“I bubble up so cool
Into the pebbly pool.
Over the edge I spill
And gallop down the hill!”
So the water became a little stream and began its long journey to the little boy’s tub. And always it wanted to run down—always down, and as it ran, it tinkled this song:
“I sing, I run,
In the shade, in the sun,
It’s always fun
To sing and to run.”
Sometimes it pushed under twigs and leaves; sometimes it made a big noise tumbling over the roots of trees; sometimes it flowed all quiet and slow through long grasses in a meadow. Once it came to the edge of a pretty big rock and over it went, splashing and crashing and dashing and making a fine, fine spray.
It sang to the little birds that took their baths in the spray. And the little birds ruffled their feathers to get dry and sang back to the little brook. “Ching-a-ree!” they sang. It sang to the bunny rabbit who got his whiskers all wet when he took a drink. It sang to the mother deer who always came to the same place and licked up some water with her tongue. To all of these and many more little wild wood things the little brook rippled its song:
“I sing, I run,
In the shade, in the sun,
It’s always fun
To sing and to run.”
But to the fish in the big dark pool under the rocks it sang so softly, so quietly, that only the fishes heard.
Now all the time that the little brook kept running down hill, it kept getting bigger. For every once in a while it would be joined by another little brook coming from another hillside spring. And, of course, the two of them were twice as large as each had been alone. This kept happening until the stream was a small river,—so big and deep that the horses couldn’t ford it any more. Then people built bridges over it, and this made the small river feel proud. Little boats sailed in it too,—canoes and sail boats and row boats. Sometimes they held a lot of little boys without any clothes on who jumped into the water and splashed and laughed and splashed and laughed.
At last the river was strong enough to carry great gliding boats, with deep deep voices. “Toot,” said the boats, “tootoot-tooooooooot!”