones.
She seemed to know her way, and she
seemed to have a quantity of luggage.
I am sure I never gave her
leave to borrow
my wheel-barrow!
[Description: Watercolor of Sam Whiskers and Anna Maria, the rats, moving out with their luggage.]
[Description: Black and white illustration of Sam Whiskers hauling luggage up a string into the haymow in the barn]
They went into the barn, arid hauled
their parcels with a bit of string to the top
of the haymow.
[Description: Black and white illustration of Tabitha Twitchit sitting in her rocking chair asleep]
After that, there were no more rats for
a long time at Tabitha Twitchit's.
[Description: Watercolor illustration of Farmer Potatoes, a man in a hat, looking in his barn for rats.]
[Description: Text Page.]
As for Farmer Potatoes, he has been
driven nearly distracted. There are rats,
and rats, and rats in his barn! They eat
up the chicken food, and steal the oats and
bran, and make holes in the meal bags.
And they are all descended from Mr.
and Mrs. Samuel Whiskers—children and
grand-children and great great grand-children.
There is no end to them!
[Description: Text Page.]
Moppet and Mittens have grown up into
very good rat-catchers.
They go out rat-catching in the village,
and they find plenty of employment. They
charge so much a dozen, and earn their
living very comfortably.
[Description: Watercolor illustration of Moppet and Mittens catching rats in the garden.]
[Description: Black and white illustration of Moppet and Mittens nailing rat tails to the barn door]
They hang up the rats' tails in a row or
the barn door, to show how many they have
caught—dozens and dozens of them.
[Description: Black and white illustration of Tom Kitten afraid of a mouse]
But Tom Kitten has always been afraid
of a rat; he never durst face anything that
is bigger than—
A Mouse.
| The Roly-Poly Pudding | |