Tom Thumb and Hunca Munca went cautiously across the hearthrug. They pushed the front door — it
was not fast.
Tom Thumb and
Hunca Munca went upstairs and peeped into the dining-room. Then they squeaked with joy!
Such a lovely dinner was laid out upon the table! There were tin spoons, and lead
knives and forks, and two dolly-chairs — all so convenient!
Tom Thumb set
to work at once to carve the ham. It was a beautiful shiny yellow, streaked with red.
The knife crumpled up and hurt him; he put his finger in his mouth.
“It is not boiled enough; it is hard. You have a try, Hunca Munca.”
Hunca Munca
stood up in her chair, and chopped at the ham with another lead knife.
“It’s as hard as the hams at the cheesemonger’s,” said Hunca Munca.
The ham broke off the plate with a jerk, and
rolled under the table.
“Let it alone,” said Tom Thumb; “give me some fish, Hunca Munca!”
Hunca Munca
tried every tin spoon in turn; the fish was glued to the dish.
Then Tom Thumb lost his temper. He put the ham in the middle of the floor, and hit it
with the tongs and with the shovel — bang, bang, smash, smash!
The ham flew all into pieces, for underneath the shiny paint it was made of nothing
but plaster!
Then there was no end to the rage and
disappointment of Tom Thumb and Hunca Munca. They broke up the pudding, the lobsters, the pears and the
oranges.
As the fish would not come off the plate, they put it into the red-hot crinkly paper
fire in the kitchen; but it would not burn either.
Tom Thumb went
up the kitchen chimney and looked out at the top — there was no soot.
While Tom Thumb was up the chimney, Hunca Munca
had another disappointment. She found some tiny canisters upon the dresser, labelled — Rice — Coffee — Sago
— but when she turned them upside down, there was nothing inside except red and blue beads.
Then those mice set to work to do all the mischief
they could — especially Tom Thumb! He took Jane’s clothes out of the chest of drawers in her bedroom, and he
threw them out of the top floor window.
But Hunca Munca had a frugal mind. After pulling half the feathers out of Lucinda’s
bolster, she remembered that she herself was in want of a feather bed.
With Tom Thumb’s assistance she carried the
bolster downstairs, and across the hearthrug. It was difficult to squeeze the bolster into the mouse-hole;
but they managed it somehow.
Then Hunca Munca went back and fetched a chair, a
book-case, a bird-cage, and several small odds and ends. The book-case and the bird-cage refused to go into
the mouse-hole.
Hunca Munca
left them behind the coal-box, and went to fetch a cradle.
Hunca Munca
was just returning with another chair, when suddenly there was a noise of talking outside upon the landing.
The mice rushed back to their hole, and the dolls came into the nursery.
What a sight met the eyes of Jane and
Lucinda!
Lucinda sat upon the upset kitchen stove and stared; and Jane leant against the
kitchen dresser and smiled — but neither of them made any remark.
The book-case and the bird-cage were rescued from
under the coal-box — but Hunca Munca has got the cradle, and some of Lucinda’s clothes.
She also has some useful pots and pans, and
several other things.
The little girl that the doll’s-house belonged to,
said — “I will get a doll dressed like a policeman!”
But the nurse said — “I will set a
mouse-trap!”
So that is the story of the two Bad Mice, — but they were not so very very naughty
after all, because Tom Thumb paid for everything he broke.
He found a crooked sixpence under the hearthrug; and upon Christmas Eve, he and Hunca
Munca stuffed it into one of the stockings of Lucinda and Jane.
And very early every morning — before anybody is
awake — Hunca Munca comes with her dust-pan and her broom to sweep the Dollies’ house!
The End
FREDERICK WARNE
Published by the Penguin Group
Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand,
London WC2R
0RL, England
Website: www.peterrabbit.com
First published by Frederick Warne 1904
This electronic edition first published 2010
New reproductions copyright ©Frederick Warne & Co., 2002
Original copyright in text and illustrations ©Frederick Warne & Co., 1904
Frederick Warne & Co. is the owner of all rights, copyrights and trademarks in the Beatrix
Potter character names and illustrations.
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-72-326564-1
.
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