CHAPTER XI.
THE BARN-OWL
“In at Tommy Smith’s window the owl has a peep;
He talks to him wisely, and leaves him asleep.”
IT was just the very exact time for a little boy like Tommy Smith to have been in bed for about five minutes (your mother will know what time it was); so, of course, he had been in bed for about five minutes, and he wasn’t asleep yet. It was a beautiful night, the window was open a little at the top, and Tommy Smith was looking through it, right away to where the moon and the stars were shining. All at once a great white bird flitted across the window—so silently!—without making any noise at all. Most birds, you know, make a swishing with their wings, which you can hear when you are close to them (sometimes when a good way off too, like the peewit), but this bird made none at all.
“Oh!” cried Tommy Smith, “whatever was that?” As he said this, the great white bird flew back again, but—just fancy!—instead of passing by the window as it did before, it flew up on to it, and sat with its head inside the room, looking at Tommy Smith. “Oh, who are you?” said Tommy Smith. And yet he knew quite well that it was an owl. No other bird could have such great, round eyes, and such a funny wise-looking face.
The owl sat looking at Tommy Smith for a little while, and then he said in a very wise tone of voice, “Guess who I am.”
“I think you are the owl,” said Tommy Smith.
“That is right,” said the owl. “But what kind of owl do you think I am?”
“Oh,” said Tommy Smith, “I suppose you are the owl that says ‘Tu whit, tu whoo.’”
“I am not,” said the owl very decisively. “I have never said anything so absurd in the whole of my life. Why, what does it mean? Nothing, I should say. It has simply no meaning. What I do say is ‘Shrirr-r-r-r,’ which is very different, is it not now?”