Old Wonder-Eyes

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Once, when I was in England, I visited some friends
who lived in a pleasant part of the country. They
had a fine old house filled with all sorts of
beautiful things, but nothing indoors was so delightful as the
wide green lawn with its smooth, soft turf, and the
garden with its laburnums and lilies and violets, and hosts
and hosts of roses. There was a pretty silvery fountain

(00:23):
playing among the flowers, so close to a little bower
of honeysuckles that the butterflies fluttering about them had to
be very careful, or the first day knew they got
their wings soaked through and through with spray. About the
house and grounds were all kinds of beautiful pets, gray
hinds and spaniels and lap dogs and rare white kittens,
gay parrots and silver pheasants and sweet singing canaries. But here,

(00:48):
in this pleasantest spot, right under the honeysuckle bar, all
alone by himself in a large green cage, sat an
ugly gray oil. He was the crossest, surliest old fellow
I ever saw in all my life. I tried very
hard to make friends with him, but it was of
no use. He never treated me with decent civility, And

(01:08):
one day, when I was offering him a bit of cake,
he caught my finger and bit it till it laid.
And I said to missus, m what do you keep
that cross old creature? For? I noticed that my friend
looked sad when she answered me, and said, we only
keep him for our dear old little Many's sake. He
was her pet. Now I had never heard of her,

(01:29):
Little Many, so I asked about her and was told
this story. Minnie was a sweet, gentle little girl. He
loved everybody and every creature that God had made, and
everybody and every creature she met loved her. Rough people
were gentle to her, and cross people were kindly. She
could go straight off vicious horses and fierce dogs and
spiteful cats, and they would become quiet, mild directly. I

(01:51):
don't think that anything could resist her loving ways, unless
it were a mad bull or a setting hen. One night,
as Many lay awake in her bed in the nursery,
listening to your summer rain, she heard a strange fluttering
and scratching in the chimney, and she called to her
nurse and said, biddy, what is that funny? Noise up there.
Betty listened a moment and said, sure, it's nothing but

(02:13):
a stray rook. Now he's quite gone away, so go
to sleep, Wigee, my darlin. Minnie tried to go to
sleep like a good girl, but after a while she
heard that sound again, and presently something came fluttering and
scratching right down into the grate and out into the room.
Minnie called again to Betty, but Betty was tired an
sleepy and wouldn't make up. It was so dark that

(02:35):
Minnie could see nothing, and she felt a little strange,
but she was no coward, and as the bird seemed
very quiet, she went to sleep again after a while
and dreamed that great flocks of rooks were flying over her, slowly, slowly,
and making the darkness with their jet black wings. She
woke very early in the morning, and the first thing
she saw was the great gray oil perched on the

(02:57):
bed post to her feet, staring at her with his
big round eyes. He did not fly off when she
started up in bed, but only ruffled up his feathers
and said who. Minnie had never seen an hole before,
and she was not afraid, And she answered merrily, you'd
better say who who are you yourself, you queer, Old
wonder Eyes. Then she woke Biddy, who was dreadfully frightened,

(03:20):
and caught up the butler, who caught the ron and
put him in a cage. This strange bird was always
rather ill natured and gruff to everybody but Minnie. He
seemed to take kindly to her from the first, so
he was called Minnie's pet, and nobody disputed her right
to him. He would take food from her little hand
and never peck her. He would perch on her shoulder

(03:41):
and let her take him on an erring round the garden.
And sometimes he would sit and watch her, studying her lessons,
and look as wise and solemn as a learned professor,
till he would fall to winking and blinking, and go
off into a sound sleep. Many grew really fond of
this pet, grave and un socialist he was, but she
always called him by the funny name she had given

(04:04):
him first, Old Wonder Eyes. In the winter time, little
Minnie was taken ill, and she grew worse and worse
till her friends all knew that she was going to
leave them very soon. Darling little Minnie was not sorry
to die, and She had loved everybody and every creature
that God had made, as she could not help loving God,
and she was not afraid to go to him when

(04:26):
he called her. The day before she died, she gave
all her pets to her brothers and sisters, but she
said to her mother, you'd take good care of poor
old wonder Eyes, for he'll have nobody to love him
when I am gone. They all missed many very much.
Whenever he heard any one coming, he would cry who,
and when he found it wasn't his friend, he would

(04:46):
ruffle up his feathers and look as though he felt
himself insulted, and grew cross her and cross her every
day till there would have been no bearing with him
if it had not been for the memory of Mannie.
The next time I saw the old Isle sitting, staring
and growling on his perch, I understood why he was
so unhappy and solemn. My heart ached for him, but

(05:07):
so did the finger he had bitten, and I did
not venture very near to tell him how sorry I
was for him. When I think of him now, I
don't blame him, but pay him for his crossness, And
I always say to myself, poor old wonder eyes and
of old wonder eyes by mister and missus L. K. Lippincott,