The Tale of Major Monkey

by Arthur Scott Bailey

"You're a Sneak-Thief!" Jasper Jay said.

Of course, the Major couldn't drill his soldiers with Johnnie Green and a half-dozen other boys on hand to watch. So the generals lurked behind trees and wished that the picnickers would go away.

Meanwhile Major Monkey himself sulked in the tree-tops, hidden high up among the leafy branches, where nobody would be likely to spy him. He watched the boys while they ate their luncheon, which they devoured as soon as they reached the picnic grove. And then he looked on while they played games—hide-and-seek, and duck-on-the-rock, and follow-my-leader, and ever so many others.

Now and then old Mr. Crow flew up and tried to talk with Major Monkey. But the Major had very little to say. And at last Mr. Crow lost all patience with him.

"Are you going to sit here all day and do nothing?" Mr. Crow demanded.

"S-sh!" Major Monkey said. "Do be quiet! Do you want them to hear you?"

"I don't care if they hear me," Mr. Crow cried. "It's plain to me that these boys will stay here all day if they're not driven away."

"No doubt!" Major Monkey agreed, as he plucked a tender shoot off the tree and ate it. "But what can we do?"