Johnnie Jones and the Man Who Cried "Wolf" too Often
Some time passed by before people began to realize that Johnnie Jones was no longer a cry-baby. On that account he had a very unpleasant experience one day.
The children were playing horse on the sidewalk, and Johnnie Jones as one of the horses, was being driven by Sammy Smith. All went well until they reached a rough place in the pavement. Here Johnnie Jones tripped and fell, scraping his leg against a sharp stone, and straining and bruising his arm quite badly. It happened so quickly that none of the children saw that he was hurt, and so did not pity him when he began to cry. They were so accustomed to hear him cry over every little trouble, that they thought nothing of his crying then. If they had known he was really hurt, they would have been kind and helped him up. As it was, they merely told him not to be such a cry-baby and ran off and left him.
Just then Father came by on his way home, and when he saw Johnnie Jones leaning against the fence, crying, he thought, too, that the little boy had become a cry-baby again. If he had seen Johnnie Jones fall, he would have picked him up and carried him home in his arms; but not knowing that the little boy was really hurt, he took hold of his hand, and walked home with him. Johnnie Jones was trying his best not to cry, but I think the bravest boy in the world might not have been able to keep back the tears, with such a sore leg and arm.
As they entered the house, Mother said: "Oh little son! crying again?"
When she had heard of the accident, she told Johnnie Jones that she was sorry, and would try to help him after lunch. But as soon as she saw that he could eat nothing at all, she asked Father to carry him upstairs, where she examined the injured leg and arm. When she found them so badly scraped and bruised, she was greatly distressed.
"You poor little boy!" she exclaimed, "No one realized that you were really in pain."
After she had bathed and bandaged the leg and arm, and made Johnnie Jones comfortable, she brought his lunch up to him, and while he was eating, told him this story:
Once, a long, long time ago, there lived a man whose name has been forgotten. He lived with other men and their families out in the pasture lands, and there he tended the sheep. Now a great many wolves lived near by, which often tried to steal into the fold and carry off the sheep. Everyone kept a close watch for these wolves, and when any person saw one he would cry out, "wolf! wolf!" so that all the others might come to help him destroy it, and save the sheep. But this first man of whom I told you, liked to call "wolf!" when there was no wolf there, just to frighten or disturb the others. Sometimes he would waken the men at night by his foolish cry, and they would come running out only to find he had given a false alarm. At last these men grew weary of answering his calls. Besides, as there had been no wolves about for some little time, they were feeling quite safe.
One night, when the foolish man was keeping watch over his sheep, he saw in the distance an entire pack of wolves coming steadily toward the fold. Instantly he raised a loud cry, "WOLF! WOLF!" and waited for help.
But no help came.
The men heard his cry. but as they did not believe the wolves were really there, they remained in their beds. One man alone could not defend himself and his sheep against a pack of hungry wolves. So, next morning, he was found badly injured, and the sheep were gone. Everyone was sorry for the man, but all knew he could blame only himself. He had cried "wolf!" too often, when there was no wolf there, and so he was not believed when the wolf came at last.
"Johnnie Jones," said Mother, when she had finished the story, "you have cried so often when there was no reason for crying, that this one time when you cried because you were really hurt, no one believed you. I am very sorry for you, little son, but don't you see that it was no one's fault but your own?"