"What harm can happen to you?" asked Mrs. Reed-Warbler. "You don't travel, so you're not exposed to as many dangers as the rest of us."
"One can never tell," said the duck. "I feel it in my back."
Then she paddled on and quacked to her children with her anxious old voice and wore a distressful look in her eyes.
One day something happened that set the whole pond in commotion.
The pike was suddenly hauled up out of the water.
The reed-warbler saw it himself. The pike hung and sprawled terribly at the end of a thin line, flew through the air in a great curve and fell down on the grass. At the other end of the line was a rod, and at the other end of the rod a boy, who was crimson in the face with delight at the big fish he had caught.
"It serves him right, the highwayman!" said the perch.
"Thank goodness, he's gone!" croaked the frogs.
And all the little roach and carp danced round the water with delight.