The Washington times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1902-1939, 1903-03-01
The Looking-GlasS Mouse
By EMIL RoESS

Now we will play that we are on a
visit to an old lady. such a nice old
lady, who lives in such a pretty little
room The old lady is sitting by the
window knitting a stocking. In the
corner near the window on a bookcase
stands a great big cage in which a
parrot sits. looking down into the
street. where the children are playing
and singing. Poor Polly can't sing, he
can only scream and whistle, and say
lots of funny things. On the bureau. IN
front Of the looking glass. stands an
other cage, and in IL sits Hansemann.
and he can sing. There is also a little
bird inside the looking glass who seems
to be singing as hard as he can.
"Teep. peep. peep," All at once
there Is n little mouse peeping out from
behind the looking glass. and pretty
soon he comes way out on the bareap.
and he looks into Hansemanns cage.
He stands on his tiptoes and stretches
his neck. so that he can see better. and
he sees that the glass is full OF food
The little mouse looks wistfully at
Hansemann and says: You have such
lot of food. and / have not a bite,'
Hansemann says nothing: he has not
even seen the hungry little mouse; he
has no time; he has TO look and look
again at the beautiful bird in the look
ing glass. But what is that? Well.
did you ever, Why. II there is not a
little mouse in the looking glass, too
Il Will have to get up on the cage
and look at him. says the little mouse
But the looking glass mouse is getting
up, too, and looks back at him. Now
our little mouse is awfuliy busy. What
is he doing? Oh. he doesn't know what
he is doing himself. but he sees very
plainly that the looking glass mouse is
sitting way down in Hansemann's dish,
eating the hemp seeds. so that the
shells hang in his mustache-
But now Polly discovers the little
mouse and begins to scream, Mother.
there is a thief, a nasty thief. a nasty
thief"
THAT ~as not me-" says the little
mouse. and then he hurries down i"to
his hole. where nobody can reach him.
1T is a shame TO have these little
mice come here and steal" says the old
lady, and she gets up and moves
sill Then she goes down into the
kitchen and brings back a mousetrap,
which she puts on the bureau. Mean
while. the little mouse is sitting with
his mother down in their dark hole,
and be says to the mamma mouse:
Now, it is so nice and light upstairs,
and there is lots of room. too; 1 guess
viii 60 up and see how Hansemann is
getting along"
Then he runs up again on the bureau.
The little mouse has never seen such
a big mouset-ap before. He looks at it
and says:
What is that? 1t must be a new kind
of a cage, but do not see any bird.
Such a nice white pine floor, and there
is both hemp seed and bacon on the
floor, but the bars are so close together
l am afraid 1 would hurt my nose if
tried to get in" The little mouse sighs,
he looks at the bacon, and says: "Oh,
my favorite dish. I must get up on that
cage and see what ] can see" And
so the little mouse gets on the cage.
There is u little round hole in the
roof. through which he looks down on
the floor; he can count the number of
seeds lying there. and he can see exactly
how big the slice OF bacon is. He
counts one, two, three, four, I'VE, six,
then he puts his finger on his nose and
says: Let me think, il there are
six big mouthfuls and / take just one
little one there will surely be six little
mouthfuls left, and besides. who can
remember just how big each slice was"
But as the little mouse is counting IL
over and over he falls in through The
hole. He goes right away for the bacon
and il tastes so good that IL is impos-
sibIe to leave even speck of it; every
bit goes down. Then he ticks the floor
where the bacon was lying. and now he
80 going right straight home. But he
can't find the door. oh, this is awful!
- is caught, Now the old lady comes
yVer to the bureau.
The old lady lifts the cage up and
looi-S a the poor little mOusie. so