{"collection":"folklore-oral-tradition","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_42366/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_42366","id":"gutenberg_42366","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/42366","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Children & Young Adult Reading","Category: Science-Fiction & Fantasy","Children -- Conduct of life -- Juvenile fiction","Conduct of life -- Juvenile fiction","Fairies -- Juvenile fiction","Fairy tales","Fantasy literature","Lion -- Juvenile fiction","Selfishness -- Juvenile fiction","Temper -- Juvenile fiction"],"text":"THE COZY LION\n\nFRANCES HODGSON BURNETT\n\n\n\nThe Cozy Lion\n\nAs told by Queen Crosspatch\n\nBy\n\nFrances Hodgson Burnett\n\nAuthor of \"Little Lord Fauntleroy\"\n\nWith Illustrations by Harrison Cady\n\n\n\n\n\nThe Century Co.\n\nNew York\n\n\nCopyright, 1907, by\n\nTHE CENTURY CO.\n\nPublished October, 1907\n\nPrinted in U. S. A.\n\n\n\n\nI AM very fond of this story of the Cozy Lion because I consider\nit a great credit to me. I reformed that Lion and taught him how\nto behave himself. The grown-up person who reads this story aloud\nto children MUST know how to Roar.\n\n\n\n\nTHE COZY LION\n\nI SHALL never forget the scolding I gave him to begin with. One\nof the advantages of being a Fairy even quite a common one is\nthat Lions can't bite you. A Fairy is too little and too light.\nIf they snap at you it's easy to fly through their mouths, and\neven if they catch you, if you just get behind their teeth you\ncan make them so uncomfortable that they will beg you to get out\nand leave them in peace.\n\nOf course it was all the Lion's fault that I scolded him. Lions\nought to live far away from people. Nobody likes Lions roaming\nabout--particularly where there are children. But this Lion said he\nwanted to get into Society, and that he was very fond of children--\nlittle fat ones between three and four. So instead of living on a\ndesert, or in a deep forest or a jungle he took the large Cave on\nthe Huge Green Hill, only a few miles from a village full of the\nfattest, rosiest little children you ever saw.\n\nHe had only been living in the Cave a few days, but even in that\nshort time the mothers and fathers had found out he was there, and\neverybody who could afford it had bought a gun and snatched it up\neven if they saw a donkey coming down the road, because they were\nafraid it might turn out to be a Lion. As for the mothers, they\nwere nearly crazy with fright, and dare not let their children go\nout to play and had to shut them up in top rooms and cupboards and\ncellars, they were so afraid the Lion might be hiding behind trees\nto jump out at them. So everything was beginning to be quite\nspoiled because nobody could have any fun.\n\nOf course if they had had any sense and believed in Fairies and had\njust gone out some moonlight night and all joined hands and danced\nslowly around in a circle and sung:\n\n     Fairies pink and Fairies rose\n     Fairies dancing on pearly toes\n        We want you, Oh! we want you!\n     Fairy Queens and Fairy slaves\n     Who are not afraid of Lions' Caves\n        Please to come to help us,\n\nthen it would have been all right, because we should have come in\nmillions, especially if they finished with this verse:\n\n     Our troubles we can never tell\n     But if _you_ would come it would all be well\n        Par-tic-u-lar-ly Silverbell.\n\n\nBut they hadn't sense enough for that--of course they hadn't--_of\ncourse they hadn't_! Which shows what loonies people are.\n\nBut you see I am much nicer than _un_-fairy persons, even if I have\nlost my nice little, pink little, sweet little Temper and if I am\ncross. So when I saw the children fretting and growing pale because\nthey had to be shut up, and the mothers crying into their washtubs\nwhen they were washing, until the water slopped over, I made up my\nmind I would go and talk to that Lion myself in a way he wouldn't\nsoon forget.\n\nIt was a beautiful morning, and the Huge Green Hill looked lovely.\nA shepherd who saw me thought I was a gold and purple butterfly and\nthrew his hat at me--the idiot! Of course he fell down on his nose--\nand very right and proper too.\n\nWhen I got to the Cave, the Lion was sitting outside his door and\nhe was crying. He was one of these nasty-tempered, discontented\nLions who are always thinking themselves injured; large round tears\nwere rolling down his nose and he was sniffling. But I must say he\nwas handsome. He was big and smooth and had the most splendid mane\nand tail I ever saw.\n\nHe would have been like a King if he had had a nicer expression.\nBut there he sat sniffling.\n\n\"I'm so lonely,\" he said. \"Nobody calls. Nobody pays me any\nattention. And I came here for the Society. No one is fonder of\nSociety than I am.\"\n\nI sat down on a flowering branch near him and shouted at him,\n\"What's the use of Society when you eat it up?\" I said.\n\nHe jumped up and lashed his tail and growled but at first he could\nnot see me.\n\n\"What's it for _but_ to be eaten up?\" he roared. \"First I want it\nto entertain me and then I want it for dessert. Where are you? Who\nare you?\"\n\n\"I'm Queen Crosspatch--Queen Silverbell as was,\" I said. \"I suppose\nyou have heard of _me_?\"\n\n\"I've heard nothing good,\" he growled. \"A good chewing is what\n_you_ want!\"\n\nHe _had_ heard something about me, but not enough. The truth was he\ndidn't really believe in Fairies--which was what brought him into\ntrouble.\n\nBy this time he had seen me and he was ignorant enough to think\nthat he could catch me, so he laid down flat in the thick, green\ngrass and stretched his big paws out and rested his nose on them,\nthinking I would be taken in and imagine he was going to sleep. I\nburst out laughing at him and swung to and fro on my flowery\nbranch.\n\n\"Do you want to eat me?\" I said. \"You'd need two or three quarts of\nme with sugar and cream--like strawberries.\"\n\nThat made him so angry that he sprang roaring at my tree and\nsnapped and shook it and tore it with his claws. But I flew up into\nthe air and buzzed all about him and he got furious--just furious.\nHe jumped up in the air and lashed his tail and _thrashed_ his tail\nand CRASHED his tail, and he turned round and round and tore up the\ngrass.\n\n\"Don't be a silly,\" I said. \"It's a nice big tufty sort of tail and\nyou will only wear it out.\"\n\nSo then he opened his mouth and roared and roared. And what do you\nsuppose _I_ did? I flew right into his mouth. First I flew into his\nthroat and buzzed about like a bee and made him cough and cough and\ncough--but he couldn't cough me up. He coughed and he houghed and\nhe woughed; he tried to catch me with his tongue and he tried to\ncatch me with his teeth but I simply made myself tinier and tinier\nand got between two big fierce white double ones and took one of my\nFairy Workers' hammers out of my pocket and hammered and hammered\nand hammered until he began to have such a jumping toothache that\nhe ran leaping and roaring down the Huge Green Hill and leaping and\nroaring down the village street to the dentist's to get some\ntoothache drops. You can just imagine how all the people rushed\ninto their houses, and how the mothers screamed and clutched their\nchildren and hid under beds and tables and in coalbins, and how the\nfathers fumbled about for guns. As for the dentist, he locked his\ndoor and bolted it and barred it, and when he found _his_ gun he\npoked it out of the window and fired it off as fast as ever he\ncould until he had fired fifty times, only he was too frightened to\nhit anything. But the village street was so full of flashes and\nsmoke and bullets that Mr. Lion turned with ten big roars and\ngalloped down the street, with guns fired out of every window where\nthe family could afford to keep a gun.\n\nWhen he got to his home in the Huge Green Hill, he just laid down\nand cried aloud and screamed and kicked his hind legs until he\nscratched a hole in the floor of his cave.\n\n\"Just because I'm a Lion,\" he sobbed, \"just because I'm a poor,\nsensitive, helpless, orphan Lion nobody has one particle of\nmanners. They won't even sell me a bottle of toothache drops. And I\nwasn't going to touch that dentist--until he had cured me and\nwrapped up the bottle nicely in paper. Not a touch was I going to\ntouch him until he had done that.\"\n\nHe opened his mouth so wide to roar with grief that I flew out of\nit. I had meant to give him a lesson and I'd given him one. When I\nflew out of his mouth of course his beautiful double teeth stopped\naching. It was such a relief to him that it made quite a change in\nhis nature and he sat up and began to smile. It was a slow smile\nwhich spread into a grin even while the tear-drops hung on his\nwhiskers.\n\n\"My word! How nice,\" he said. \"It's stopped.\"\n\nI had flown to the top of his ear and I shouted down it.\n\n\"I stopped it,\" I said. \"And I began it. And if you don't behave\nyourself, I'll give you earache and that will be worse.\"\n\nBefore I had given him his lesson he would have jumped at me but\nnow he knew better. He tried to touch my feelings and make me sorry\nfor him. He put one paw before his eyes and began to sniff again.\n\n\"I am a poor sensitive lonely orphan Lion,' he said.\n\n\"You are nothing of the sort,\" I answered very sharply. \"You are\nnot poor, and heaven knows you are not sensitive, and you needn't\nbe lonely. I don't know whether you are an orphan or not--and I\ndon't care. You are a nasty, ill-tempered, selfish, biting, chewing\nthing.\"\n\n\"There's a prejudice against Lions,\" he wept. \"People don't like\nthem. They never invite them to children's parties--nice little\nfat, tender, children's parties--where they would enjoy themselves\nso much--and the refreshments would be just what they like best.\nThey don't even invite them to grown-up parties. What I want to ask\nyou is this: has _one_ of those villagers called on me since I came\nhere--even a tough one?\"\n\n\"Nice stupids they would be if they did,\" I answered.\n\nHe lifted up his right paw and shook his head from side to side in\nthe most mournful way.\n\n\"There,\" he said. \"You are just as selfish as the rest. Everybody\nis selfish. There is no brotherly love or consideration in the\nworld. Sometimes I can scarcely bear it. I am going to ask you\nanother question, and it is almost like a riddle. Who did you ever\nsee try to give pleasure to a Lion?\"\n\nI got into his ear then and shouted down it as loud as ever I\ncould.\n\n\"Who did you ever see a _Lion_ try to give pleasure to?\" I said.\n\"You just think over that. And when you find the answer, tell it to\n_me_.\"\n\nI don't know whether it was the newness of the idea, or the\nsuddenness of it, but he turned pale. Did you ever see a Lion turn\npale? I never did before and it was funny. You know people's skins\nturn pale but a Lion's skin is covered with hair and you can't see\nit, so his hair has to turn pale or else you would never know he\nwas turning pale at all. This Lion's hair was a beautiful tawny\ngolden color to begin with and first his whiskers turned white and\nthen his big mane and then his paws and then his body and last his\nlong splendid tail with the huge fluffy tuft on the end of it. Then\nhe stood up and his tail hung down and he said weakly:\n\n\"I do not know the answer to that riddle. I will go and lie down in\nmy Cave. I do not believe I have one friend in this world.\" And he\nwalked into his Cave and laid down and sobbed bitterly.\n\nHe forgot I was inside his ear and that he carried me with him. But\nI can tell you I had given him something to think of and that was\nwhat he needed. This way of feeling that nothing in the world but a\nLion has a right to be comfortable--just because you happen to be a\nLion yourself--is too _silly_ for anything.\n\nI flew outside his ear and boxed it a little.\n\n\"Come!\" I said. \"Crying won't do you any good. Are you really\nlonely--really--really--really so that it gives you a hollow\nfeeling?\"\n\nHe sat up and shook his tears away so that they splashed all about--\nsomething like rain.\n\n\"Yes,\" he answered, \"to tell the truth I am--I _do_ like Society. I\nwant friends and neighbors--and I don't only want them for dessert,\nI am a sociable Lion and am affectionate in my nature--and\nclinging. And people run as fast as they can the moment they hear\nmy voice.\" And he quite choked with the lump in his throat.\n\n\"Well,\" I snapped, \"what else do you expect?\" That overcame him and\nhe broke into another sob. \"I expect kindness,\" he said, \"and\ninvitations to afternoon teas--and g-g-arden parties----\"\n\n\"Well you won't get them,\" I interrupted, \"If you don't change your\nways. If you _eat_ afternoon teas and garden parties as though they\nwere lettuce sandwiches, you can't expect to be invited to them. So\nyou may as well go back to the desert or the jungle and live with\nLions and give up Society altogether.\"\n\n\"But ever since I was a little tiny Lion--a tiny, tiny one--I have\nwanted to get into Society. I _will_ change--I will! Just tell me\nwhat to do. And do sit on my ear and talk down it and stroke it. It\nfeels so comfortable and friendly.\"\n\nYou see he had forgotten that he had meant to chew me up. So I\nbegan to give him advice.\n\n\"The first things you will have to do will be to change your temper\nand your heart and your diet, and stop growling and roaring when\nyou are not pleased.'\n\n\"I'll do that, I'll do that,\" he said ever so quickly. \"You don't\nwant me to cut my mane and tail off, do you?\"\n\n\"No. You are a handsome Lion and beauty is much admired.\" Then I\nsnuggled quite close up to his ear and said down it, \"Did you ever\nthink how _nice_ a Lion would be if--if he were much nicer?\"\n\n\"N-no,\" he faltered.\n\n\"Did you ever think how like a great big cozy lovely dog you are?\nAnd how nice your big fluffy mane would be for little girls and\nboys to cuddle in, and how they could play with you and pat you and\nhug you and go to sleep with their heads on your shoulder and love\nyou and adore you--if you only lived on Breakfast Foods and things--\nand had a really sweet disposition?\"\n\nHe must have been rather a nice Lion because that minute he began\nto look \"kind of smiley round the mouth and teary round the\nlashes\"--which is part of a piece of poetry I once read.\n\n\"Oh! Aunt Maria!\" he exclaimed a little slangily. \"I never thought\nof that: it _would_ be nice.\"\n\n\"A Lion could be the coziest thing in the world--if he would,\" I\nwent on.\n\nHe jumped up in the air and danced and kicked his hind legs for\njoy.\n\n\"Could he! Could he! Could he?\" he shouted out. \"Oh! let me be a\nCozy Lion! Let me be a Cozy Lion! Hooray! Hooray! Hooray! I would\nlike it better than being invited to Buckingham Palace!\"\n\n\"Little children would just _flock_ to see you and play with you,\"\nI said. \"And then if they came, their mothers and fathers couldn't\nbe kept away. They would flock too.\"\n\nThe smile of joy that spread over his face actually reached his\nears and almost shook me off.\n\n\"That _would_ be Society!\" he grinned.\n\n\"The very best!\" I answered. \"Children who are _real_ darlings, and\nnot imitations, come first, and then mothers and fathers--the rest\njust straggle along anywhere.\"\n\n\"When could it begin? When could it begin?\" he panted out.\n\n\"Not,\" I said very firmly, \"until you have tried some Breakfast\nFood!\"\n\n\"Where shall I get it? Oh! Where? Oh! Where?\"\n\n\"_I_ will get it, of course,\" was my answer.\n\nThen I stood up on the very tip of his ear and put my tiny golden\ntrumpet to my lips. (And Oh! how that Lion did roll up his eyes to\ntry to catch a glimpse of me!) And I played this tune to call my\nFairy Workers:\n\n     I'm calling from the Huge Green Hill,\n        Tira-lira-lira,\n     The Lion's Cave is cool and still.\n        Tira-lira-lira.\n\n     The Lion wishes to improve\n     And show he's filled with tender love\n        And _not_ with Next Door Neighbor.\n\n\n     The Lion wishes to be good.\n     To fill him _full_ of Breakfast Food\n        Will aid him in his labor.\n\n\n     Bring Breakfast Food from far and near\n     --He'll eat a dreadful lot I fear.\n        Oh! Tira-lira-lira-la\n        And Tira-lira-ladi.\n\n\n     A Lion learning to be good\n     Needs Everybody's Breakfast Food.\n        You workers bring it--Tira-la\n        And Tira-lira-ladi.\n\n\nThen the Fairy Workers came flying in clouds. In three minutes and\nthree quarters they were swarming all over the Huge Green Hill and\ninto the Lion's Cave, every one of them with a little sack on his\ngreen back. They swarmed here and they swarmed there. Some were\ncooks and brought tiny pots and kettles and stoves and they began\nto cook Breakfast Foods as fast as lightning. The Lion sat up. (I\nforgot to say that he had turned un-pale long before this and was\nthe right color again.) And his mouth fell wide open, just with\nsurprise and amazement. What amazed him most was that one out of\nall those thousands of little Workers in their green caps and\nsmocks was the least bit afraid of him. Why, what do you think! My\nlittle Skip just jumped up and stood on the end of the Lion's nose\nwhile he asked me a question. You never saw anything as funny as\nthat Lion looking down the bridge of his nose at him until he\nsquinted awfully. He was so interested in him.\n\n\"Does he take it with sugar and cream, your Royal\nSilver-cross-bell-ness?\" Skip asked me, taking off his green cap\nand bowing low.\n\n\"Try him with it in both ways,\" I said.\n\nWhen the Workers had made a whole lot of all the kinds together\nthey poured it into a hollow stone and covered it with sugar and\ncream.\n\n\"Ready, your Highnesses!\" they all called out in chorus.\n\n\"Is that it?\" said the Lion. \"It looks very nice. How does one eat\nit? Must I bite it?\"\n\n\"Dear me, no,\" I answered. \"Lap it.\"\n\nSo he began. If you'll believe me, he simply reveled in it. He ate\nand ate and ate, and lapped and lapped and lapped and he did not\nstop until the hollow stone was quite clean and empty and his sides\nwere quite swelled and puffed out. And he looked as pleased as\nPunch.\n\n\"I never ate anything nicer in my life,\" he said. \"There was a\nSunday School picnic I once went to.\"\n\n\"A Sunday School picnic!\" I shouted so fiercely that he blushed all\nover. The very tuft on his tail was deep rose color. \"Who invited\nyou?\"\n\nHe hung his head and stammered.\n\n\"I was not exactly _invited_,\" he said, \"and didn't go _with_ the\nschool to the picnic grounds--but I should have come back with it--\nat least some of it--but for some men with guns!\"\n\nI stamped on his ear as hard as ever I could.\n\n\"Never let me hear you mention such a subject again,\" I said.\n\"Nobody in Society would speak to you if they knew of it!\"\n\nHe quite shook in his shoes--only he hadn't any shoes.\n\n\"I'll never even think of it again,\" he said. \"I see my mistake. I\napologize. I do indeed!\"\n\nNow what _do_ you suppose happened at that very minute? If I hadn't\nbeen a Fairy I should have been frightened to death. At that very\nminute I heard little children's voices singing like skylarks\nfarther down on the Huge Green Hill--actually little children a\nwhole lot of them!\n\n\"It--it sounds like the Sunday School pic----\" the Lion began to\nSay--and then he remembered he must not mention the subject and\nstopped short.\n\n\"Has your heart changed?\" I said to him. \"Are you sure it has?\"\n\n\"I think it has,\" he said meekly, \"but even if it hadn't, ma'am,\nI'm so _full_ of Breakfast Food I couldn't eat a strawberry.\"\n\nIt happened that I had my heart glass with me--I can examine hearts\nwith it and see if they have properly changed or not.\n\n\"Roll over on your back,\" I said. \"I will examine your heart now.\"\n\nAnd the little children on the Huge Green Hill side were coming\nnearer and nearer and laughing and singing and twittering more like\nskylarks than ever.\n\nHe rolled over on his back and I jumped off his ear on to his big\nchest. I thumped and listened and looked about until I could see\nhis great heart and watch it beating--thub--thub--thub--thub. It\nactually had changed almost all over except one little corner and\nas the children's voices came nearer and nearer and sounded like\nwhole nests full of skylarks let loose, even the corner was\nchanging as fast as it could. Instead of a big ugly dark red fiery\nheart, it was a soft ivory white one with delicate pink spots on\nit.\n\n\"It has changed!\" I cried out. \"You are going to be a great big\nnice soft cozy thing, and you couldn't eat a picnic if you tried--\nand you will never try.\"\n\nHe was all in a flutter with relief when he got up and stood on his\nfeet.\n\nAnd the laughing little voices came nearer and nearer and I flew to\nthe Cave door to see what _was_ happening.\n\nIt was really a picnic. And goodness! how dangerous it would have\nbeen if it had not been for me. That's the way I am always saving\npeople, you notice.\n\nThe little children in the village had grown so tired of being shut\nup indoors that about fifty of them who were too little to know any\nbetter had climbed out of windows, and slipped out of doors, and\ncrawled under things, and hopped over them, and had all run away\ntogether to gather flowers and wild Peachstrawberines, and lovely\nbig yellow Plumricots which grew thick on the bushes and in the\ngrass on the Huge Green Hill. The delicious sweet pink and purple\nIce-cream-grape-juice Melons hung in clusters on trees too high for\nthem to reach, but they thought they would just sit down under\ntheir branches and look at them and sniff and hope one would fall.\n\nAnd there they came--little plump girls and boys in white frocks\nand with curly heads--not the least bit afraid of anything:\ntumbling down and laughing and picking themselves up and laughing,\nand when they got near the Cave, one of my Working Fairies, just\nfor fun, flew down and lighted on one little girl's fat hand. She\njumped for joy when she saw him and called to the others and they\ncame running and tumbling to see what she had found.\n\n\"Oh! Look--look!\" she called out. \"What is he! What is he! He isn't\na bird--and he isn't a bee and he isn't a butterfly. He's a little\nteeny, weeny-weeny-weeny-weeny wee, and he has little green shoes\non and little green stockings, and a little green smock and a\nlittle green hat and he's laughing and laughing.\"\n\nAnd then a boy saw another in the grass--and another under a leaf,\nand he shouted out, too.\n\n\"Oh! here's another--here's another.\" And then the Workers all\nbegan to creep out of the grass and from under the leaves and fly\nup in swarms and light on the children's arms and hands and hats\nand play with them and tickle them and laugh until every child was\ndancing with fun, because they had never seen such things before in\ntheir lives.\n\nI flew back to the Lion. He was quite nervous.\n\n\"It is a picnic,\" I said. \"And now is your chance. Can you purr?\"\n\n\"Yes, I can.\" And he began to make a beautiful purring which\nsounded like an immense velvet cat over a saucer of cream.\n\n\"Come out then,\" I ordered him. \"Smile as sweetly as you can and\ndon't stop purring. Try to look like a wriggling coaxing dog--I\nwill go first and prevent the children from getting frightened.\"\n\nSo out we went. I was riding in his ear and peeping out over the\ntop of it. I did not let the children see me because I wanted them\nto look at the Lion and at nothing else.\n\nWhat I did was to make them remember in a minute all the nicest\nLions they had ever seen in pictures or in the circus. Many of them\nhad never seen a Lion at all and the few who had been to a circus\nhad only seen them in big cages behind iron bars, and with notices\nwritten up, \"Don't go near the Lions.\"\n\nWhen my Lion came out he was smiling the biggest, sleepiest,\ncurliest, sweetest smile you ever beheld and he was purring, and he\nwas softly waving his tail. He stood still on the grass a moment\nand then lay down with his big head on his paws just like a huge,\naffectionate, coaxing dog waiting and begging somebody to come and\npet him. And after staring at him for two minutes, all the children\nbegan to laugh, and then one Little _little_ girl who had a great\nmastiff for a friend at home, suddenly gave a tiny shout and\nrunning to him tumbled over his paws and fell against his mane and\nhid her face in it, chuckling and chuckling.\n\nThat was the beginning of the most splendid fun a picnic ever had.\nEvery one of them ran laughing and shouting to the Lion. It was\nsuch a treat to them to actually have a Lion to play with. They\npatted him, they buried their hands and faces in his big mane, they\nstroked him, they scrambled up on his back, and sat astride there.\nLittle boys called out, \"Hello, Lion! Hello, Lion!\" and little\ngirls kissed his nice tawny back and said \"Liony! Liony! Sweet old\nLiony!\" The Little Little Girl who had run to him first settled\ndown right between his huge front paws, resting her back\ncomfortably against his chest, and sucked her thumb, her blue eyes\nlooking very round and big. She _was_ comfy.\n\nI kept whispering down his ear to tell him what to do. You see, he\nhad never been in Society at all and he had to learn everything at\nonce.\n\n\"Now, don't move suddenly,\" I whispered. \"And be sure not to make\nany loud Lion noises. They don't understand Lion language yet.\"\n\n\"But oh! I am so happy,\" he whispered back, \"I want to jump up and\nroar for joy.\"\n\n\"Mercy on us!\" I said. \"That would spoil everything. They'd be\nfrightened to death and run away screaming and crying and never\ncome back.\"\n\n\"But this little one with her head on my chest is such a\n_sweetie_!\" he said. \"Mayn't I just give her a little lick--just a\nlittle one?\"\n\n\"Your tongue is too rough. Wait a minute,\" I answered.\n\nMy Fairy Workers were swarming all about. They were sitting in\nbunches on the bushes and hanging in bunches from branches, and\nhopping about and giggling and laughing and nudging each other in\nthe ribs as they looked on at the Lion and children. They were as\namused as they had been when they watched Winnie sitting on the\neggs in the Rook's nest. I called Nip to come to me.\n\n\"Jump on to the Lion's tongue,\" I said to him, \"and smooth it off\nwith your plane until it is like satin velvet--not silk velvet, but\nsatin velvet.\"\n\nThe Lion politely put out his tongue. Nip leaped up on it and began\nto work with his plane. He worked until he was quite hot, and he\nmade the tongue so smooth that it was _quite_ like satin velvet.\n\n\"Now you can kiss the baby,\" I said.\n\nThe Little Little Girl had gone to sleep by this time and she had\nslipped down and lay curled up on the Lion's front leg as if it was\nan arm and the Lion bent down and delicately licked her soft cheek,\nand her fat arm, and her fat leg, and purred and purred.\n\nWhen the other children saw him they crowded round and were more\ndelighted than ever.\n\n\"He's kissing her as if he was a mother cat and she was his\nkitten,\" one called out, and she held out her hand. \"Kiss me too.\nKiss me, Liony,\" she said.\n\nHe lifted his head and licked her little hand as she asked and then\nall the rest wanted him to kiss them and they laughed so that the\nLittle Little Girl woke up and laughed with them and scrambled to\nher feet and hugged and hugged as much of the Lion as she could put\nher short arms round. She felt as if he was her Lion.\n\n\"I love--oo I love oo,\" she said. \"Tome and play wiv us.\"\n\nHe smiled and smiled and got up so carefully that he did not upset\nthree or four little boys and girls who were sitting on his back.\nYou can imagine how they shouted with glee when he began to trot\ngently about with them and give them a ride. Of course everybody\nwanted to ride. So he trotted softly over the grass first with one\nload of them and then with another. When each ride was over he lay\ndown very carefully for the children to scramble down from his back\nand then other ones scrambled up. The things he did that afternoon\nreally made me admire him. A Cozy Lion is nicer to play with than\nanything else in the world. He shook Ice-cream-grape-juice Melons\ndown from the trees for them.\n\nHe carried on his back to a clear little running brook he knew,\nevery one who wanted a drink. He jumped for them, he played tag\nwith them and when he caught them, he rolled them over and over on\nthe grass as if they were kittens; he showed them how his big claws\nwould go in and out of his velvet paws like a pussy cat's. Whatever\ngame they played he would always be \"It,\" if they wanted him to.\nWhen the tiniest ones got sleepy he made grass beds under the shade\nof trees and picked them up daintily by their frocks or little\ntrousers and carried them to their nests just as kittens or puppies\nare carried by their mothers. And when the others wanted to be\ncarried too, he carried them as well.\n\nThe children enjoyed themselves so much that they forgot about\ngoing home altogether. And as they had laughed and run about every\nminute and had had _such_ fun, by the time the sun began to go down\nthey were all as sleepy as could be. But even then one little\nfellow in a white sailor suit asked for something else. He went and\nstood by the Lion with one arm around his neck and the other under\nhis chin. \"Can you roar, old Lion?\" he asked him. \"I am sure you\ncan roar.\"\n\nThe Lion nodded slowly three times.\n\n\"He says 'Yes--Yes,'\" shouted everybody, \"Oh! do roar for us as\nloud as ever you can. We won't be frightened the least bit.\"\n\nThe Lion nodded again and smiled. Then he lifted up his head and\nopened his mouth and roared and _roared_ and ROARED. They were not\nthe least bit frightened. They just shrieked and laughed and jumped\nup and down and made him do it over and over again.\n\n* * * * *\n\nNow I will tell you what had happened in the village.\n\nAt first when the children ran away the mothers and fathers were\nall at their work and did not miss them for several hours. It was\nat lunch time that the grown-ups began to find out the little folks\nwere gone and then one mother ran out into the village street, and\nthen another and then another, until all the mothers were there,\nand all of them were talking at once and wringing their hands and\ncrying. They went and looked under beds, and tables and in\ncupboards, and in back gardens and in front gardens, and they\nrushed to the village pond to see if there were any little hats or\nbonnets floating on the top of the water. But all was quiet and\nserene and nothing was floating anywhere--and there was not one\nsign of the children.\n\nWhen the fathers came the mothers all flew at them. You see it\nisn't any joke to lose fifty children all at once.\n\nThe fathers thought of the Lion the first thing, but the mothers\nhad tried not to think of him because they couldn't bear it.\n\nBut at last the fathers got all the guns and all the pistols and\nall the iron spikes and clubs and scythes and carving knives and\nold swords, and they armed themselves with them and began to march\nall together toward the Huge Green Hill. The mothers _would_ go too\nand _they_ took scissors and big needles and long hat pins and one\ntook a big pepper-pot, full of red pepper, to throw into the Lion's\neyes.\n\nThey had so much to do before they were ready that when they\nreached the Huge Green Hill the sun was going down and what do you\nthink they heard?\n\nThey heard this----\n\n\"Ro-o-a-a-arh! Ro-o-a-a-rh! Ro-o-a-a-arrh!\" almost as loud as\nthunder. And at the same time they heard the shouts and shrieks of\nthe entire picnic.\n\nBut _they_ did not know that the picnic was shouting and screaming\nfor joy.\n\nSo they ran and ran and ran--and stumbled and scrambled and hurried\nand scurried and flurried faster and faster till they had scrambled\nup the Huge Green Hill to where the Lion's Cave was and then they\ngathered behind a big clump of bushes and the fathers began to cock\ntheir guns and the mothers to sharpen their scissors and hat pins.\n\nBut the mother with the pepper-pot had nothing to sharpen, so she\npeeped from behind the bushes, and suddenly she cried out, \"Oh! Oh!\nOh! Oh! Look! Look! And don't fire a single gun, on any account.\"\n\nAnd they all struggled to the front to peep. And _this_--thanks to\nMe--_was what they saw_!\n\nOn the green places before the Lion's Cave on several soft heaps of\ngrass, the tiniest children were sitting chuckling or sucking their\nthumbs. On the grass around them a lot of others were sitting or\nstanding or rolling about with laughter and kicking up their heels--\nand right in front of the Cave there stood the Lion looking\nabsolutely angelic. His tail had a beautiful blue sash on it tied\njust below the tuft in a lovely bow, he had a sash round his waist,\nand four children on his back. The Little Little Girl was sitting\non his mane which was stuck full of flowers, and she was trying to\nput a wreath on the top of his head and couldn't get it straight,\nwhich made him look rather rakish. On one side of him stood the\nlittle boy in the sailor suit, and on the other stood a little\ngirl, and each one held him by the end of a rope of pink and white\nwild roses which they were going to lead him with.\n\nThe mother of the Little Little Girl could not wait one minute\nlonger. She ran out towards her, calling out:----\n\n\"Oh! Betsy-petsy! Oh! Betsy-petsy! Mammy's Lammy-girl!\"\n\nAnd then the other mothers threw away their scissors and hat pins\nand ran after her in a crowd.\n\nWhat that clever Lion did was to carefully lie down without\nupsetting anybody and stretch out his head on his paws as if he was\na pet poodle, and purr and purr like a velvet cat.\n\nThe picnic simply shouted with glee. It was the kind of picnic\nwhich is always shouting with glee.\n\n\"Oh! Mother! Mother! Father! Father!\" it called out. \"Look at our\nLion! Look at our Lion! We found him ourselves! He's ours.\"\n\nAnd the sailor boy shouted,\n\n\"He'll roar for me, Mother!\"\n\nAnd the rest cried out one after another,\n\n\"He'll sit up and beg for me!\"\n\n\"He'll carry me by my trousers!\"\n\n\"He can play tag!\"\n\n\"He'll show you his claws go in and out!\"\n\n\"Mother, ask him to take you on his back to get a drink.\"\n\n\"May he go home and sleep with me, Mother?\"\n\nIt was like a bedlam of skylarks let loose this time, and the Lion\nhad to do so many tricks that only determination to show how Cozy\nhe was kept up his strength. He was determined to prove to the\nFathers and Mothers that he _was_ Cozy.\n\nAnd he did it.\n\nFrom that time he was the Lion of the Village. He was invited\neverywhere. There never was a party without him. Birthday parties,\ngarden parties, tea parties, wedding parties--he went to them all.\nHis life was one round of gaiety.\n\nHe became _most_ accomplished. He could do all the things Lions do\nin Hippodromes--and a great many more. The Little Little Girl gave\nhim a flute for a present and he learned to play on it beautifully.\nWhen he had an evening at home he used to sit at his Cave door and\nplay and sing. First he played and then he sang this----\n\n\n     My Goodness Gracious Me!\n     This _is_ Socier-tee!\n     My Goodness Gracious Mercy Me!\n     This _is_ Socier-ier-tee!\n     It _is_ Socier-tee!\n\n\nHe had composed it himself.\n\n\nThe next story I shall tell you is about my Spring Cleaning. That\nwill show you how I have to work when the winter is over and how,\nif it were not for Me, things would never be swept up and made tidy\nfor the summer. The primroses and violets would NEVER be wakened,\nor the Dormice called up, or anything. It IS a busy time, I can\ntell you.","title":"The Cozy Lion: As Told by Queen Crosspatch","tradition":"folklore-oral-tradition","translated_text":null,"word_count":6518}