Sandman's Goodnight Stories

<SPAN name="chap22"></SPAN> <h3> LITTLE PITCHER-MAN </h3> <SPAN name="img-127"></SPAN> <center> <ANTIMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-127.jpg" ALT="Little Pitcher-man" BORDER="2" width-obs="352" height-obs="180"> <H3 STYLE="width: 352px"> Little Pitcher-man </h3> </center> <p>On a pantry shelf there once lived a funny squatty-looking pitcher-man. His cap was brown and that was the top of the pitcher. His coat was yellow and his vest green.</p> <p>He was round and fat, as well as squatty, and his legs were short. He wore brown trousers (what there was of them) and white stockings and black shoes.</p> <p>But the face under the cap was what everyone noticed most; it was always laughing. Oh, I forgot to say that his hands held on to his sides as if he feared he would burst with laughing so hard.</p> <p>One day there came to the pantry to live a new dish, and when it saw the Pitcher-man it asked another dish standing by why the Pitcher-man was always laughing.</p> <p>"I do not know," replied the other dish, "but he never does anything but laugh. I have never thought to ask why."</p> <p>So the new dish waited until it was all quiet in the pantry at night, and then it asked the Pitcher-man why he laughed all the time.</p> <p>"Oh dear! I have to laugh every time I think of it," answered the Pitcher-man. "No one has ever asked me why I laughed before, and I do not know that I can stop long enough to tell you why."</p> <p>But all the other dishes gathered about him and begged him to tell his story, and at last he managed to stop laughing and talk.</p> <p>"It happened ever and ever so long ago," he said, "one moonlight night when the house was very still.</p> <p>"Mistress Puss came in through the door and looked about; then she sniffed, for you see on a platter on the shelf was a nice fish for the next day's dinner.</p> <p>"Puss walked along to the window, and just before she jumped up on the sill so she could jump on the shelf I saw a mouse run along the shelf where the fish was and jump into a pie that was cut.</p> <p>"He ran under the crust and began to nibble and, of course, did not see Puss; but when she reached the fish she gave it a pull and the tail hit the pie.</p> <p>"Oh dear! when I think of it I just have to laugh," and Pitcher-man again held his sides while he almost burst with laughing.</p> <p>"Oh, do tell us what happened!" asked the dishes, so interested they could hardly wait to hear the end of the story.</p> <p>The Pitcher-man wiped his eyes and then went on: "As I said, the tail of the fish hit the pie where the mouse was eating. That, of course, scared him and he jumped out.</p> <p>"He landed right on Puss's head and that scared her so she tumbled off the shelf, the fish on top of her.</p> <p>"Puss never knew what happened. She thought the fish was alive and ran for her life, and the mouse hustled about helter-skelter trying to find the hole in the wall, for his wits were just scared out of his head.</p> <p>"Oh dear! it was so funny, and the next day when the cook gave the fish-head to Puss she ran out of doors and cook thought she had a fit because no cat was ever known to refuse fish before.</p> <p>"But I knew what was the matter, and every time I think about it all I just have to laugh. Ha! ha! ha!"</p> <p>And that is the reason little Pitcher-man is always laughing. He cannot stop, for he always is thinking about what he saw many years ago one moonlight night in the pantry.</p> <br/><br/><br/> <div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />