Free Beautiful Joe by Marshall Saunders

get used to other people besides himself.
    Carl
looked thoughtful, and his mother went on to say that there was no one in the
house, not even the cat, that would harm his birds.
    “You might
even charge admission for a day or two,” said Jack, gravely, “and introduce us
to them, and make a little money.”
    Carl was
rather annoyed at this, but his mother calmed him by showing him a letter she
had just gotten from one of her brothers, asking her to let one of her boys
spend his Christmas holidays in the country with him.
    “I want
you to go, Carl,” she said.
    He was
very much pleased, but looked sober when he thought of his pets. “Laura and I
will take care of them,” said his mother, “and start the new management of
them.”
    “Very
well,” said Carl, “I will go then; I’ve no young ones now, so you will not find
them much trouble.”
    I thought
it was a great deal of trouble to take care of them. The first morning after
Carl left, Billy, and Bella, and Davy, and I followed Miss Laura upstairs. She
made us sit in a row by the door, lest we should startle the canaries. She had
a great many things to do. First, the canaries had their baths. They had to get
them at the same time every morning. Miss Laura filled the little white dishes
with water and put them in the cages, and then came and sat on a stool by the
door. Bella, and Billy, and Davy climbed into her lap, and I stood close by
her. It was so funny to watch those canaries. They put their heads on one side and
looked first at their little baths and then at us. They knew we were strangers.
Finally, as we were all very quiet, they got into the water; and what a good
time they had, fluttering their wings and splashing, and cleaning themselves so
nicely.
    Then they
got up on their perches and sat in the sun, shaking themselves and picking at
their feathers.
    Miss Laura
cleaned each cage, and gave each bird some mixed rape and canary seed. I heard
Carl tell her before he left not to give them much hemp seed, for that was too
fattening. He was very careful about their food. During the summer I had often
seen him taking up nice green things to them: celery, chickweed, tender
cabbage, peaches, apples, pears, bananas; and now at Christmas time, he had
green stuff growing in pots on the window ledge.
    Besides
that he gave them crumbs of coarse bread, crackers, lumps of sugar, cuttlefish
to peck at, and a number of other things. Miss Laura did everything just as he
told her; but I think she talked to the birds more than he did. She was very
particular about their drinking water, and washed out the little glass cups
that held it most carefully.
    After the
canaries were clean and comfortable, Miss Laura set their cages in the sun, and
turned to the goldfish. They were in large glass globes on the windows eat. She
took a long-handled tin cup, and dipped out the fish from one into a basin of
water. Then she washed the globe thoroughly and put the fish back, and scattered
wafers of fish food on the top. The fish came up and snapped at it, and acted
as if they were glad to get it. She did each globe and then her work was over
for one morning.
    She went
away for a while, but every few hours through the day she ran up to Carl’s room
to see how the fish and canaries were getting on. If the room was too chilly
she turned on more heat; but she did not keep it too warm, for that would make
the birds tender.
    After a
time the canaries got to know her, and hopped gaily around their cages, and
chirped and sang whenever they saw her coming. Then she began to take some of
them downstairs, and to let them out of their cages for an hour or two every
day. They were very happy little creatures, and chased each other about the
room, and flew on Miss Laura’s head, and pecked saucily at her face as she sat
sewing and watching them. They were not at all afraid of me nor of Billy, and
it was quite a sight to see them hopping up to Bella. She looked so large
beside them.
    One little
bird