"Well, well, I don't understand what all the animals around here have
talked about! This is the third or fourth very old story that you
haven't heard, and when I came in here to visit this afternoon, I had an
idea that everything I might offer to tell, you had heard from some of
the others."

"Suppose you tell me what Mrs. Lioness did to Mr. Rat?" your Aunt Amy
suggested, and Mrs. Mouser began:

"Once upon a time--you can see from the beginning how old this story
is--Mr. Rat ate his way into the place where they keep animals to show
them off--a Zoological Garden, I believe Mr. Man calls it. Well, after
Mr. Rat got in he found a Mrs. Lion who was all alone, and feeling as
though she really needed company. She was just as kind to Mr. Rat as she
could be, and asked him why he didn't make his home there with her.

"'I would like to,' Mr. Rat said, 'for you seem to be a very nice kind
of a Mrs. Lion; but when Mr. Man, who owns this place, comes along, he
will kill me if he can.'

"'I would like to see Mr. Man try to hurt any one who was visiting me!'
Mrs. Lion said sharply, as she held up her paw. 'Do you see that? I
could kill Mr. Man with it in a minute if I struck him.'

"As she spoke she laid her paw on Mr. Rat in play, just to show him what
she could do, and the 'play' was so rough that the breath of life was
squeezed out of Mr. Rat in a jiffy.

"Now you might have supposed that Mrs. Lion would feel badly because she