The Tale of Benny Badger

SLEEPY-TIME TALES (Trademark Registered) BY ARTHUR SCOTT BAILEY AUTHOR OF TUCK-ME-IN TALES (Trademark Registered) ———————
Benny doesn't like Mr. Coyote's singing.
(Trademark Registered)
Author of TUCK-ME-IN TALES (Trademark Registered) ILLUSTRATED BY HARRY L. SMITH NEW YORK GROSSET & DUNLAP PUBLISHERS Made in the United States of America
Copyright, 1919, by GROSSET & DUNLAP

Of course, Benny Badger had the best of reasons for living on the high, dry plains. There he had for neighbors plenty of ground squirrels and prairie dogs. And it is likely that he enjoyed their company much more than they did his.
If anyone had asked them, those little wild people would no doubt have confessed that they wished Benny Badger was somewhere else. But their wishes meant nothing to Benny—if he knew anything of them. Although he couldn't help noticing that his small neighbors hurried into their homes whenever they caught sight of him, Benny never took the hint and went away. On the contrary, when he spied a prairie dog or a ground squirrel disappearing into his burrow Benny was more than ready to go right in after him.
Now, the tunnels that led to the houses of those smaller folk were too small to admit anybody as bulky as Benny Badger. But that difficulty never hindered Benny. Digging was the easiest thing he did. He had a powerful body, short, stout legs, and big feet, which bore long, strong claws. And when he started to dig his way into somebody else's home he certainly did make the dirt fly.
He was so fond of digging that he even dug countless holes of his own, just for the fun it gave him—so far as anybody could find out. And if he had only left other folk's holes alone some of his neighbors would not have objected to his favorite sport. For more than one fox and coyote had been known to make his home in a hole dug by Benny Badger. And, though they never took the trouble to thank him for saving them work, they often chuckled about his odd way of having fun, and remarked among themselves that Benny must be a stupid fellow.