Chirpy Cricket’s nearest relations all looked exactly like him. Everybody said that the Crickets bore a strong family resemblance to one another. But there were others—more distant cousins—that were quite unlike Chirpy. There were the Mole Crickets, who stayed in the ground and never, never came to the surface; and there were the Tree Crickets, who lived in the trees and fiddled re-teat! re-teat re-teat! until you might have thought they would get tired of their ditty.
But they never did. They seemed to like their music as much as Chirpy Cricket liked his cr-r-r-i! cr-r-r-i! cr-r-r-i!
III
THE BUMBLEBEE FAMILY
The farmyard was not the first place that Chirpy Cricket chose for his home. Before he dug himself a hole under the straw near the barn he had settled in the pasture. Although the cows seemed to think that the grass in the pasture belonged to them alone, Chirpy decided that there ought to be enough for him too, if he didn’t eat too much.
He had been living in the pasture some time before he discovered that a very musical family had come to live next door to him. They were known as the Bumblebees; and there were dozens of them huddled into a hole long since deserted by some Woodchucks that had moved to other quarters.
Although they were said to be great workers—most of them!—the Bumblebee family found plenty of time to make music. They were very fond of humming. And in the beginning Chirpy Cricket thought their humming a pleasant sound to hear, as he sat in his dark hole during the daytime.
“They’re having a party in there!” he said, the first time he noticed the droning music. “No doubt”—he added—“no doubt they’re enjoying a dance!”