"How are Farmer Green's chickens this fall?" Noisy Jake asked him in a loud voice, while Jasper Jay quietly amused himself by dropping hemlock seeds upon Solomon's head.

Still Solomon Owl made no remarks at all. But he was thinking deeply.

And though some people claimed that he was not nearly so wise as he looked, there were some things that he knew just as well as anyone else.

But Jasper Jay was not aware of that.

XII

SOLOMON OWL'S EYES

AFTER a while Jasper Jay saw that his friends were growing tired of teasing Solomon Owl. So he said to them suddenly, in what was for him a low voice, "Let's go hunt acorns now!" And he flew off with a pleased grin upon his face, for he hoped that he had made trouble for Noisy Jake. His friends all followed him, too, while Noisy Jake hurried on behind them, trying to overtake and pa.s.s Jasper Jay.

But he never headed Jasper all the way to the oak woods. And Jasper had a good time there, making all the noise he pleased and eating so many acorns that he made himself almost ill.... If that isn't having a good time, then somebody must be mistaken.

Now, it was quite natural for Jasper Jay to think that he had nothing to fear from Solomon Owl. To be sure, he had flown back and forth in front of Solomon's round, staring eyes; and he had dropped hemlock seeds upon Solomon's head. But he felt quite safe, because he was _sure_ Solomon Owl couldn't see him in the daylight. Furthermore, he had said hardly a word, so Solomon shouldn't know, from his voice, that Jasper was teasing him.

When he met Solomon, therefore, right after sunset that same day, as Jasper was hurrying home from the oak woods to get his night's sleep and Solomon Owl was just starting out on his nightly wanderings, Jasper spoke boldly to the big, bulky fellow.

"Good-evening, Mr. Owl!" said he. "I hope you're well, and that you had a good rest to-day."

Solomon Owl turned his head in Jasper's direction and stared at him for a moment. And then he hooted long and loud.

"I'm glad to know it," said Jasper--though he had no idea what Solomon Owl was saying.

In spite of himself, Jasper began to feel a bit uneasy. There was something terrifying in Solomon's odd cry, especially when the dark was falling fast and Jasper Jay was still some distance from home.

"Wait a moment, young fellow!" said Solomon Owl in a deep, hollow voice.

"I've something to say to you. Weren't you roaming through the woods with a crowd of rowdies this afternoon?"

Jasper Jay couldn't deny it. But he didn't want to admit it, either. So he said:

"I believe Noisy Jake led a nutting party this way."

"Ha!" exclaimed Solomon Owl. "They didn't pick any hemlock seeds, I suppose?"

"I'll ask them," Jasper Jay murmured. "And I'll let you know to-morrow."

He turned away, because he didn't care to talk any longer. His voice was too faint. And his legs felt strangely weak. For Jasper Jay was thoroughly frightened.

"Don't be in a hurry!" Solomon Owl's queer voice boomed. "Some people think I can't see in the daytime. But they're very much mistaken. And n.o.body ever dropped hemlock seeds on my head yet without my knowing it."

Jasper Jay did not wait to hear anything more. He sprang into the air and tore off through the forest, just before Solomon Owl jumped.

For a heavy gentleman who was big around the waist, Solomon Owl was surprisingly quick. But Jasper Jay was even quicker. And it was lucky for him that he left when he did, for Solomon felt very, very hungry. He had had nothing to eat since dawn.

But he made his rush in vain. Missing Jasper Jay by a few inches, he crashed head foremost into a tree before he could stop. And the pain in the top of his head made him hoot at the top of his voice. Perhaps he was angry, too.

Anyhow, to Jasper Jay the horrid cry sounded as if it were just behind him. He never knew before that he could fly so fast. And some of his friends, who saw a blue streak in the twilight, did not even recognize him.

For several days afterward, Noisy Jake, whom Jasper pa.s.sed in his headlong flight, talked about the blue lightning he had seen when he was going home from the nutting party. And since n.o.body could prove that he was mistaken, no one was so foolish as to dispute him.

And that was the way that Jasper Jay learned something about Solomon Owl's eyes--and something about manners, too.

XIII

TEASING A SINGER

THOUGH there were many feathered folk in Pleasant Valley, Jasper Jay did not care to have much to do with any except his own family. Unless he had other business that was more urgent he was always ready to join a troop of noisy blue jays bent on some mischief. But if there were none of his own kind about, Jasper usually preferred to be alone.

Strangely enough, Jasper did not even like to hear other birds singing.

He claimed that their voices were altogether too sweet.

"It's sickening to hear their songs," he used to say. "Somebody ought to put a stop to these concerts that we have to listen to all summer long." And he was always telling people that what he liked was a good, loud, jarring call, that you could hear without any trouble. "These soft, musical notes are all nonsense!" he declared.

Jasper held it to be his duty, whenever he chanced to come across one of those forest concerts, to seat himself in a nearby tree and make as much noise as he could, in order to interrupt the singing.

Of course, such actions on the part of Jasper Jay did not make the songsters of Pleasant Valley like him any better. But Jasper never minded that.

"I shall keep right on interrupting these singing societies," he said, "until I've put an end to such nuisances."

Naturally, that was only his way of looking at such matters. As for the other birds, they thought that the real nuisance was Jasper Jay.

Now, one of the finest singers in the whole neighborhood was Buddy Brown-Thrasher. Though he belonged to the Pleasant Valley Singing Society, he sang so well that he usually preferred to sing by himself, instead of attending a singing party. Each morning and each evening he would seat himself in the topmost branches of a tree near the thicket where he lived; and there he would sing his favorite song over and over again.

Often other birds some distance away would cease their own music just to enjoy his, for it was very beautiful. If a wooden Indian had roamed through the woods where Buddy Brown-Thrasher was singing, he would have stopped to listen. n.o.body could have helped doing that.

At least, n.o.body could have helped listening except Jasper Jay. In his opinion, Buddy Brown-Thrasher was the most annoying of all the feathered songsters. He often went out of his way to interrupt Buddy's evening-song. (In the morning Jasper was in too great a hurry for his breakfast to trouble himself in any such fashion.)

Well, it is not surprising that Buddy Brown-Thrasher should be upset by Jasper Jay's provoking visits. It is scarcely pleasant, when you are singing your best notes in a tree-top, to have them suddenly spoiled by a harsh _jay, jay_, and to be mocked with boisterous laughter. The time came at last when Buddy Brown-Thrasher said he couldn't stand it any longer.

"Something will have to be done!" he declared. So he put on his thinking-cap at once. Being a gentlemanly sort of person, he never once thought of _fighting_ Jasper Jay. But he felt sure that there must be some way to teach Jasper better manners. He knew, however, that there was no use of trying to reason with the rude fellow. If he had merely talked with Jasper, and asked him if he wouldn't please do differently, Buddy Brown-Thrasher would have received no more than a jeering shout in reply.

Naturally, he hoped for something more satisfactory than that.

XIV

FINDING A WAY