THE AMBITIOUS THRUSH
ONCE there was a thrush who lived in a tree on the borders of a field that a man sowed to cotton seed. The seed sprouted up through the ground and grew into bushes, and after a time the bushes had big, brown pods on them. Presently the pods burst open and the fluffy white cotton bulged out of them. “How nice and soft that cotton looks!” said the thrush.
She picked some of it and used it to line her nest. Never before had she slept with such ease as she did on that bed of cotton.
In her flights about the region she often passed the door of a man who made a business of carding cotton so it could be spun into thread. By carding it he disentangled the fibers, and then he formed it into small rolls and sold it to the spinners. The thrush often observed him at his work, and at length she concluded that she, also, would make some use of the cotton besides simply lining her nest with it. So again and again, every day, she would fly down among the cotton bushes, pluck out a fluff of cotton in her beak and fly away and hide it. She kept on doing this till she had quite a large heap. Then she flew to the house of the cotton-carder, and alighted in front of him. “Good day, man,” said she.
“Good day, little bird,” said the cotton-carder.
“Man,” said the thrush, “I have a heap of beautiful cotton; and you shall have half of it if you will card the rest and make it into rolls for me.”
“Very well,” said the man, “I will do as you desire. Where is your cotton?”
“Come with me, and I will show you,” said the thrush.
So she flew along ahead of the man and guided him to the place where she had hidden her hoard of cotton. The man took the cotton home and carded it and made it into rolls. Half of it he took for doing the work, and the rest he gave back to the thrush.