Read stories about animals. Stories about good feelings and friendliness of animals

Mikhail Prishvin “Squirrel Memory”

Today, looking at the tracks of animals and birds in the snow, this is what I read from these tracks: a squirrel made its way through the snow into the moss, took out two nuts hidden there since the fall, ate them right away - I found the shells. Then she ran ten meters away, dived again, again left a shell on the snow and after a few meters made a third climb.

What kind of miracle? It’s impossible to think that she could smell the nut through a thick layer of snow and ice. This means that since the fall I remembered about my nuts and the exact distance between them.

But the most amazing thing is that she could not measure centimeters like we did, but directly by eye she determined with precision, dived and reached. Well, how could one not envy the squirrel’s memory and ingenuity!

Mikhail Prishvin “Gadgets”

I got a speck of dust in my eye. While I was taking it out, another speck got into my other eye.

Then I noticed that the wind was carrying sawdust towards me and they immediately lay down in a path in the direction of the wind. This means that in the direction from which the wind was coming, someone was working on a dry tree.

I walked into the wind along this white path of sawdust and soon saw that these were the two smallest tits, nuts, gray with black stripes on their plump white cheeks, working with their noses on the dry wood and getting insects for themselves in the rotten wood. The work went on so briskly that before my eyes the birds went deeper and deeper into the tree. I patiently looked at them through binoculars, until finally only the tail of one nut was visible. Then I quietly walked in from the other side, crept up and covered the place where the tail was sticking out with my palm. The bird in the hollow did not make a single movement and immediately seemed to die. I accepted the palm, touched the tail with my finger - it lay there, not moving; I stroked my finger along the back - it lies like a dead woman. And another nut sat on a branch two or three steps away and squeaked.

One could guess that she was trying to persuade her friend to lie as quietly as possible. “You,” she said, “lie down and be silent, and I’ll squeak next to him, he’ll chase me, I’ll fly, and then don’t yawn.”

I didn’t bother torturing the bird, I stepped aside and watched what would happen next. I had to stand for quite a long time, because the loose nut saw me and warned the prisoner: “Better lie down a little, otherwise he’s standing not far away and watching.”

I stood like that for a very long time, until finally the loose nut squeaked in a special voice, as I guess:

- Get out, there’s nothing you can do: it’s worth it.

The tail disappeared. A head appeared black stripe on the cheek. Squeaked:

- Where is he?

“There it is,” squeaked another, “see?”

“Ah, I see,” the captive squeaked.

And she fluttered out.

They flew away only a few steps and probably managed to whisper to each other:

- Let's see, maybe he left.

We sat on the top branch. We took a closer look.

“It’s worth it,” said one.

“It’s worth it,” said another.

And they flew away.

Mikhail Prishvin "Bear"

Many people think that you can only go into the forest, where there are a lot of bears, and so they will pounce and eat you, and all that will be left of the goat are legs and horns.

This is so untrue!

Bears, like any animal, walk through the forest with great caution, and, when they smell a person, they run away from him so much that not only the whole animal, but you won’t even see a glimpse of its tail.

Once in the north they showed me a place where there were a lot of bears. This place was in the upper reaches of the Koda River, which flows into Pinega. I didn’t want to kill the bear at all, and it wasn’t the time to hunt for it: they hunt in winter, but I came to Koda in early spring, when the bears had already left their dens.

I really wanted to catch the bear eating, somewhere in a clearing, or fishing on the river bank, or on vacation. Having a weapon just in case, I tried to walk through the forest as carefully as animals, hiding near warm tracks; more than once it seemed to me that I even smelled a bear... But this time, no matter how much I walked, I was never able to meet the bear itself.

It finally happened, my patience ran out, and the time had come for me to leave.

I headed to the place where I had hidden the boat and food.

Suddenly I see: a large spruce paw in front of me trembled and swayed.

“Some kind of animal,” I thought.

Taking my bags, I got into the boat and sailed away.

And just opposite the place where I got into the boat, on the other bank, very steep and high, a commercial hunter lived in a small hut.

After about an hour or two, this hunter rode his boat down the Koda, caught up with me and found me in that hut halfway where everyone stops.

It was he who told me that from his shore he saw a bear, how it flew out of the taiga just opposite the place from where I went to my boat.

It was then that I remembered how, in complete calm, the spruce legs swayed in front of me.

I felt annoyed with myself for making noise to the bear. But the hunter also told me that the bear not only escaped my sight, but also laughed at me... It turns out that he ran very close to me, hid behind the turnout and from there, standing on his hind legs, watched me: and how I came out of the forest, and how I got into the boat and swam. And then, when I closed myself off to him, he climbed a tree and watched me for a long time as I descended the Code.

“So long,” said the hunter, “that I got tired of watching and went to the hut to drink tea.”

I was annoyed that the bear laughed at me.

But it’s even more annoying when various talkers scare children with forest animals and imagine them in such a way that if you show up in the forest without a weapon, they will leave you with only horns and legs.

Konstantin Ushinsky “Chicken and ducklings”

The owner wanted to raise ducks. She bought duck eggs, put them under the chicken and is waiting for her ducklings to hatch.

The hen sits on the eggs, sits patiently, comes down for a while to peck at the food and then returns to the nest.

The hen has hatched her ducklings, is happy, clucks, leads them around the yard, tears up the ground - looking for food for them.

One day a hen and her brood went outside the fence and reached a pond. The ducklings saw the water, they all ran to it, one after another they started swimming.

The poor chicken runs along the shore, screams, calls the ducklings to her - she is afraid that they will drown. And the ducklings are happy about the water, they swim, dive and don’t even think about going ashore.

The housewife barely managed to get the chicken away from the water.

Konstantin Ushinsky “Swallow”

In the fall, the boy wanted to destroy the swallow’s nest stuck under the roof, in which the owners were no longer there: sensing the approach of cold weather, they flew away.

“Don’t ruin your nest,” the father told the boy. “In the spring the swallow will fly again, and she will be pleased to find her former home.”

The boy obeyed his father.

Winter passed, and at the end of April a pair of sharp-winged, beautiful birds, cheerful and chirping, flew in and began to fly around the old nest. Work began to boil, swallows carried clay and silt from a nearby stream in their noses, and soon the nest, which had deteriorated a little over the winter, was refinished. Then the swallows began to carry either fluff, then a feather, or a stalk of moss into the nest.

A few more days passed, and the boy noticed that only one swallow was flying out of the nest, and the other remained in it constantly.

“Apparently, she put on the testicles and is now sitting on them,” the boy thought.

In fact, after three weeks, tiny heads began to peek out of the nest. How glad the boy was now that he had not ruined the nest!

Sitting on the porch, he spent hours watching how caring birds flew through the air and caught flies, mosquitoes and midges. How quickly they scurried back and forth, how tirelessly they obtained food for their children! The boy marveled at how the swallows did not get tired of flying all day long, without sitting down for almost a single minute, and expressed his surprise to his father.

The father took out a stuffed swallow and showed it to his son:

- Look how long, large wings and tail the swallow has, in comparison with its small, light body and such tiny legs that it has almost nothing to sit on, which is why it can fly so fast and for a long time. If the swallow could speak, then it would tell you such wonders - about the southern Russian steppes, about the Crimean mountains. Covered with grapes, about the stormy Black Sea, which she had to fly through without sitting down even once, about Asia Minor, where everything bloomed and turned green. When we already had snow, about the blue Mediterranean Sea, where she had to relax once or twice on the islands, about Africa, where she built her nest and caught midges when we had Epiphany frosts.

“I didn’t think swallows fly so far,” said the boy.

“And not just swallows,” the father continued. - Larks, quails, blackbirds, cuckoos, wild ducks, geese and many other birds, which are called migratory, also fly away from us to warm countries for the winter. For some, the warmth that happens in winter in southern Germany and France is enough; others need to fly over high snowy mountains to take refuge for the winter in the blooming lemon and orange groves of Italy and Greece; others need to fly even further, across the entire Mediterranean Sea in order to bring out and feed their children somewhere on the banks of the Nile.

“Why don’t they stay in warm countries the whole year,” asked the boy, “if it’s so good there?”

“Apparently they don’t have enough food for the children, or maybe it’s too hot.” But here's what you

Marvel: how do swallows, flying thousands of four miles, find their way to the very house where they have built their nest?

Konstantin Ushinsky “Leshy”

The inhabitants of one secluded village were in great anxiety, especially the women and children. In their favorite nearby forest, where boys and girls were constantly snooping, now for berries, now for mushrooms, there was a goblin. As soon as night falls, laughter, whistling, meowing will go through the forest, and from time to time terrible screams are heard, as if someone is being strangled. When he starts screaming and laughing, his hair stands on end. Children, not only at night, but also during the day, were afraid to go to their favorite forest, where previously all they could hear was the singing of nightingales and the lingering cries of orioles. At the same time, young chickens, ducks and goslings began to disappear around the village more often than before.

One young peasant, Yegor, finally got tired of it.

“Wait, women,” he said, “I’ll bring you the devil alive.”

Yegor waited until evening, took a bag and a gun and went into the forest, despite the requests of his cowardly wife. He wandered in the forest all night, his wife did not sleep all night and listened in horror as the goblin laughed and howled until daylight.

Only in the morning did Yegor appear from the forest. He was carrying something large and living in a bag, one of Yegor’s hands was wrapped in a rag, and blood was visible on the rag. The whole village came running to the brave peasant’s yard and watched, not without fear, as he shook out of a bag some unprecedented bird, shaggy, with red ears. big eyes. She clicks her crooked beak, moves her eyes, and tears at the ground with sharp claws; Crows, magpies and jackdaws, as soon as they saw the monster, began to rush over it, raising a terrible cry and uproar.

- Owl! - one old man shouted here. - After all, I told you, stupid ones, that the owl was doing all this mischief.

Konstantin Ushinsky “Viper”

Around our farm, in the ravines and wet places, there were many snakes. I’m not talking about snakes: we are so used to the harmless snake that we don’t even call it a snake. He has small sharp teeth in his mouth, he catches mice and even birds and, perhaps, can bite through the skin; but there is no poison in these teeth, and the snake’s bite is completely harmless. We had a lot of snakes; especially in the piles of straw that lay near the threshing floor: as soon as the sun warms them, they will crawl out of there; They hiss when you approach, they show their tongue or sting, but it’s not the sting that snakes bite. Even in the kitchen there were snakes under the floor, and when the children would sit on the floor and slurp milk, they would crawl out and pull their heads towards the cup, and the children would hit them on the forehead with a spoon.

But we also had more than just snakes: there was also a poisonous snake, black, large, without those yellow stripes that are visible near the head of a snake. We call such a snake a viper. The viper often bit cattle, and if they didn’t have time, they used to call old grandfather Okhrim from the village, who knew some medicine against the bite poisonous snakes, then the cattle will certainly fall - it will swell, poor, like a mountain. One of our boys died from a viper. She bit him near the shoulder, and before Okhrim arrived, the swelling spread from his arm to his neck and chest: the child began to delirium, toss about, and two days later he died. As a child, I heard a lot about vipers and was terribly afraid of them, as if I felt that I would have to meet a dangerous reptile.

They mowed it behind our garden, in a dry ravine, where in the spring a stream runs every year, but in the summer it is only damp and tall, thick grass grows. Every mowing was a holiday for me, especially when the hay was raked into stacks. Here, it happened, you would start running around the hayfield and throw yourself into the haystacks with all your might and wallow in the fragrant hay until the women chased you away so that you wouldn’t break the haystack.

That’s how this time I ran and tumbled: there were no women, the mowers had gone far away, and only our big black dog Brovko was lying on a haystack and gnawing on a bone.

I somersaulted into one heap, turned around in it twice and suddenly jumped up in horror. Something cold and slippery brushed my hand. The thought of a viper flashed through my head - so what? The huge viper, which I had disturbed, crawled out of the hay and, rising on its tail, was ready to attack me.

Instead of running, I stand petrified, as if the reptile had fascinated me with its lidless, unblinking eyes.

Another minute and I would have died; but Brovko, like an arrow, flew off the hay, rushed at the snake, and a mortal struggle ensued between them.

The dog tore the snake with its teeth and trampled it with its paws; the snake bit the dog in the face, chest, and stomach. But a minute later, only scraps of the viper lay on the ground, and Brovko began to run and disappeared.

But the strangest thing is that from that day on Brovko disappeared and wandered in an unknown place.

Only two weeks later he returned home: thin, scrawny, but healthy.

My father told me that dogs know the herb that they use to treat viper bites.

Leo Tolstoy "Swans"

Swans flew in a herd from the cold side to warm lands. They flew across the sea. They flew day and night, and another day and another night, without resting, they flew over the water. There was a full month in the sky, and the swans saw blue water far below them. All the swans were exhausted, flapping their wings; but they did not stop and flew on. Old, strong swans flew in front, and those who were younger and weaker flew behind. One young swan flew behind everyone. His strength weakened. He flapped his wings and could not fly any further. Then he, spreading his wings, went down. He descended closer and closer to the water; and his comrades further and further became whiter in the monthly light. The swan descended onto the water and folded its wings. The sea rose beneath him and rocked him. A flock of swans was barely visible as a white line in the bright sky. And in the silence you could barely hear the sound of their wings ringing. When they were completely out of sight, the swan bent its neck back and closed its eyes. He did not move, and only the sea, rising and falling in a wide strip, raised and lowered him. Before dawn, a light breeze began to sway the sea. And the water splashed into the white chest of the swan. The swan opened his eyes. The dawn reddened in the east, and the moon and stars became paler. The swan sighed, stretched out its neck and flapped its wings, rose up and flew, clinging to the water with its wings.

He rose higher and higher and flew alone over the dark, rippling waves.

Vitaly Bianchi "Snow Book"

They wandered around and were followed by animals in the snow. You won’t immediately understand what happened here.

To the left, under a bush, a hare trail begins. The trail from the hind legs is elongated and long; from the front - round, small.

A hare trail followed across the field. On one side of it there is another footprint, a larger one; There are holes in the snow from claws - a fox track. And on the other side of the hare’s trail there is another trail: also a fox’s, only it leads back. The hare circled the field; fox too. The hare to the side - the fox behind him.

Both tracks end in the middle of a field.

But to the side there is another hare trail. It disappears, goes on... It goes, goes, goes - and suddenly it breaks off - as if it went underground! And where it disappeared, the snow was crushed there, and it was as if someone had smeared it with their fingers.

Where did the fox go? Where did the hare go? Let's sort it by warehouse. There is a bush. The bark has been torn off. It’s trampled under the bush, followed. Rabbit tracks. Here the hare was fattening: he was gnawing bark from a bush. Will stand on hind legs, he will tear off a piece with his teeth, chew it, step over with his paws, and tear off another piece nearby.

I was full and wanted to sleep. I went looking for somewhere to hide.

And here is a fox trail, next to a hare one. It was like this: the hare went to sleep. An hour passes, then another. A fox is walking through the field. Look, a hare's footprint in the snow! Fox nose to the ground. I sniffed - the trail was fresh!

She ran along the trail. The fox is cunning, and the hare is not simple: he knew how to confuse his trail. He galloped and galloped across the field, turned, turned a large loop, crossed his own trail - and to the side.

The trail is still smooth, unhurried: the hare walked calmly, without sensing trouble.

The fox ran and ran and saw: there was a fresh trail across the trail. I didn’t realize that the hare had made a noose.

She turned sideways - following a fresh trail; runs, runs - and stops: the trail is broken! Where to now?

And the point is simple: this is a new bunny trick - deuce.

The hare made a loop, crossed its trail, walked a little forward, and then turned around and back along its trail.

He walked carefully, foot to foot.

The fox stood, stood, and then went back. I came to the crossroads again. I tracked down the whole loop.

She walks, walks, sees that the hare has deceived her, the trail leads nowhere!

She snorted and went into the forest about her business.

And it was like this: the hare made a deuce - he walked back along his trail.

I didn’t reach the loop and waved through the snowdrift to the side.

He jumped over a bush and lay down under a pile of brushwood.

He lay there while the fox followed his trail.

And when the fox left, he burst out from under the brushwood and into the thicket!

Jumps wide - paws to paws: racing trail.

He rushes without looking back. Stump on the road. The hare is passing by. And on the stump... And on the stump sat a big eagle owl.

I saw a hare, took off, and followed him. He caught up and hit me in the back with all his claws!

The hare poked into the snow, and the eagle owl settled in, beat the snow with its wings, and lifted it off the ground.

Where the hare fell, the snow was crushed there. Where the owl flapped its wings, there were marks in the snow from feathers, as if from fingers.

Vitaly Bianki "Terenty-Teterev"

He lived in the forest Teterev, his name was Terenty.

In the summer he had a good time: he hid in the grass, in the thick foliage from evil eyes. And winter has come, the bushes and trees have fallen off - and there is nowhere to hide.

So the forest animals, angry, began to argue about who would get Terenty-Teterev for dinner now. The fox says - to her. The marten says - to her.

Fox says:

- Terenty will sit down to sleep on the ground, in the bush. In the summer you can’t see him in the bush, but now here he is. I earn a living from below, I will eat it.

And Kunica says:

- No, Terenty will sit down to sleep on a tree. I make a living at the top, I’ll eat it.

Terenty-Teterev heard their argument and got scared. He flew to the edge of the forest, sat on the top of his head, and let’s think about how to deceive the evil animals.

If you sit on a tree, the marten will catch you; if you fly to the ground, the fox will grab you. Where to spend the night?

I thought and thought and thought and thought, but came up with nothing and dozed off.

He dozed off and in his dream he saw that he was not sleeping on a tree, not on the ground, but in the air. A marten can’t reach it from a tree, and a fox can’t reach it from the ground: if you just tuck your legs under you, it won’t even be able to jump.

Terenty tucked his legs in his sleep and banged from a branch!

And the snow was deep, soft, like fluff. The Fox sneaks silently along it. He runs to the edge of the forest. And above, along the branches, the Marten is jumping and also to the edge. Both are in a hurry after Terenty-Teterev.

So Marten was the first to gallop up to the tree and look at all the trees, climb all the branches - no Terenty!

“Oh,” he thinks, “I’m late! Apparently he was sleeping on the ground in a bush. The fox probably got it."

And the Fox came running, looked around the entire edge of the forest, climbed all the bushes - no Terenty!

“Oh,” he thinks, “I’m late! Apparently he was sleeping in a tree. The marten apparently got it."

The Fox raised her head, and Marten - there she was: sitting on a branch, baring her teeth.

The fox got angry and shouted:

“You ate my Terenty, here I am for you!”

And Marten to her:

“You ate it yourself, and you’re talking about me.” Here I am for you!

And they started to fight. They fight hotly: the snow melts under them, shreds fly.

Suddenly - bang-ta-ta-tah! - Something black will come out from under the snow!

The Fox and the Marten are in their heels with fear. They rushed in different directions: Marten - into a tree, Fox - into the bushes.

And it was Terenty-Teterev who jumped out. He fell from a tree and fell asleep in the snow. Only the noise and the fight woke him up, otherwise he would probably be asleep right now.

Since then, all the black grouse sleep in the snow in the winter: they are warm and comfortable there and safe from evil eyes.

Vitaly Bianchi "Masters without an axe"

They gave me a riddle: “The hut was built without hands, without an axe.” What's happened?

It turns out it's a bird's nest.

I looked - right! Here is a magpie's nest: like a log, everything is made of branches, the floor is smeared with clay, covered with straw, in the middle is the entrance; roof made of branches. Why not a hut? And the magpie never held an ax in her paws.

Here I deeply felt sorry for the bird: it is difficult, oh how difficult it is, for them, the unfortunate ones, to build their homes without hands, without an axe! I began to think: what can I do here, how can I help them?

You can't help them.

But an ax... You can get an ax for them.

I took out a hatchet and ran into the garden.

Lo and behold, a nightjar is sitting on the ground between the hummocks. Me to him:

- Nightjar, nightjar, is it difficult for you to make nests without hands, without an axe?

- And I don’t even build nests! - says the nightjar. “Look where I’m hatching my eggs.”

A nightjar fluttered up, and under it there was a hole between the hummocks. And in the hole lie two beautiful marble eggs.

“Well,” I think to myself, “this doesn’t need either hands or an axe. I managed to get along without them.”

He ran out to the river. Look, there the titmouse is jumping along the branches and bushes, collecting fluff from the willow with its thin nose.

- What do you need fluff, remez? - I ask.

“I’m making a nest out of it,” he says. “My nest is downy, soft, like your mitten.”

“Well,” I think to myself, “this little hatchet doesn’t need anything either - collecting fluff...”

He ran to the house. Lo and behold, a killer whale swallow is busy under the ridge, making a nest. He crushes clay with his nose, chops it in the river with his nose, carries it with his nose.

“Well,” I think, “and my little hatchet has nothing to do with it. And it’s not worth showing it.”

What a lovely nest: the outside is decorated with green moss, the inside is smooth as a cup.

- How did you make such a nest for yourself? - I ask. - How did you decorate it so well inside?

“I made it with my paws and nose,” answers the song thrush. — I coated everything inside with cement made from wood dust and my own spittle.

“Well,” I think, “I ended up in the wrong place again. We need to look for birds that do carpentry.”

And I hear: “Knock-knock-knock! Knock-knock-knock-knock!” - from the forest.

I'm going there. And there's a woodpecker.

He sits on a birch tree and does carpentry, makes himself a hollow to take the children out.

- Woodpecker, woodpecker, stop poking your nose! Guess I've had a headache for a long time. Look what kind of instrument I brought you: a real axe!

The woodpecker looked at the ax and said:

“Thank you, but I don’t need your instrument.” I’m fine with carpentry anyway: I hold myself up with my paws, lean on my tail, bend in half, swing my head, and hit my nose! Only splinters and dust fly!

The woodpecker confused me: apparently all birds are masters without an axe.

Then I saw an eagle's nest. A huge pile of thick branches on the tallest pine tree in the forest.

“Here,” I think, someone needs an ax to chop branches!

I ran up to that pine tree and shouted:

- Eagle, eagle! And I brought you an axe!

Discord and the eagle wings and screams:

- Thank you, boy! Throw your ax into the pile. I’ll pile more branches on it - it will be a strong building, a good nest.

Vitaly Bianki “Kuzyar-Chipmunk and Inoyka-Bear”

Before, Kuzyar-Chipmunk was all yellow, like a pine nut without a shell. He lived - he was not afraid of anyone, he did not hide from anyone, he ran wherever he wanted. Yes, once at night I argued with Inoika the Bear. And the small ones with the big ones - you know how to argue: even if you argue, you lose.

They had a dispute: who is first in the morning? Sunbeam will he see?

So they climbed onto the hillocks and sat down.

Monk-Bear sat down facing the direction where the sun would rise from behind the forest in the morning. And Kuzyar-Chipmunk sat down facing where the sun set behind the forest in the evening. They sat back to back and sat and waited.

Before Kuzyar-Chipmunk high mountain rises. In front of Inoyka-Bear lies a smooth valley.

Foreign Bear thinks:

“What a stupid Kuzyar! Where did you sit down? You won’t see the sun there until evening.”

They sit, remain silent, and do not close their eyes.

Now the night began to brighten and the sky became clear.

In front of the Inoyka-Bear a black valley lies, and the sky above it brightens, brightens, brightens...

The foreigner thinks:

“Now the first ray of light will fall on the valley, and I won. Right now..."

But no, there is still no ray. Inoika is waiting, waiting...

Suddenly Kuzyar-Chipmunk shouts behind him:

- I see, I see! I am the first!

The Inoyka-Bear was surprised: in front of him the valley was still dark.

He turned over his shoulder, and behind him the tops of the mountains were burning like the sun and shining like gold!

And Kuzyar-Chipmunk dances on his hind legs - he rejoices.

Oh, how annoying Inoika-Bear became! You bet on the kid!

He quietly extended his paw - whoop! - by the collar of Kuzyar-Chipmunk, so that he wouldn’t dance or tease him.

Yes, Kuzyar-Chipmunk rushed, and all five bear claws ran down his back. Five straps were torn out from head to tail.

Kuzyar-Chipmunk slipped into the hole. He healed and licked his wounds. But the marks from the bear claws remained.

From then on, Kuzyar-Chipmunk became timid. He runs away from everyone, through hollows, and hides in burrows. All you will see is: five black straps flash on the back - and it’s gone.

Vitaly Bianchi “Small, but mighty”

Genka walked through the swamp. Look, it's coming out of the reeds.

He grabbed the nose and pulled out the bird: the neck was long, the nose was long, the legs were long—it looked like a heron, but as tall as a jackdaw.

“Chick!” - thinks. I put it in my bosom and ran home.

At home, he let the heron fall on the floor and fell asleep himself.

“Tomorrow,” he thinks, “I’ll feed you.”

In the morning, I lowered my legs from the bed and began to pull on my pants. And the heron saw the finger and thought it was a frog. Yes bale with your nose!

- Oh oh! - Genka shouts. - You fight! Zhuchka, Zhuchka, here!

Bug on a heron, heron on a Bug. With his nose, like scissors, he cuts and stabs - only the wool flies.

The bug tucked its tail and tore. The heron behind her on straight legs, like on knitting needles, scratches and scratches - get out of the way, watch out!

Genka after the heron. Yes, where is it: a heron flap-flop its wings - and through the fence.

Genka opened his mouth:

- That's it, little bird! Small and smart...

And the heron was an adult, only of such a small breed.

She flew to her swamp - there the chicks in her nest were hungry for a long time, their mouths were open, asking for frogs.

Vasily Sukhomlinsky “Old Dog”

The Man had a faithful friend - the Dog. For many years he guarded the Man's household.

Years passed. The dog got old and began to see poorly.

One day on a clear summer day he did not recognize his owner.

When the owner returned from the field, he ran out of his booth and barked as if at a stranger.

The owner was surprised and asked:

“So you don’t recognize me anymore?”

The dog wagged his tail guiltily. He poked his leg and whined softly. He wanted to say: forgive me, and I don’t know how it happened that I didn’t recognize you! A few days later, the Man brought a small Puppy from somewhere.

He built another, small one next to the old Dog’s booth, and said to the Puppy:

- Live here.

The Old Dog asked the Man:

- Why do you need another dog?..

“So that you don’t get bored,” said the Man and affectionately patted the old Dog on the back.

Then the Man turned, sighed quietly and left.

The dog could not sigh, he whined pitifully, and a tear rolled down from one of his eyes to the ground.

And the Puppy was tumbling and playing on the grass.

Konstantin Paustovsky "Hare's Paws"

Vanya Malyavin came to the veterinarian in our village from Lake Urzhenskoe and brought a small warm hare wrapped in a torn cotton jacket. The hare was crying and blinking his eyes red from tears often...

-Are you crazy? - the veterinarian shouted. “Soon you’ll be bringing mice to me, you bastard!”

“Don’t bark, this is a special hare,” Vanya said in a hoarse whisper. - His grandfather sent him and ordered him to be treated.

- What to treat for?

— His paws are burned.

The veterinarian turned Vanya to face the door, pushed him in the back and shouted after him:

- Go ahead, go ahead! I don't know how to treat them. Fry it with onions and grandpa will have a snack.

Vanya didn’t answer. He went out into the hallway, blinked his eyes, sniffed and buried himself in the log wall. Tears flowed down the wall. The hare quietly trembled under his greasy jacket.

- What are you doing, little one? - the compassionate grandmother Anisya asked Vanya; she took her only goat to the vet. “Why are you two shedding tears, dear ones?” Oh what happened?

“He’s burned, grandpa’s hare,” Vanya said quietly. “He burned his paws in a forest fire, he can’t run.” Look, he's about to die.

“Don’t die, darling,” Anisya muttered. “Tell your grandfather that if he really wants the hare to go out, let him take him to the city to see Karl Petrovich.”

Vanya wiped his tears and walked home through the forests, to Lake Urzhenskoe. He did not walk, but ran barefoot along the hot sandy road. A recent forest fire went north near the lake. It smelled of burning and dry cloves. It grew in large islands in the clearings.

The hare moaned.

Vanya found fluffy leaves covered with soft silver hair along the way, tore them out, put them under a pine tree and turned the hare around. The hare looked at the leaves, buried his head in them and fell silent.

-What are you doing, gray? - Vanya asked quietly. - You should eat.

The hare was silent.

The hare moved his ragged ear and closed his eyes.

Vanya took him in his arms and ran straight through the forest - he had to quickly let the hare drink from the lake.

There was unheard-of heat over the forests that summer. In the morning, strings of white clouds floated in. At noon, the clouds quickly rushed upward, towards the zenith, and before our eyes they were carried away and disappeared somewhere beyond the boundaries of the sky. The hot hurricane had been blowing for two weeks without a break. The resin flowing down the pine trunks turned into amber stone.

The next morning the grandfather put on clean boots and new bast shoes, took a staff and a piece of bread and wandered into the city. Vanya carried the hare from behind. The hare became completely silent, only occasionally shuddering with his whole body and sighing convulsively.

The dry wind blew up a cloud of dust over the city, soft as flour. Chicken fluff, dry leaves and straw were flying in it. From a distance it seemed as if a quiet fire was smoking over the city.

The market square was very empty and hot; The carriage horses were dozing near the water shed, and they had straw hats on their heads.

Grandfather crossed himself.

- Either a horse or a bride - the jester will sort them out! - he said and spat.

They asked passersby for a long time about Karl Petrovich, but no one really answered anything. We went to the pharmacy. A fat old man in pince-nez and a short white robe shrugged his shoulders angrily and said:

- I like it! Quite a strange question! Karl Petrovich Korsh, a specialist in childhood diseases, has stopped accepting patients for three years now. Why do you need it?

The grandfather, stuttering from respect for the pharmacist and from timidity, told about the hare.

- I like it! - said the pharmacist. — There are some interesting patients in our city. I like this great!

He nervously took off his pince-nez, wiped it, put it back on his nose and stared at his grandfather. Grandfather was silent and stood still. The pharmacist was also silent. The silence became painful.

- Poshtovaya street, three! — the pharmacist suddenly shouted in anger and slammed some disheveled thick book shut. - Three!

Grandfather and Vanya reached Pochtovaya Street just in time - a high thunderstorm was setting in from behind the Oka River. Lazy thunder stretched across the horizon, like a sleepy strongman straightening his shoulders and reluctantly shaking the ground.

Gray ripples went down the river. Silent lightning surreptitiously, but swiftly and strongly struck the meadows; Far beyond the Glades, a haystack that they had lit was already burning. Large drops of rain fell on the dusty road, and soon it became like the surface of the moon: each drop left a small crater in the dust.

Karl Petrovich was playing something sad and melodic on the piano when his grandfather’s disheveled beard appeared in the window.

A minute later Karl Petrovich was already angry.

“I’m not a veterinarian,” he said and slammed the lid of the piano. Immediately thunder roared in the meadows. “All my life I’ve been treating children, not hares.”

“A child, a hare, it’s all the same,” muttered the grandfather stubbornly. - It’s all the same! Heal, show mercy! Our veterinarian has no jurisdiction over such matters. He horse-rided for us. This hare, one might say, is my savior: I owe him my life, I must show gratitude, but you say - quit!

A minute later, Karl Petrovich, an old man with gray ruffled eyebrows, worriedly listened to his grandfather’s stumbling story.

Karl Petrovich eventually agreed to treat the hare. The next morning, the grandfather went to the lake, and left Vanya with Karl Petrovich to go after the hare.

A day later, the entire Pochtovaya Street, overgrown with goose grass, already knew that Karl Petrovich was treating a hare that had been burned in a terrible forest fire and had saved some old man. Two days later everyone already knew about it Small town, and on the third Day a long young man in a felt hat came to Karl Petrovich, introduced himself as an employee of a Moscow newspaper and asked for a conversation about the hare.

The hare was cured. Vanya wrapped him in a cotton rag and took him home. Soon the story about the hare was forgotten, and only some Moscow professor spent a long time trying to get his grandfather to sell him the hare. He even sent letters with stamps in response. But the grandfather did not give up. Under his dictation, Vanya wrote a letter to the professor:

“The hare is not corrupt, he is a living soul, let him live in freedom. With this I remain Larion Malyavin.”

This fall I spent the night with Grandfather Larion on Lake Urzhenskoye. Constellations, cold as grains of ice, floated in the water. The dry reeds rustled. The ducks shivered in the thickets and quacked pitifully all night.

Grandfather couldn't sleep. He sat by the stove and mended a torn fishing net. Then he put on a samovar - it immediately fogged up the windows in the hut and the stars turned from fiery points into cloudy balls. Murzik was barking in the yard. He jumped into the darkness, flashed his teeth and jumped back - he fought with the impenetrable October night. The hare slept in the hallway and occasionally, in his sleep, loudly tapped his hind paw on the rotten floorboard.

We drank tea at night, waiting for the distant and hesitant dawn, and over tea my grandfather finally told me the story about the hare.

In August, my grandfather went hunting on the northern shore of the lake. The forests were as dry as gunpowder. Grandfather came across a little hare with a torn left ear. The grandfather shot at him with an old gun tied with wire, but missed. The hare ran away.

The grandfather realized that a forest fire had started and the fire was coming straight towards him.

The wind turned into a hurricane. The fire raced across the ground at an unheard of speed. According to the grandfather, even a train could not escape such a fire. Grandfather was right: during the hurricane, the fire moved at a speed of thirty kilometers per hour.

Grandfather ran over the bumps, stumbled, fell, the smoke ate his eyes, and behind him a wide roar and crackle of flames could already be heard.

Death overtook the grandfather, grabbed him by the shoulders, and at that time a hare jumped out from under the grandfather’s feet. He ran slowly and dragged his hind legs. Then only the grandfather noticed that the hare’s hair was burnt.

The grandfather was delighted with the hare, as if it were his own.

As an old forest dweller, grandfather knew that animals are much more better than man they sense where the fire is coming from and are always saved. They die only in those rare cases when fire surrounds them.

Grandfather ran after the hare. He ran, cried with fear and shouted: “Wait, honey, don’t run so fast!”

The hare brought the grandfather out of the fire.

When they ran out of the forest to the lake, the hare and grandfather both fell from fatigue. Grandfather picked up the hare and took it home. The hare's hind legs and stomach were singed. Then his grandfather cured him and kept him with him.

“Yes,” said the grandfather, looking at the samovar so angrily, as if the samovar was to blame for everything, “yes, but before that hare, it turns out that I was very guilty, dear man.”

- What have you done wrong?

- And you go out, look at the hare, at my savior, then you will know. Take a flashlight!

I took the lantern from the table and went out into the hallway. The hare was sleeping. I bent over him with a flashlight and noticed that the hare’s left ear was torn. Then I understood everything.

Konstantin Paustovsky “Cat Thief”

We were in despair. We didn't know how to catch this red cat. He stole from us every night. He hid so cleverly that none of us really saw him. Only a week later it was finally possible to establish that the cat’s ear was torn and a piece of his dirty tail was cut off. It was a cat who had lost all conscience, a cat - a tramp and a bandit. Behind his back they called him Thief.

He stole everything: fish, meat, sour cream and bread. One day he even dug up a tin can of worms in the closet. He didn’t eat them, but the chickens came running to the opened jar and pecked our entire supply of worms. The overfed chickens lay in the sun and moaned. We walked around them and argued, but fishing was still disrupted.

We spent almost a month tracking down the ginger cat. The village boys helped us with this. One day they rushed over and, out of breath, said that at dawn a cat had rushed, crouching, through the gardens and dragged a kukan with perches in its teeth. We rushed to the cellar and discovered that the kukan was missing; on it were ten fat perches caught on Prorva. This was no longer theft, but robbery in broad daylight. We vowed to catch the cat and beat him up for gangster tricks.

The cat was caught that same evening. He stole a piece of liverwurst from the table and climbed up a birch tree with it. We started shaking the birch tree. The cat dropped the sausage and it fell on Reuben's head. The cat looked at us from above with wild eyes and howled menacingly. But there was no salvation, and the cat decided on a desperate act. With a terrifying howl, he fell from the birch tree, fell to the ground, bounced up like a soccer ball, and rushed under the house.

The house was small. He stood in a remote, abandoned garden. Every night we were woken up by a knock wild apples, falling from the branches onto its planked roof. The house was littered with fishing rods, shot, apples and dry leaves. We only spent the night in it. We spent all our days, from dawn to dark, on the banks of countless streams and lakes. There we fished and made fires in the coastal thickets. To get to the shores of the lakes, one had to trample down narrow paths in the fragrant tall grasses. Their corollas swayed above their heads and showered their shoulders with yellow flower dust. We returned in the evening, scratched by rose hips, tired, burned by the sun, with bundles of silvery fish, and each time we were greeted with stories about new tramp antics of the red cat. But finally the cat was caught. He crawled under the house into the only narrow hole. There was no way out.

We blocked the hole with an old fishing net and began to wait. But the cat didn't come out. He howled disgustingly, like an underground spirit, howled continuously and without any fatigue. An hour passed, two, three... It was time to go to bed, but the cat howled and cursed under the house, and it got on our nerves. Then Lyonka, the son of the village shoemaker, was called. Lenka was famous for his fearlessness and agility. He was tasked with getting a cat out from under the house. Lyonka took a silk fishing line, tied a fish caught during the day to it by the tail and threw it through the hole into the underground. The howling stopped. We heard a crunch and a predatory click as the cat grabbed the fish’s head with its teeth. He held on with a death grip. Lyonka was pulled by the fishing line. The cat desperately resisted, but Lyonka was stronger, and, besides, the cat did not want to release the tasty fish. A minute later, the cat’s head with flesh clamped in its teeth appeared in the hole of the manhole. Lenka grabbed the cat by the collar and lifted him above the ground. We took a good look at it for the first time.

The cat closed his eyes and laid back his ears. He tucked his tail under himself just in case. It turned out to be a skinny, despite the constant theft, fiery red stray cat with white markings on his stomach.

Having examined the cat, Reuben thoughtfully asked:

- What should we do with him?

- Rip it out! - I said.

“It won’t help,” said Lyonka. “He’s had this kind of character since childhood.” Try to feed him properly.

The cat waited, closing his eyes. We followed this advice, dragged the cat into the closet and gave him a wonderful dinner: fried pork, perch aspic, cottage cheese and sour cream. The cat ate for more than an hour. He came out of the closet staggering, sat down on the threshold and washed himself, looking at us and at the low stars with green, impudent eyes. After washing, he snorted for a long time and rubbed his head on the floor. This was obviously supposed to signify fun. We were afraid that he would rub the fur on the back of his head. Then the cat rolled over onto his back, caught his tail, chewed it, spat it out, stretched out by the stove and snored peacefully.

From that day on, he settled in with us and stopped stealing. The next morning he even performed a noble and unexpected act. Chickens climbed onto

table in the garden and, pushing each other and quarreling, began to peck from the plates buckwheat porridge. The cat, trembling with indignation, crept up to the chickens and jumped onto the table with a short cry of victory. The chickens took off with a desperate cry. They overturned the jug of milk and rushed, losing their feathers, to run away from the garden.

A long-legged fool rooster, nicknamed “Hoarlach,” rushed ahead, hiccupping. The cat rushed after him on three legs, and with the fourth, front paw, hit the rooster on the back. Dust and fluff flew from the rooster. Inside him, with each blow, something thumped and hummed, as if a cat was hitting a rubber ball. After this, the rooster lay in a fit for several minutes, his eyes rolled back, and moaned quietly. He was doused cold water, and he walked away. Since then, chickens have been afraid to steal. Seeing the cat, they hid under the house, squeaking and jostling.

There is a cat in our family. His name is Masik. He will soon turn one year old. He is like a member of our family. When we sit down to dinner, he’s right there. He hits the tablecloth with his paw and asks for food. It turns out funny. He loves fish and bread. He also loves it when I play with him. And during the day, if no one is home, he basks on the balcony in the sun. Does Masik sleep with me or older sister Christina.

I love him so much.

Tymin Anton, 2nd grade, school No. 11, Belgorod

I have a feathered pet at home - Kesha the parrot. He came to us two years ago. Now he knows how to talk and feels quite confident with people. My parrot is very cheerful, smart and talented.

I love him very much and am very glad that I have him.

Varfolomeeva Ekaterina, 2nd grade, school No. 11, Belgorod

My friend

My mother and I went to the market, bought a kitten and brought it home. He began to hide everywhere. We named him Tishka. He grew up and began to catch mice. We soon found out that it was a cat, and now we are expecting kittens.

Belevich Ksenia, 2nd grade, school No. 11, Belgorod

My turtle

I have a little turtle living at home. Her name is Dina. We go for a walk with her. She eats fresh grass outside. Then I take it home. She walks around the apartment and looks for a dark corner. When he finds it, he sleeps in it for an hour or two.

I taught her to eat in the kitchen. Dina loves apples, cabbage, soaked bread, and raw meat. Once a week we bathe the turtle in a basin.

This is my turtle.

Miroshnikova Sofia, 2nd grade, school No. 11, Belgorod

My favorite rabbit

I have little rabbit. He is so cute, he has tiny red eyes. He is the most beautiful in the world! When I saw him for the first time, I could not take my eyes off his beauty.

The rabbit never runs away from me, but on the contrary, as soon as he sees me, he immediately asks to be held in my arms. Well, just like mine younger brother! He is very smart. Likes to eat grass and corn.

I love my bunny!

Bobylev Denis, 7 years old

Kitty Samik

I don’t have any animals at home, but my friend the cat Samson lives with my grandmother in the village. Beautiful, fluffy, black with white spots on the chest.

Usually houses are guarded dogs, and my grandmother’s guard is Samik. First, he drove all the mice out of all the sheds and out of the basement. And for several years now, not a single mouse! But that is not all. He doesn’t let other people’s cats or dogs into the garden, or the garden, or the yard, and this helps my grandmother! Even if someone approaches the house, Samik begins to meow loudly, and the grandmother already knows that someone stranger has come!

Granny pampers her guard with milk, fish, and sausage. After all, he is so smart! He deserves it!

Baidikov Vladislav

When I was little, we lived in the North in the city of Noyabrsk. Mom, dad and I were at the market and bought two rabbits. One was white and the other was gray. I was very happy! We bought food for them. They lived in a cage on the balcony. I fed them carrots and cabbage every day and cleaned their cage. I really loved rabbits and played with them.

When we left the North, we were unable to take the rabbits on the long journey. They were afraid that they would die. Mom took a photo of me with them. I think about them often and miss them.

Eremeeva Sabina, 7 years old, 2 "A" class, school No. 11, Belgorod

Konstantin Paustovsky

The lake near the shores was covered with heaps yellow leaves. There were so many of them that we couldn't fish. The fishing lines lay on the leaves and did not sink.

We had to take an old boat out to the middle of the lake, where the water lilies were blooming and the blue water seemed black as tar. There we caught colorful perches, pulled out tin roach and ruff with eyes like two small moons. The pikes flashed their teeth, small as needles, at us.

It was autumn in the sun and fogs. Through the fallen forests, distant clouds and thick blue air were visible.

At night, in the thickets around us, low stars moved and trembled.

There was a fire burning in our parking lot. We burned it all day and night to drive away the wolves - they howled quietly along the far shores of the lake. They were disturbed by the smoke of the fire and cheerful human cries.

We were sure that fire frightens animals, but one evening in the grass, near the fire, some animal began to snort angrily. He was not visible. He ran around us anxiously, rustling the tall grass, snorting and getting angry, but didn’t even stick his ears out of the grass. Potatoes were being fried in a frying pan, a sharp, tasty smell emanated from them, and the animal obviously came running to this smell.

A boy came to the lake with us. He was only nine years old, but he tolerated spending the night in the forest and the cold of autumn dawns well. Much better than us adults, he noticed and told everything. He was an inventor, this boy, but we adults really loved his inventions. We couldn’t, and didn’t want to, prove to him that he was telling a lie. Every day he came up with something new: either he heard the fish whispering, or he saw how the ants made a ferry across the stream from pine bark and cobwebs and crossed in the light of the night, an unprecedented rainbow. We pretended to believe him.

Everything that surrounded us seemed extraordinary: the late moon shining over the black lakes, and high clouds like mountains of pink snow, and even the familiar sea noise of tall pines.

The boy was the first to hear the animal’s snort and hissed at us to keep quiet. We became silent. We tried not to even breathe, although our hand involuntarily reached for the double-barreled gun - who knows what kind of animal it could be!

Half an hour later, the animal stuck out a wet black nose from the grass, similar to a pig’s snout. The nose sniffed the air for a long time and trembled with greed. Then a sharp muzzle with black piercing eyes appeared from the grass. Finally the striped skin appeared. A small badger crawled out of the thickets. He pressed his paw and looked at me carefully. Then he snorted in disgust and took a step towards the potatoes.

It fried and hissed, splashing boiling lard. I wanted to shout to the animal that it would get burned, but I was too late: the badger jumped to the frying pan and stuck his nose into it...

It smelled like burnt leather. The badger squealed and rushed back into the grass with a desperate cry. He ran and screamed throughout the forest, broke bushes and spat in indignation and pain.

Confusion began on the lake and in the forest: frightened frogs screamed without time, birds became alarmed, and a pike worth a pound struck right at the shore like a cannon shot.

In the morning the boy woke me up and told me that he himself had just seen a badger treating its burnt nose.

I didn't believe it. I sat down by the fire and listened sleepily to the morning voices of the birds. In the distance, white-tailed sandpipers whistled, ducks quacked, cranes cooed in the dry moss swamps, and turtle doves cooed quietly. I didn't want to move.

The boy pulled me by the hand. He was offended. He wanted to prove to me that he didn't lie. He called me to go see how the badger was being treated. I reluctantly agreed. We carefully made our way into the thicket, and among the thickets of heather I saw a rotten pine stump. He smelled of mushrooms and iodine.

A badger stood near a stump, with its back to us. He picked up the stump and stuck his burnt nose into the middle of the stump, into the wet and cold dust. He stood motionless and cooled his unfortunate nose, while another little badger ran and snorted around him. He was worried and pushed our badger in the stomach with his nose. Our badger growled at him and kicked with his furry hind paws.

Then he sat down and cried. He looked at us with round and wet eyes, moaned and licked his sore nose with his rough tongue. It was as if he was asking for help, but we could do nothing to help him.

Since then, the lake - it was previously called Nameless - we have nicknamed the Lake of the Stupid Badger.

And a year later I met a badger with a scar on its nose on the shores of this lake. He sat by the water and tried to catch the dragonflies rattling like tin with his paw. I waved my hand at him, but he sneezed angrily in my direction and hid in the lingonberry bushes.

Since then I haven't seen him again.

Belkin fly agaric

N.I. Sladkov

Winter is a harsh time for animals. Everyone is preparing for it. The bear and badger fatten up fat, the chipmunk stores pine nuts, the squirrel stores mushrooms. And everything, it would seem, is clear and simple here: lard, mushrooms, and nuts will come in handy in winter!

Just not at all, but not with everyone!

Here, for example, is a squirrel. She dries mushrooms on twigs in the fall: russula, honey mushrooms, moss mushrooms. The mushrooms are all good and edible. But among the good and edible ones you suddenly find... fly agaric! Stumbled upon a twig - red, speckled with white. Why does a squirrel need poisonous fly agaric?

Maybe young squirrels unknowingly dry fly agarics? Maybe when they grow wiser they won’t eat them? Maybe dry fly agaric becomes non-poisonous? Or maybe dried fly agaric is something like medicine for them?

There are many different assumptions, but there is no exact answer. I wish I could find out and check everything!

White-fronted

Chekhov A.P.

The hungry wolf got up to go hunting. Her cubs, all three of them, were fast asleep, huddled together, warming each other. She licked them and walked away.

It was already the spring month of March, but at night the trees crackled with cold, like in December, and as soon as you stuck out your tongue, it began to sting strongly. The wolf was in poor health and suspicious; She shuddered at the slightest noise and kept thinking about how at home without her no one would offend the wolf cubs. The smell of human and horse tracks, tree stumps, stacked firewood and the dark, manure-laden road frightened her; It seemed to her as if people were standing behind the trees in the darkness and dogs were howling somewhere beyond the forest.

She was no longer young and her instincts had weakened, so that it happened that she mistook a fox’s track for a dog’s and sometimes even, deceived by her instincts, lost her way, which had never happened to her in her youth. Due to poor health, she no longer hunted calves and large rams, as before, and already walked far around horses with foals, and ate only carrion; She had to eat fresh meat very rarely, only in the spring, when she, having come across a hare, took her children away from her or climbed into the men's barn where the lambs were.

About four versts from her lair, near the post road, there was a winter hut. Here lived the watchman Ignat, an old man of about seventy, who kept coughing and talking to himself; He usually slept at night, and during the day he wandered through the forest with a single-barreled gun and whistled at the hares. He must have served as a mechanic before, because every time before stopping he shouted to himself: “Stop, car!” and, before going any further: “Full speed ahead!” With him was a huge black dog of an unknown breed, named Arapka. When she ran far ahead, he shouted to her: “Reverse!” Sometimes he sang and at the same time staggered greatly and often fell (the wolf thought it was from the wind) and shouted: “He went off the rails!”

The wolf remembered that in the summer and autumn a sheep and two lambs grazed near the winter hut, and when she ran past not so long ago, she thought she heard something bleating in the barn. And now, approaching the winter quarters, she realized that it was already March and, judging by the time, there must certainly be lambs in the barn. She was tormented by hunger, she thought about how greedily she would eat the lamb, and from such thoughts her teeth clicked and her eyes shone in the darkness like two lights.

Ignat's hut, his barn, stable and well were surrounded by high snowdrifts. It was quiet. The little black must have been sleeping under the barn.

The wolf climbed up the snowdrift to the barn and began raking the thatched roof with her paws and muzzle. The straw was rotten and loose, so that the wolf almost fell through; Suddenly a warm smell of steam, the smell of manure and sheep's milk hit her right in the face. Below, feeling the cold, the lamb gently bleated. Jumping into the hole, the wolf fell with her front paws and chest on something soft and warm, probably on a ram, and at that time something in the barn suddenly squealed, barked and burst into a thin, howling voice, the sheep shied towards the wall, and The wolf, frightened, grabbed the first thing she caught in her teeth and rushed out...

She ran, straining her strength, and at this time Arapka, who had already sensed the wolf, howled furiously, disturbed chickens clucked in the winter hut, and Ignat, going out onto the porch, shouted:

Full speed ahead! Let's go to the whistle!

And it whistled like a car, and then - go-go-go-go!.. And all this noise was repeated by the forest echo.

When little by little all this calmed down, the wolf calmed down a little and began to notice that her prey, which she held in her teeth and dragged through the snow, was heavier and seemed to be harder than lambs usually are at this time, and it smelled as if differently, and some strange sounds were heard... The wolf stopped and put her burden on the snow to rest and start eating, and suddenly jumped back in disgust. It was not a lamb, but a puppy, black, with a large head and high legs, of a large breed, with the same white spot all over its forehead, like Arapka’s. Judging by his manners, he was an ignoramus, a simple mongrel. He licked his bruised, wounded back and, as if nothing had happened, waved his tail and barked at the wolf. She growled like a dog and ran away from him. He's behind her. She looked back and clicked her teeth; he stopped in bewilderment and, probably deciding that it was she who was playing with him, stretched his muzzle towards the winter hut and burst into a loud, joyful bark, as if inviting his mother Arapka to play with him and the wolf.

It was already dawn, and when the wolf made her way to her place through the dense aspen forest, every aspen tree was clearly visible, and the black grouse were already waking up and beautiful roosters often fluttered up, disturbed by the careless jumps and barking of the puppy.

“Why is he running after me? - thought the wolf with annoyance. “He must want me to eat him.”

She lived with the wolf cubs in a shallow hole; three years ago, during a strong storm, a tall old pine tree was uprooted, which is why this hole was formed. Now at the bottom there were old leaves and moss, and there were bones and bull horns with which the wolf cubs played. They had already woken up and all three, very similar friend at each other, stood side by side on the edge of their hole and, looking at the returning mother, wagged their tails. Seeing them, the puppy stopped at a distance and looked at them for a long time; noticing that they were also looking at him attentively, he began to bark angrily at them, as if they were strangers.

It was already dawn and the sun had risen, the snow was sparkling all around, and he still stood at a distance and barked. The wolf cubs sucked their mother, pushing her with their paws into her skinny belly, and at that time she was gnawing on a horse bone, white and dry; she was tormented by hunger, her head ached from the dog’s barking, and she wanted to rush at the uninvited guest and tear him apart.

Finally the puppy became tired and hoarse; Seeing that they were not afraid of him and did not even pay attention, he began to timidly, now crouching, now jumping, approach the wolf cubs. Now, in daylight, it was easy to see him... His white forehead was large, and on his forehead there was a bump, such as happens to very stupid dogs; the eyes were small, blue, dull, and the expression of the entire muzzle was extremely stupid. Approaching the wolf cubs, he stretched his wide paws forward, put his muzzle on them and began:

Me, me... nga-nga-nga!..

The wolf cubs did not understand anything, but waved their tails. Then the puppy hit one of the wolf cubs with his paw. big head. The wolf cub also hit him on the head with his paw. The puppy stood sideways to him and looked at him sideways, wagging its tail, then suddenly rushed away and made several circles on the crust. The wolf cubs chased him, he fell on his back and lifted his legs up, and the three of them attacked him and, squealing with delight, began to bite him, but not painfully, but as a joke. The crows sat on a tall pine tree and looked down at their struggle, and were very worried. It became noisy and fun. The sun was already hot like spring; and the roosters, constantly flying over the pine tree fallen by the storm, seemed emerald in the brilliance of the sun.

Usually she-wolves accustom their children to hunting by letting them play with prey; and now, watching how the wolf cubs chased the puppy on the crust and fought with it, the wolf thought:

“Let them get used to it.”

Having played enough, the cubs went into the hole and went to bed. The puppy howled a little with hunger, then also stretched out in the sun. And when they woke up, they started playing again.

All day and evening the wolf remembered how last night the lamb bleated in the barn and how it smelled of sheep's milk, and from her appetite she clicked her teeth at everything and did not stop gnawing greedily on an old bone, imagining to herself that it was a lamb. The wolf cubs suckled, and the puppy, who was hungry, ran around and sniffed the snow.

“Let’s eat him...” the wolf decided.

She came up to him, and he licked her face and whined, thinking that she wanted to play with him. In the past, she ate dogs, but the puppy smelled strongly of dog, and, due to poor health, she no longer tolerated this smell; she felt disgusted and walked away...

By night it got colder. The puppy got bored and went home.

When the wolf cubs were fast asleep, the wolf went hunting again. Like the previous night, she was alarmed by the slightest noise, and she was frightened by stumps, firewood, and dark, lonely juniper bushes that looked like people in the distance. She ran away from the road, along the crust. Suddenly something dark flashed on the road far ahead... She strained her eyes and ears: in fact, something was walking ahead, and even measured steps could be heard. Isn't it a badger? She carefully, barely breathing, taking everything to the side, overtook the dark spot, looked back at it and recognized it. It was a puppy with a white forehead who was returning to his winter hut, slowly and step by step.

“I hope he doesn’t bother me again,” the wolf thought and quickly ran forward.

But the winter hut was already close. She again climbed up the snowdrift into the barn. Yesterday's hole had already been filled with spring straw, and two new strips stretched across the roof. The wolf began to quickly work with her legs and muzzle, looking around to see if the puppy was coming, but as soon as the warm steam and the smell of manure hit her, a joyful, liquid bark was heard from behind. It's the puppy back. He jumped onto the wolf's roof, then into a hole and, feeling at home, in the warmth, recognizing his sheep, barked even louder... Arapka woke up under the barn and, sensing the wolf, howled, the chickens clucked, and when Ignat appeared on the porch with with her single-barreled gun, the frightened wolf was already far from her winter hut.

Fut! - Ignat whistled. - Fut! Drive at full speed!

He pulled the trigger - the gun misfired; he fired again - again it misfired; he fired a third time - and a huge sheaf of fire flew out of the trunk and a deafening “boo” was heard! boo!". There was a strong blow to his shoulder; and, taking a gun in one hand and an ax in the other, he went to see what was causing the noise...

A little later he returned to the hut.

Nothing... - Ignat answered. - It's an empty matter. Our White-fronted one got into the habit of sleeping with the sheep, in the warmth. Only there is no such thing as going through the door, but everything seems to be going through the roof. The other night he tore up the roof and went for a walk, the scoundrel, and now he’s returned and tore up the roof again. Silly.

Yes, the spring in the brain burst. I don't like death, stupid people! - Ignat sighed, climbing onto the stove. - Well, man of God, it’s too early to get up, let’s go to sleep at full speed...

And in the morning he called White-fronted to him, tore him painfully by the ears and then, punishing him with a twig, kept saying:

Walk through the door! Walk through the door! Walk through the door!

Faithful Troy

Evgeny Charushin

A friend and I agreed to go skiing. I went to pick him up in the morning. He lives in a big house - on Pestel Street.

I entered the yard. And he saw me from the window and waved his hand from the fourth floor.

Wait, I'll come out now.

So I’m waiting in the yard, at the door. Suddenly someone from above thunders down the stairs.

Knock! Thunder! Tra-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta! Something wooden is knocking and cracking on the steps, like some kind of ratchet.

“Is it really possible,” I think, “that my friend fell down with skis and poles, counting the steps?”

I came closer to the door. What is there rolling down the stairs? I am waiting.

And then I saw a spotted dog, a bulldog, coming out of the door. Bulldog on wheels.

His torso is bandaged to a toy car - a gas truck.

And the bulldog steps on the ground with its front paws - it runs and rolls itself.

The muzzle is snub-nosed and wrinkled. The paws are thick, widely spaced. He drove out of the door and looked around angrily. And then a ginger cat crossed the yard. Like a bulldog rushing after a cat - only the wheels are bouncing on the rocks and ice. He drove the cat into the basement window, and he drives around the yard, sniffing the corners.

Then I pulled out a pencil and a notebook, sat down on the step and let’s draw it.

My friend came out with skis, saw that I was drawing a dog, and said:

Draw him, draw him - this is not an ordinary dog. Because of his bravery, he became crippled.

How so? - I ask.

My friend stroked the bulldog along the folds on the scruff of the neck, gave him candy in his teeth and said to me:

Let's go, I'll tell you the whole story along the way. A wonderful story, you really won't believe it.

So,” said the friend when we went out the gate, “listen.

His name is Troy. In our opinion, this means faithful.

And it was right to call him that.

One day we all left for work. Everyone in our apartment serves: one is a teacher at school, another is a telegraph operator at the post office, the wives also serve, and the children study. Well, we all left, and Troy was left alone to guard the apartment.

Some thief found out that our apartment was empty, turned the lock on the door and started running our house.

He had a huge bag with him. He grabs everything he can find and puts it in a bag, grabs it and sticks it. My gun ended up in the bag, new boots, a teacher’s watch, Zeiss binoculars, and children’s felt boots.

He pulled on about six jackets, French jackets, and all sorts of jackets: there was obviously no room in the bag.

And Troy lies by the stove, is silent - the thief does not see him.

This is Troy’s habit: he will let anyone in, but he won’t let anyone out.

Well, the thief has robbed us all clean. I took the most expensive, the best. It's time for him to leave. He leaned towards the door...

And Troy is standing at the door.

He stands and is silent.

And what kind of face does Troy have?

And looking for a pile!

Troy is standing, frowning, his eyes are bloodshot, and a fang is sticking out of his mouth.

The thief was rooted to the floor. Try to leave!

And Troy grinned, leaned forward and began to advance sideways.

He approaches quietly. He always intimidates the enemy like this - whether a dog or a person.

The thief, apparently out of fear, was completely stunned, rushing around

He started talking to no avail, and Troy jumped on his back and bit through all six jackets on him at once.

You know how bulldogs have a death grip?

They will close their eyes, their jaws will slam shut, and they will not open their teeth, even if they were killed here.

The thief rushes about, rubbing his back against the walls. Flowers in pots, vases, books are thrown off the shelves. Nothing helps. Troy hangs on it like some kind of weight.

Well, the thief finally guessed, he somehow wriggled out of his six jackets and the whole sack, along with the bulldog, was out the window!

This is from the fourth floor!

The bulldog flew headfirst into the yard.

Slurry splashed to the sides, rotten potatoes, herring heads, all sorts of rubbish.

Troy and all our jackets ended up right in the trash heap. Our garbage dump was filled to the brim that day.

After all, what happiness! If he had hit the rocks, he would have broken all his bones and not made a sound. He would die immediately.

And here it’s as if someone deliberately set him up for a trash heap - still, it’s easier to fall.

Troy emerged from the trash heap and climbed out as if completely intact. And just think, he still managed to intercept the thief on the stairs.

He grabbed him again, this time in the leg.

Then the thief gave himself away, screamed and howled.

Residents came running to howl from all the apartments, from the third, and from the fifth, and from the sixth floor, from the entire back staircase.

Keep the dog. Ooh! I'll go to the police myself. Just tear off the damned devil.

It's easy to say - tear it off.

Two people pulled the bulldog, and he only waved his stumpy tail and clamped his jaw even tighter.

The residents brought a poker from the first floor and stuck Troy between his teeth. It was only in this manner that they unclenched his jaws.

The thief came out into the street - pale, disheveled. He's shaking all over, holding on to the policeman.

What a dog,” he says. - What a dog!

They took the thief to the police. There he told how it happened.

I come home from work in the evening. I see the lock on the door is turned inside out. There is a bag of our goods lying around in the apartment.

And in the corner, in his place, Troy lies. All dirty and smelly.

I called Troy.

And he can’t even come close. Crawling and squealing.

His back legs were paralyzed.

Well, now the whole apartment takes turns taking him out for a walk. I fitted him with wheels. He rolls down the stairs on his wheels himself, but can no longer climb back. Someone needs to lift the car from behind. Troy himself steps over with his front paws.

This is how the dog on wheels lives now.

Evening

Boris Zhitkov

The cow Masha goes to look for her son, the calf Alyosha. Can't see him anywhere. Where did he go? It's time to go home.

And the calf Alyoshka ran around, got tired, and lay down in the grass. The grass is tall - Alyosha is nowhere to be seen.

The cow Masha was afraid that her son Alyoshka had disappeared, and she started mooing with all her strength:

At home they milked Masha, milked a whole bucket fresh milk. They poured it into Alyosha’s bowl:

Here, drink, Alyoshka.

Alyoshka was delighted - he had been wanting milk for a long time - he drank it all to the bottom and licked the bowl with his tongue.

Alyoshka got drunk and wanted to run around the yard. As soon as he started running, suddenly a puppy jumped out of the booth and started barking at Alyoshka. Alyoshka was scared: that’s right, scary beast, if he barks so loudly. And he started to run.

Alyoshka ran away, and the puppy did not bark anymore. It became quiet all around. Alyoshka looked - no one was there, everyone had gone to bed. And I wanted to sleep myself. He lay down and fell asleep in the yard.

The cow Masha also fell asleep on the soft grass.

The puppy also fell asleep at his kennel - he was tired, he barked all day.

The boy Petya also fell asleep in his crib - he was tired, he had been running around all day.

And the bird has long since fallen asleep.

She fell asleep on a branch and hid her head under her wing to make it warmer to sleep. I'm tired too. I flew all day, catching midges.

Everyone has fallen asleep, everyone is sleeping.

Only the night wind does not sleep.

He rustles in the grass and rustles in the bushes

Volchishko

Evgeny Charushin

A little wolf lived in the forest with his mother.

One day my mother went hunting.

And a man caught the wolf, put it in a bag and brought it to the city. He placed the bag in the middle of the room.

The bag did not move for a long time. Then the little wolf wallowed in it and got out. He looked in one direction and was scared: a man was sitting, looking at him.

I looked in the other direction - the black cat was snorting, puffing up, twice his size, barely standing. And next to him the dog bares his teeth.

The little wolf was completely afraid. I reached back into the bag, but I couldn’t fit in - the empty bag lay on the floor like a rag.

And the cat puffed up, puffed up and hissed! He jumped on the table and knocked over the saucer. The saucer broke.

The dog barked.

The man shouted loudly: “Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!"

The little wolf hid under a chair and began to live and tremble there.

There is a chair in the middle of the room.

The cat looks down from the back of the chair.

The dog is running around the chair.

A man sits in a chair and smokes.

And the little wolf is barely alive under the chair.

At night the man fell asleep, and the dog fell asleep, and the cat closed his eyes.

Cats - they don’t sleep, they only doze.

The little wolf came out to look around.

He walked around, walked around, sniffed, and then sat down and howled.

The dog barked.

The cat jumped on the table.

The man on the bed sat up. He waved his arms and shouted. And the little wolf crawled under the chair again. I began to live there quietly.

In the morning the man left. He poured milk into a bowl. The cat and dog began to lap up milk.

The little wolf crawled out from under the chair, crawled to the door, and the door was open!

From the door to the stairs, from the stairs to the street, from the street across the bridge, from the bridge to the garden, from the garden to the field.

And behind the field there is a forest.

And in the forest there is a mother wolf.

And now the little wolf has become a wolf.

Thief

Georgy Skrebitsky

One day we were given a young squirrel. She very soon became completely tame, ran around all the rooms, climbed on cabinets, shelves, and so deftly - she would never drop or break anything.

In my father's office, over the sofa, there were huge deer horns. The squirrel often climbed on them: it used to climb onto the horn and sit on it, like on a tree branch.

She knew us guys well. As soon as you enter the room, a squirrel jumps from somewhere from the closet right onto your shoulder. This means she asks for sugar or candy. She loved sweets very much.

There were sweets and sugar in our dining room, in the buffet. They were never locked up because we children didn’t take anything without asking.

But then one day my mother calls us all into the dining room and shows us an empty vase:

Who took the candy from here?

We look at each other and are silent - we don’t know which of us did it. Mom shook her head and said nothing. And the next day the sugar disappeared from the cupboard and again no one admitted that they had taken it. At this point my father got angry and said that now he would lock everything up and wouldn’t give us any sweets all week.

And the squirrel, along with us, was left without sweets. He used to jump onto his shoulder, rub his muzzle against his cheek, pull his ear with his teeth, and ask for sugar. Where can I get it?

One afternoon I sat quietly on the sofa in the dining room and read. Suddenly I see: a squirrel jumped up on the table, grabbed a crust of bread in its teeth - and onto the floor, and from there onto the cabinet. A minute later, I look, she climbed onto the table again, grabbed the second crust - and again onto the cabinet.

“Wait,” I think, “where does she take all the bread?” I pulled up a chair and looked at the closet. I see my mother’s old hat lying there. I lifted it up - here you go! There’s just something under there: sugar, candy, bread, and various bones...

I go straight to my father and show him: “That’s who our thief is!”

And the father laughed and said:

How could I not have guessed this before! After all, it is our squirrel who makes supplies for the winter. Now it’s autumn, all the squirrels in the wild are stocking up on food, and ours is not lagging behind, it’s also stocking up.

After this incident, they stopped keeping sweets away from us, they just attached a hook to the sideboard so that the squirrel couldn’t get into it. But the squirrel did not calm down and continued to prepare supplies for the winter. If he finds a crust of bread, a nut or a seed, he will immediately grab it, run away and hide it somewhere.

We once went into the forest to pick mushrooms. We arrived late in the evening, tired, ate, and quickly went to bed. They left a bag of mushrooms on the window: it’s cool there, they won’t spoil until the morning.

We get up in the morning - the whole basket is empty. Where did the mushrooms go? Suddenly my father shouts from the office and calls us. We ran to him and saw that all the deer antlers above the sofa were covered with mushrooms. There are mushrooms everywhere on the towel hook, behind the mirror, and behind the painting. The squirrel did this early in the morning: he hung mushrooms for himself to dry for the winter.

In the forest, squirrels always dry mushrooms on branches in the fall. So ours hurried. Apparently she sensed winter.

Soon the cold really set in. The squirrel kept trying to get into some corner where it would be warmer, and one day she completely disappeared. They looked and looked for her - she was nowhere to be found. She probably ran into the garden, and from there into the forest.

We felt sorry for the squirrels, but there was nothing we could do.

We got ready to light the stove, closed the vent, piled on some wood, and set it on fire. Suddenly something moves in the stove and rustles! We quickly opened the vent, and from there the squirrel jumped out like a bullet - straight onto the closet.

And the smoke from the stove just pours into the room, it doesn’t go down the chimney. What's happened? The brother made a hook out of thick wire and stuck it through the vent into the pipe to see if there was anything there.

We look - he is dragging a tie from the pipe, his mother’s glove, he even found his grandmother’s holiday scarf there.

Our squirrel dragged all this into the chimney for its nest. That's what it is! Even though he lives in the house, he doesn’t abandon his forest habits. Such is, apparently, their squirrel nature.

Caring mom

Georgy Skrebitsky

One day the shepherds caught a fox cub and brought it to us. We put the animal in an empty barn.

The little fox was still small, all gray, his muzzle was dark, and his tail was white at the end. The animal hid in the far corner of the barn and looked around in fear. Out of fear, he didn’t even bite when we stroked him, but only pressed his ears back and trembled all over.

Mom poured milk into a bowl for him and placed it right next to him. But the frightened animal did not drink milk.

Then dad said that the little fox should be left alone - let him look around and get used to the new place.

I really didn’t want to leave, but dad locked the door and we went home. It was already evening, and soon everyone went to bed.

At night I woke up. I hear a puppy yapping and whining somewhere very close by. Where do I think he came from? Looked out the window. It was already light outside. From the window you could see the barn where the little fox was. It turns out that he was whining like a puppy.

The forest began right behind the barn.

Suddenly I saw a fox jump out of the bushes, stop, listen and stealthily run up to the barn. Immediately the yapping stopped, and a joyful squeal was heard instead.

I slowly woke up mom and dad, and we all started looking out the window together.

The fox ran around the barn and tried to dig up the ground underneath it. But there was a strong stone foundation there, and the fox could not do anything. Soon she ran away into the bushes, and the little fox again began to whine loudly and pitifully.

I wanted to watch the fox all night, but dad said that she wouldn’t come again and told me to go to bed.

I woke up late and, having dressed, first of all hurried to visit the little fox. What is it?.. On the threshold right next to the door lay a dead bunny. I quickly ran to my dad and brought him with me.

That's the thing! - Dad said when he saw the bunny. - This means that the mother fox once again came to the little fox and brought him food. She couldn't get inside, so she left it outside. What a caring mother!

All day I hung around the barn, looked into the cracks and went with my mother twice to feed the little fox. And in the evening I couldn’t fall asleep, I kept jumping out of bed and looking out the window to see if the fox had come.

Finally, mom got angry and covered the window with a dark curtain.

But in the morning I got up before the light and immediately ran to the barn. This time, it was no longer a bunny lying on the doorstep, but a strangled neighbor’s chicken. Apparently, the fox came again at night to visit the fox cub. She failed to catch prey for him in the forest, so she climbed into her neighbors’ chicken coop, strangled the chicken and brought it to her cub.

Dad had to pay for the chicken, and besides, he got a lot from the neighbors.

Take the little fox wherever you want,” they shouted, “or else the fox will take all the birds with us!”

There was nothing to do, dad had to put the little fox in a bag and take it back to the forest, to the fox holes.

Since then, the fox never came to the village again.

Hedgehog

MM. Prishvin

Once I was walking along the bank of our stream and noticed a hedgehog under a bush. He noticed me too, curled up and started tapping: knock-knock-knock. It was very similar, as if a car was walking in the distance. I touched him with the tip of my boot - he snorted terribly and pushed his needles into the boot.

Oh, you're like that with me! - I said and pushed him into the stream with the tip of my boot.

Instantly, the hedgehog turned around in the water and swam to the shore, like a small pig, only instead of bristles there were needles on its back. I took a stick, rolled the hedgehog into my hat and took it home.

I had a lot of mice. I heard that the hedgehog catches them, and I decided: let him live with me and catch mice.

So I put this prickly lump in the middle of the floor and sat down to write, while I kept looking at the hedgehog out of the corner of my eye. He did not lie motionless for long: as soon as I quieted down at the table, the hedgehog turned around, looked around, tried to go this way, that way, finally chose a place under the bed and became completely quiet there.

When it got dark, I lit the lamp, and - hello! - the hedgehog ran out from under the bed. He, of course, thought to the lamp that the moon had risen in the forest: when there is a moon, hedgehogs love to run through forest clearings.

And so he started running around the room, imagining that it was a forest clearing.

I took the pipe, lit a cigarette and blew a cloud near the moon. It became just like in the forest: both the moon and the cloud, and my legs were like tree trunks and, probably, the hedgehog really liked them: he darted between them, sniffing and scratching the backs of my boots with needles.

After reading the newspaper, I dropped it on the floor, went to bed and fell asleep.

I always sleep very lightly. I hear some rustling in my room. He struck a match, lit the candle and only noticed how the hedgehog flashed under the bed. And the newspaper was no longer lying near the table, but in the middle of the room. So I left the candle burning and I myself did not sleep, thinking:

Why did the hedgehog need the newspaper?

Soon my tenant ran out from under the bed - and straight to the newspaper; he spun around around her, made noise, made noise, and finally managed to: somehow put a corner of a newspaper on his thorns and dragged it, huge, into the corner.

That’s when I understood him: the newspaper was like dry leaves in the forest to him, he was dragging it for his nest. And it turned out to be true: soon the hedgehog wrapped himself in newspaper and made himself a real nest out of it. Having finished this important task, he left his home and stood opposite the bed, looking at the moon candle.

I let the clouds in and ask:

What else do you need? The hedgehog was not afraid.

Do you want to drink?

I wake up. The hedgehog doesn't run.

I took a plate, put it on the floor, brought a bucket of water and then poured water into the plate, then poured it into the bucket again, and made such a noise as if it was a stream splashing.

Well, go, go, I say. - You see, I made the moon for you, and sent the clouds, and here is water for you...

I look: it’s like he’s moved forward. And I also moved my lake a little towards it. He will move, and I will move, and that’s how we agreed.

Drink, I say finally. He began to cry. And I ran my hand over the thorns so lightly, as if I was stroking them, and I kept saying:

You're a good guy, you're a good guy!

The hedgehog got drunk, I say:

Let's sleep. He lay down and blew out the candle.

I don’t know how long I slept, but I hear: I have work in my room again.

I light a candle, and what do you think? A hedgehog is running around the room, and there is an apple on its thorns. He ran to the nest, put it there and ran into the corner after another, and in the corner there was a bag of apples and it fell over. The hedgehog ran up, curled up near the apples, twitched and ran again, dragging another apple on the thorns into the nest.

So the hedgehog settled down to live with me. And now, when drinking tea, I will certainly bring it to my table and either pour milk into a saucer for him to drink, or give him some buns for him to eat.

Hare's feet

Konstantin Paustovsky

Vanya Malyavin came to the veterinarian in our village from Lake Urzhenskoe and brought a small warm hare wrapped in a torn cotton jacket. The hare was crying and blinking his eyes red from tears often...

Are you crazy? - the veterinarian shouted. “Soon you’ll be bringing mice to me, you fool!”

“Don’t bark, this is a special hare,” Vanya said in a hoarse whisper. - His grandfather sent him and ordered him to be treated.

What to treat for?

His paws are burned.

The veterinarian turned Vanya to face the door,

pushed him in the back and shouted after him:

Go ahead, go ahead! I don't know how to treat them. Fry it with onions and grandpa will have a snack.

Vanya didn’t answer. He went out into the hallway, blinked his eyes, sniffed and buried himself in the log wall. Tears flowed down the wall. The hare quietly trembled under his greasy jacket.

What are you doing, little one? - the compassionate grandmother Anisya asked Vanya; she took her only goat to the vet. - Why are you two shedding tears, dear ones? Oh what happened?

“He’s burned, grandfather’s hare,” Vanya said quietly. - He burned his paws in a forest fire, he can’t run. Look, he's about to die.

“Don’t die, darling,” Anisya muttered. - Tell your grandfather, if he really wants the hare to go out, let him take him to the city to Karl Petrovich.

Vanya wiped his tears and walked home through the forests, to Lake Urzhenskoe. He did not walk, but ran barefoot along the hot sandy road. The recent forest fire passed away, to the north, near the lake itself. It smelled of burning and dry cloves. It grew in large islands in the clearings.

The hare moaned.

Vanya found fluffy leaves covered with soft silver hair along the way, tore them out, put them under a pine tree and turned the hare around. The hare looked at the leaves, buried his head in them and fell silent.

What are you doing, gray? - Vanya asked quietly. - You should eat.

The hare was silent.

The hare moved his ragged ear and closed his eyes.

Vanya took him in his arms and ran straight through the forest - he had to quickly let the hare drink from the lake.

There was unheard-of heat over the forests that summer. In the morning, strings of dense white clouds floated in. At noon, the clouds quickly rushed upward, towards the zenith, and before our eyes they were carried away and disappeared somewhere beyond the boundaries of the sky. The hot hurricane had been blowing for two weeks without a break. The resin flowing down the pine trunks turned into amber stone.

The next morning the grandfather put on clean boots and new bast shoes, took a staff and a piece of bread and wandered into the city. Vanya carried the hare from behind.

The hare became completely silent, only occasionally shuddering with his whole body and sighing convulsively.

The dry wind blew up a cloud of dust over the city, soft as flour. Chicken fluff, dry leaves and straw were flying in it. From a distance it seemed as if a quiet fire was smoking over the city.

The market square was very empty and hot; The carriage horses were dozing near the water shed, and they had straw hats on their heads. Grandfather crossed himself.

Either a horse or a bride - the jester will sort them out! - he said and spat.

They asked passersby for a long time about Karl Petrovich, but no one really answered anything. We went to the pharmacy. A fat old man in pince-nez and a short white robe shrugged his shoulders angrily and said:

I like it! Quite a strange question! Karl Petrovich Korsh, a specialist in childhood diseases, has stopped seeing patients for three years now. Why do you need it?

The grandfather, stuttering from respect for the pharmacist and from timidity, told about the hare.

I like it! - said the pharmacist. - There are some interesting patients in our city! I like this great!

He nervously took off his pince-nez, wiped it, put it back on his nose and stared at his grandfather. Grandfather was silent and stomped around. The pharmacist was also silent. The silence became painful.

Poshtovaya street, three! - the pharmacist suddenly shouted in anger and slammed some disheveled thick book. - Three!

Grandfather and Vanya reached Pochtovaya Street just in time - a high thunderstorm was setting in from behind the Oka River. Lazy thunder stretched beyond the horizon, like a sleepy strongman straightening his shoulders, and reluctantly shaking the earth. Gray ripples went down the river. Silent lightning surreptitiously, but swiftly and strongly struck the meadows; Far beyond the Glades, a haystack that they had lit was already burning. Large drops of rain fell on the dusty road, and soon it became like the surface of the moon: each drop left a small crater in the dust.

Karl Petrovich was playing something sad and melodic on the piano when his grandfather’s disheveled beard appeared in the window.

A minute later Karl Petrovich was already angry.

“I’m not a veterinarian,” he said and slammed the lid of the piano. Immediately thunder roared in the meadows. - All my life I have been treating children, not hares.

“A child, a hare, it’s all the same,” the grandfather muttered stubbornly. - It’s all the same! Heal, show mercy! Our veterinarian has no jurisdiction over such matters. He horse-rided for us. This hare, one might say, is my savior: I owe him my life, I must show gratitude, but you say - quit!

A minute later, Karl Petrovich, an old man with gray ruffled eyebrows, worriedly listened to his grandfather’s stumbling story.

Karl Petrovich eventually agreed to treat the hare. The next morning, the grandfather went to the lake, and left Vanya with Karl Petrovich to go after the hare.

A day later, the entire Pochtovaya Street, overgrown with goose grass, already knew that Karl Petrovich was treating a hare that had been burned in a terrible forest fire and had saved some old man. Two days later the whole small town already knew about this, and on the third day a long young man in a felt hat came to Karl Petrovich, introduced himself as an employee of a Moscow newspaper and asked for a conversation about the hare.

The hare was cured. Vanya wrapped him in a cotton rag and took him home. Soon the story about the hare was forgotten, and only some Moscow professor spent a long time trying to get his grandfather to sell him the hare. He even sent letters with stamps in response. But the grandfather did not give up. Under his dictation, Vanya wrote a letter to the professor:

“The hare is not corrupt, he is a living soul, let him live in freedom. With this I remain Larion Malyavin.”

This fall I spent the night with Grandfather Larion on Lake Urzhenskoye. Constellations, cold as grains of ice, floated in the water. The dry reeds rustled. The ducks shivered in the thickets and quacked pitifully all night.

Grandfather couldn't sleep. He sat by the stove and mended a torn fishing net. Then he set the samovar - it immediately fogged up the windows in the hut, and the stars turned from fiery points into cloudy balls. Murzik was barking in the yard. He jumped into the darkness, clattered his teeth and bounced away - he fought with the impenetrable October night. The hare slept in the hallway and occasionally, in his sleep, loudly tapped his hind paw on the rotten floorboard.

We drank tea at night, waiting for the distant and hesitant dawn, and over tea my grandfather finally told me the story about the hare.

In August, my grandfather went hunting on the northern shore of the lake. The forests were as dry as gunpowder. Grandfather came across a little hare with a torn left ear. The grandfather shot at him with an old gun tied with wire, but missed. The hare ran away.

The grandfather realized that a forest fire had started and the fire was coming straight towards him. The wind turned into a hurricane. The fire raced across the ground at an unheard of speed. According to the grandfather, even a train could not escape such a fire. Grandfather was right: during the hurricane, the fire moved at a speed of thirty kilometers per hour.

Grandfather ran over the bumps, stumbled, fell, the smoke ate his eyes, and behind him a wide roar and crackle of flames could already be heard.

Death overtook the grandfather, grabbed him by the shoulders, and at that time a hare jumped out from under the grandfather’s feet. He ran slowly and dragged his hind legs. Then only the grandfather noticed that the hare’s hair was burnt.

The grandfather was delighted with the hare, as if it were his own. As an old forest dweller, my grandfather knew that animals sense where the fire is coming from much better than humans and always escape. They die only in those rare cases when fire surrounds them.

Grandfather ran after the hare. He ran, cried with fear and shouted: “Wait, honey, don’t run so fast!”

The hare brought the grandfather out of the fire. When they ran out of the forest to the lake, the hare and grandfather both fell from fatigue. Grandfather picked up the hare and took it home.

The hare's hind legs and stomach were singed. Then his grandfather cured him and kept him with him.

Yes,” said the grandfather, looking at the samovar so angrily, as if the samovar was to blame for everything, “yes, but before that hare, it turns out that I was very guilty, dear man.”

What have you done wrong?

And you go out, look at the hare, at my savior, then you will know. Take a flashlight!

I took the lantern from the table and went out into the hallway. The hare was sleeping. I bent over him with a flashlight and noticed that the hare’s left ear was torn. Then I understood everything.

How an elephant saved its owner from a tiger

Boris Zhitkov

The Hindus have tame elephants. One Hindu went with an elephant into the forest to collect firewood.

The forest was deaf and wild. The elephant trampled the owner's path and helped to cut down trees, and the owner loaded them onto the elephant.

Suddenly the elephant stopped obeying its owner, began to look around, shake its ears, and then raised its trunk and roared.

The owner also looked around, but did not notice anything.

He became angry with the elephant and hit its ears with a branch.

And the elephant bent its trunk with a hook to lift its owner onto its back. The owner thought: “I’ll sit on his neck - this way it will be even more convenient for me to rule over him.”

He sat on the elephant and began to whip the elephant on the ears with a branch. And the elephant backed away, trampled and twirled its trunk. Then he froze and became wary.

The owner raised a branch to hit the elephant with all his might, but suddenly he jumped out of the bushes huge tiger. He wanted to attack the elephant from behind and jump on its back.

But he got his paws on the firewood, and the firewood fell down. The tiger wanted to jump another time, but the elephant had already turned, grabbed the tiger across the stomach with its trunk, and squeezed it like a thick rope. The tiger opened his mouth, stuck out his tongue and shook his paws.

And the elephant had already lifted him up, then slammed him to the ground and began to trample him with his feet.

And the elephant's legs are like pillars. And the elephant trampled the tiger into a cake. When the owner recovered from his fear, he said:

What a fool I was for beating an elephant! And he saved my life.

The owner took the bread he had prepared for himself from his bag and gave it all to the elephant.

Cat

MM. Prishvin

When I see from the window how Vaska is making his way in the garden, I shout to him in the most gentle voice:

Wow!

And in response, I know, he also screams at me, but my ear is a little tight and I don’t hear, but only see how, after my scream, a pink mouth opens on his white muzzle.

Wow! - I shout to him.

And I guess - he shouts to me:

I'm coming now!

And with a firm, straight tiger step he heads into the house.

In the morning, when the light from the dining room through the half-open door is still only visible as a pale crack, I know that Vaska the cat is sitting right by the door in the dark, waiting for me. He knows that the dining room is empty without me, and he is afraid: in another place he might doze off my entrance to the dining room. He has been sitting here for a long time and, as soon as I bring the kettle in, he rushes towards me with a kind cry.

When I sit down for tea, he sits on my left knee and watches everything: how I crush sugar with tweezers, how I cut bread, how I spread butter. I know that he does not eat salted butter, and only takes a small piece of bread if he does not catch a mouse at night.

When he is sure that there is nothing tasty on the table - a crust of cheese or a piece of sausage, he sits down on my knee, stomps around a little and falls asleep.

After tea, when I get up, he wakes up and goes to the window. There he turns his head in all directions, up and down, counting dense flocks of jackdaws and crows flying at this early morning hour. Of everything complex world life big city he chooses only birds for himself and rushes entirely towards them.

During the day - birds, and at night - mice, and so he has the whole world: during the day, in the light, the black narrow slits of his eyes, crossing a cloudy green circle, see only birds; at night, his entire black luminous eye opens and sees only mice.

Today the radiators are warm, and that’s why the window fogged up a lot, and the cat had a very bad time counting ticks. So what do you think my cat! He stood up on his hind legs, his front legs on the glass and, well, wipe, well, wipe! When he rubbed it and it became clearer, he again sat down calmly, like porcelain, and again, counting the jackdaws, began to move his head up, down, and to the sides.

During the day - birds, at night - mice, and this is Vaska’s whole world.

Cat Thief

Konstantin Paustovsky

We were in despair. We didn't know how to catch this red cat. He stole from us every night. He hid so cleverly that none of us really saw him. Only a week later it was finally possible to establish that the cat’s ear was torn and a piece of his dirty tail was cut off.

It was a cat who had lost all conscience, a cat - a tramp and a bandit. Behind his back they called him Thief.

He stole everything: fish, meat, sour cream and bread. One day he even dug up a tin can of worms in the closet. He didn’t eat them, but the chickens came running to the opened jar and pecked our entire supply of worms.

The overfed chickens lay in the sun and moaned. We walked around them and argued, but fishing was still disrupted.

We spent almost a month tracking down the ginger cat. The village boys helped us with this. One day they rushed in and, out of breath, said that at dawn a cat had rushed, crouching, through the vegetable gardens and dragged a kukan with perches in its teeth.

We rushed to the cellar and discovered that the kukan was missing; on it were ten fat perches caught on Prorva.

This was no longer theft, but robbery in broad daylight. We vowed to catch the cat and beat him up for gangster tricks.

The cat was caught that same evening. He stole a piece of liverwurst from the table and climbed up a birch tree with it.

We started shaking the birch tree. The cat dropped the sausage and it fell on Reuben's head. The cat looked at us from above with wild eyes and howled menacingly.

But there was no salvation, and the cat decided on a desperate act. With a terrifying howl, he fell from the birch tree, fell to the ground, bounced up like a soccer ball, and rushed under the house.

The house was small. He stood in a remote, abandoned garden. Every night we were awakened by the sound of wild apples falling from the branches onto his plank roof.

The house was littered with fishing rods, shot, apples and dry leaves. We only spent the night in it. All days, from dawn to dark,

We spent time on the banks of countless streams and lakes. There we fished and made fires in the coastal thickets.

To get to the shores of the lakes, one had to trample down narrow paths in the fragrant tall grasses. Their corollas swayed above their heads and showered their shoulders with yellow flower dust.

We returned in the evening, scratched by rose hips, tired, burned by the sun, with bundles of silver fish, and each time we were greeted with stories about new tramp antics of the red cat.

But finally the cat was caught. He crawled under the house into the only narrow hole. There was no way out.

We blocked the hole with an old net and began to wait. But the cat didn't come out. He howled disgustingly, like an underground spirit, howled continuously and without any fatigue. An hour passed, two, three... It was time to go to bed, but the cat howled and cursed under the house, and it got on our nerves.

Then Lenka, the son of the village shoemaker, was called. Lenka was famous for his fearlessness and agility. He was tasked with getting the cat out from under the house.

Lenka took a silk fishing line, tied a fish caught during the day to it by the tail, and threw it through the hole into the underground.

The howling stopped. We heard a crunch and a predatory click as the cat grabbed the fish’s head with its teeth. He grabbed with a death grip. Lenka pulled the fishing line. The cat desperately resisted, but Lenka was stronger, and, besides, the cat did not want to release the tasty fish.

A minute later, the cat’s head with flesh clamped in its teeth appeared in the hole of the manhole.

Lenka grabbed the cat by the collar and lifted him off the ground. We took a good look at it for the first time.

The cat closed his eyes and laid back his ears. He tucked his tail under himself just in case. It turned out to be a skinny, despite the constant theft, fiery red stray cat with white markings on his stomach.

What should we do with it?

Rip it out! - I said.

It won’t help,” said Lenka. - He has had this character since childhood. Try to feed him properly.

The cat waited, closing his eyes.

We followed this advice, dragged the cat into the closet and gave him a wonderful dinner: fried pork, perch aspic, cottage cheese and sour cream.

The cat ate for more than an hour. He came out of the closet staggering, sat down on the threshold and washed himself, looking at us and at the low stars with green, impudent eyes.

After washing, he snorted for a long time and rubbed his head on the floor. This was obviously supposed to mean fun. We were afraid that he would rub the fur on the back of his head.

Then the cat rolled over onto his back, caught his tail, chewed it, spat it out, stretched out by the stove and snored peacefully.

From that day on, he settled in with us and stopped stealing.

The next morning he even performed a noble and unexpected act.

The chickens climbed onto the table in the garden and, pushing each other and quarreling, began to peck buckwheat porridge from the plates.

The cat, trembling with indignation, crept up to the chickens and jumped onto the table with a short cry of victory.

The chickens took off with a desperate cry. They overturned the jug of milk and rushed, losing their feathers, to run away from the garden.

A long-legged fool rooster, nicknamed “Gorlach,” rushed ahead, hiccupping.

The cat rushed after him on three legs, and with its fourth, front paw it hit the rooster on the back. Dust and fluff flew from the rooster. Inside him, with each blow, something thumped and hummed, as if a cat was hitting a rubber ball.

After this, the rooster lay in a fit for several minutes, his eyes rolled back, and moaned quietly. They poured cold water on him and he walked away.

Since then, chickens have been afraid to steal. Seeing the cat, they hid under the house, squeaking and jostling.

The cat walked around the house and garden like a master and watchman. He rubbed his head against our legs. He demanded gratitude, leaving tufts of red fur on our trousers.

We renamed him from Thief to Policeman. Although Reuben claimed that this was not entirely convenient, we were sure that the police would not be offended by us for this.

Mug under the Christmas tree

Boris Zhitkov

The boy took a net - a wicker net - and went to the lake to catch fish.

He was the first to catch a blue fish. Blue, shiny, with red feathers, with round eyes. The eyes are like buttons. And the fish’s tail is just like silk: blue, thin, golden hairs.

The boy took a mug, a small mug made of thin glass. He scooped some water from the lake into a mug, put the fish in the mug - let it swim for now.

The fish gets angry, fights, breaks out, and the boy quickly grabs it - bang!

The boy quietly took the fish by the tail, threw it into the mug - it was completely out of sight. He ran on himself.

“Here,” he thinks, “wait, I’ll catch a fish, a big crucian carp.”

The first one to catch a fish will be a great guy. Just don’t grab it right away, don’t swallow it: there are prickly fish - ruff, for example. Bring it, show it. I myself will tell you which fish to eat and which to spit out.

The ducklings flew and swam in all directions. And one swam the farthest. He climbed out onto the shore, shook himself off and began to waddle. What if there are fish on the shore? He sees that there is a mug under the Christmas tree. There is water in a mug. “Let me take a look.”

The fish are rushing about in the water, splashing, poking, there is nowhere to get out - there is glass everywhere. The duckling came up and saw - oh, yes, fish! He took the biggest one and picked it up. And hurry to your mother.

“I’m probably the first. I was the first to catch the fish, and I’m great.”

The fish is red, white feathers, two antennae hanging from its mouth, dark stripes on the sides, and a spot on its comb like a black eye.

The duckling flapped its wings and flew along the shore - straight to its mother.

The boy sees a duck flying, flying low, right above his head, holding a fish in its beak, a red fish as long as a finger. The boy shouted at the top of his lungs:

This is my fish! Thief duck, give it back now!

He waved his arms, threw stones, and screamed so terribly that he scared away all the fish.

The duckling got scared and screamed:

Quack quack!

He shouted “quack-quack” and lost the fish.

The fish swam into the lake, into deep water, waved its feathers, and swam home.

“How can you return to your mother with an empty beak?” - thought the duckling, turned back and flew under the Christmas tree.

He sees that there is a mug under the Christmas tree. A small mug, in the mug there is water, and in the water there are fish.

The duckling ran up and quickly grabbed the fish. A blue fish with a golden tail. Blue, shiny, with red feathers, with round eyes. The eyes are like buttons. And the fish’s tail is just like silk: blue, thin, golden hairs.

The duckling flew higher and closer to its mother.

“Well, now I won’t scream, I won’t open my beak. Once I was already gaping.”

Here you can see mom. It's already very close. And mom shouted:

Quack, what are you talking about?

Quack, this is a fish, blue, gold, - there is a glass mug under the Christmas tree.

So again the beak opened, and the fish splashed into the water! A blue fish with a golden tail. She shook her tail, whined and walked, walked, walked deeper.

The duckling turned back, flew under the tree, looked into the mug, and in the mug there was a very small fish, no bigger than a mosquito, you could barely see the fish. The duckling pecked into the water and flew back home with all his strength.

Where's your fish? - asked the duck. - I can not see anything.

But the duckling is silent and does not open its beak. He thinks: “I’m cunning! Wow, how cunning I am! Cunningest of all! I’ll be silent, otherwise I’ll open my beak and miss the fish. Dropped it twice."

And the fish in its beak beats like a thin mosquito and crawls into the throat. The duckling got scared: “Oh, I think I’ll swallow it now!” Oh, I think I swallowed it!”

The brothers arrived. Everyone has a fish. Everyone swam up to mom and poked their beaks. And the duck shouts to the duckling:

Well, now show me what you brought! The duckling opened its beak, but there was no fish.

Mitya's friends

Georgy Skrebitsky

In winter, in the December cold, a moose cow and her calf spent the night in a dense aspen forest. It's starting to get light. The sky turned pink, and the forest, covered with snow, stood all white, silent. Fine shiny frost settled on the branches and on the backs of the moose. The moose were dozing.

Suddenly, somewhere very close, the crunch of snow was heard. The moose became wary. Something gray flashed among the snow-covered trees. One moment - and the moose were already rushing away, breaking the icy crust of the crust and getting stuck knee-deep in deep snow. The wolves were chasing them. They were lighter than moose and galloped across the crust without falling through. With every second the animals are getting closer and closer.

The moose could no longer run. The elk calf stayed close to its mother. A little more - and the gray robbers will catch up and tear both of them apart.

Ahead is a clearing, a fence near the forest guardhouse, and a wide open gate.

The moose stopped: where to go? But behind, very close, the crunch of snow was heard - the wolves were overtaking. Then the moose cow, having gathered the rest of her strength, rushed straight into the gate, the elk calf followed her.

The forester's son Mitya was shoveling snow in the yard. He barely jumped to the side - the moose almost knocked him down.

Moose!.. What's wrong with them, where are they from?

Mitya ran up to the gate and involuntarily stepped back: there were wolves at the very gate.

A shiver ran down the boy’s back, but he immediately swung his shovel and shouted:

Here I am!

The animals scurried away.

Atu, atu!.. - Mitya shouted after them, jumping out of the gate.

Having driven away the wolves, the boy looked into the yard. A moose cow and a calf stood huddled in the far corner of the barn.

Look how scared they were, everything is trembling... - Mitya said affectionately. - Do not be afraid. Now it won't be touched.

And he, carefully moving away from the gate, ran home - to tell what guests had rushed into their yard.

And the moose stood in the yard, recovered from their fright and went back into the forest. Since then, they stayed in the forest near the lodge all winter.

In the morning, walking on the way to school, Mitya often saw moose from afar on the forest edge.

Having noticed the boy, they did not rush away, but only watched him carefully, pricking up their huge ears.

Mitya cheerfully nodded his head at them, like old friends, and ran further into the village.

On an unknown path

N.I. Sladkov

I had to walk on different paths: bear, boar, wolf. I walked along rabbit paths and even bird paths. But this was the first time I had walked such a path. This path was cleared and trampled by ants.

On animal trails I unraveled animal secrets. Will I see anything on this trail?

I did not walk along the path itself, but nearby. The path is too narrow - like a ribbon. But for the ants it was, of course, not a ribbon, but a wide highway. And many, many Muravyov ran along the highway. They dragged flies, mosquitoes, horseflies. The transparent wings of the insects glittered. It seemed as if a trickle of water was pouring between the blades of grass along the slope.

I walk along the ant trail and count my steps: sixty-three, sixty-four, sixty-five steps... Wow! These are my big ones, but how many ants are there?! Only at the seventieth step did the trickle disappear under the stone. Serious trail.

I sat down on a stone to rest. I sit and watch the living vein beat under my feet. The wind blows - ripples along a living stream. The sun will shine and the stream will sparkle.

Suddenly, it was as if a wave rushed along the ant road. The snake swerved along it and - dive! - under the stone on which I was sitting. I even pulled my leg back - it was probably a harmful viper. Well, rightly so - now the ants will neutralize it.

I knew that ants boldly attack snakes. They will stick around the snake and all that will remain is scales and bones. I even decided to take the skeleton of this snake and show it to the guys.

I'm sitting, waiting. A living stream beats and beats underfoot. Well, now it's time! I carefully lift the stone so as not to damage the snake skeleton. There is a snake under the stone. But not dead, but alive and not at all like a skeleton! On the contrary, she became even thicker! The snake, which was supposed to be eaten by the ants, calmly and slowly ate the Ants itself. She pressed them with her muzzle and pulled them into her mouth with her tongue. This snake was not a viper. I have never seen such snakes before. The scales are like sandpaper, fine, the top and bottom are the same. Looks more like a worm than a snake.

An amazing snake: it raised its blunt tail up, moved it from side to side, like its head, and suddenly crawled forward with its tail! But the eyes are not visible. Either a snake with two heads, or without a head at all! And it eats something - ants!

The skeleton didn't come out, so I took the snake. At home I looked at it in detail and determined the name. I found her eyes: small, about the size of a pinhead, under the scales. That's why they call it the blind snake. She lives in burrows underground. She doesn't need eyes there. But crawling either with your head or your tail forward is convenient. And she can dig the ground.

This is the unprecedented beast that the unknown path led me to.

What can I say! Every path leads somewhere. Just don’t be lazy to go.

Autumn is on the doorstep

N.I. Sladkov

Forest dwellers! - the wise Raven shouted one morning. - Autumn is at the threshold of the forest, is everyone ready for its arrival?

Ready, ready, ready...

But we'll check it now! - Raven croaked. - First of all, autumn will let the cold into the forest - what will you do?

The animals responded:

We, squirrels, hares, foxes, will change into winter coats!

We, badgers, raccoons, will hide in warm holes!

We, hedgehogs, bats, will fall into a deep sleep!

The birds responded:

We, the migratory ones, will fly away to warmer lands!

We, sedentary people, will put on down padded jackets!

Secondly, - the Raven shouts, - autumn will begin to rip off the leaves from the trees!

Let him rip it off! - the birds responded. - The berries will be more visible!

Let him rip it off! - the animals responded. - It will become quieter in the forest!

The third thing, - the Raven does not let up, - autumn will click the last insects with frost!

The birds responded:

And we, blackbirds, will fall on the rowan tree!

And we, woodpeckers, will begin to peel the cones!

And we, goldfinches, will get to the weeds!

The animals responded:

And we will sleep more peacefully without mosquito flies!

The fourth thing,” the Raven buzzes, “autumn will become boring!” He will catch up with dark clouds, let down tedious rains, and incite dreary winds. The day will be shortened, the sun will be hidden in your bosom!

Let him pester himself! - the birds and animals responded in unison. - You won’t keep us bored! What do we care about rain and wind when we

in fur coats and down jackets! Let's be well-fed - we won't get bored!

The wise Raven wanted to ask something else, but he waved his wing and took off.

He flies, and under him is a forest, multi-colored, motley - autumn.

Autumn has already crossed the threshold. But it didn’t scare anyone at all.

Hunting for a butterfly

MM. Prishvin

Zhulka, my young marbled blue hunting dog, runs like crazy after birds, after butterflies, even after large flies until the hot breath throws her tongue out of her mouth. But that doesn't stop her either.

Today there was such a story in front of everyone.

The yellow cabbage butterfly caught my eye. Giselle rushed after her, jumped and missed. The butterfly continued to move. The crook is behind her - hap! At least there’s something for the butterfly: it flies, flutters, as if laughing.

Hap! - past. Hap, hap! - past and past.

Hap, hap, hap - and there is no butterfly in the air.

Where is our butterfly? Excitement began among the children. "Ahah!" - that was all I could hear.

The butterfly is not in the air, the cabbage plant has disappeared. Giselle herself stands motionless, like wax, turning her head up, down, and sideways in surprise.

Where is our butterfly?

At this time, hot steam began to press inside Zhulka’s mouth - dogs don’t have sweat glands. The mouth opened, the tongue fell out, steam escaped, and along with the steam a butterfly flew out and, as if nothing had happened to it at all, fluttered about over the meadow.

Zhulka was so exhausted with this butterfly, it was probably so difficult for her to hold her breath with the butterfly in her mouth, that now, having seen the butterfly, she suddenly gave up. With her long, pink tongue hanging out, she stood and looked at the flying butterfly with eyes that immediately became small and stupid.

The children pestered us with the question:

Well, why doesn’t a dog have sweat glands?

We didn't know what to tell them.

Schoolboy Vasya Veselkin answered them:

If dogs had glands and they didn’t have to laugh, they would have caught and eaten all the butterflies a long time ago.

Under the snow

N.I. Sladkov

Snow poured out and covered the ground. The various small fry were happy that no one would find them under the snow now. One animal even boasted:

Guess who I am? Looks like a mouse, not a mouse. The size of a rat, not a rat. I live in the forest, and I’m called Vole. I am a water vole, and simply - water rat. Even though I am a merman, I am not sitting in the water, but under the snow. Because in winter all the water froze. I’m not the only one sitting under the snow now; many have become snowdrops for the winter. We've waited for carefree days. Now I’ll run to my pantry and pick out the biggest potato...

Here, from above, a black beak pokes through the snow: in front, behind, on the side! Vole bit her tongue, shrank and closed her eyes.

It was the Raven who heard the Vole and began to poke his beak into the snow. He walked above, poked, and listened.

Did you hear it, or what? - muttered. And he flew away.

The vole took a breath and whispered to herself:

Phew, how nice it smells like mouse meat!

Vole rushed backwards with all her short legs. I barely escaped. I caught my breath and thought: “I’ll be silent - the Raven won’t find me. What about Lisa? Maybe roll out in the grass dust to fight off the mouse spirit? I will do so. And I’ll live in peace, no one will find me.”

And from the snorkel - Laska!

“I found you,” he says. He says this affectionately, and her eyes shoot out green sparkles. And the little white teeth shine. - I found you, Vole!

A vole in a hole - Weasel follows it. Vole in the snow - and Weasel in the snow, Vole in the snow - and Weasel in the snow. I barely escaped.

Only in the evening - without breathing! - Vole crept into her pantry and there - with a look around, listening and sniffing! - I chewed a potato from the edge. And I was glad about that. And she no longer boasted that her life under the snow was carefree. And keep your ears open under the snow, and there they will hear and smell you.

About the elephant

Boris Zhidkov

We were approaching India by boat. They were supposed to come in the morning. I changed my shift, was tired and couldn’t fall asleep: I kept thinking about how it would be there. It’s like if, as a child, they brought me a whole box of toys and only tomorrow I can uncork it. I kept thinking - in the morning, I’ll immediately open my eyes - and Indians, black, will come around, muttering incomprehensibly, not like in the picture. Bananas right on the bush

the city is new - everything will move and play. And elephants! The main thing is that I wanted to see the elephants. I still couldn’t believe that they weren’t there like in the zoological department, but were simply walking around and carrying things around: suddenly such a huge mass was rushing down the street!

I couldn’t sleep; my legs were itching with impatience. After all, you know, when you travel by land, it’s not at all the same: you see how everything gradually changes. And then for two weeks the ocean - water and water - and immediately new country. It's like the curtain has been raised in a theater.

The next morning they stamped on the deck and began to buzz. I rushed to the porthole, to the window - it was ready: the white city stood on the shore; port, ships, near the side of the boat: they are black in white turbans - their teeth are shining, they are shouting something; the sun is shining with all its might, pressing, it seems, pressing with light. Then I went crazy, I literally suffocated: as if I was not me and it was all a fairy tale. I haven't wanted to eat anything since the morning. Dear comrades, I will stand two watches at sea for you - let me go ashore as soon as possible.

The two of them jumped out onto the shore. In the port, in the city, everything is seething, boiling, people are milling about, and we are like crazy and don’t know what to look at, and we don’t walk, as if something is carrying us (and even after the sea, it’s always strange to walk along the shore). We look - a tram. We got on the tram, we didn’t really know why we were going, just to keep going - we went crazy. The tram rushes us along, we stare around and don’t notice that we have reached the outskirts. It doesn't go any further. We got out. Road. Let's go along the road. Let's come somewhere!

Here we calmed down a little and noticed that it was very hot. The sun is above the crown itself; the shadow does not fall from you, but the whole shadow is under you: you walk and trample on your shadow.

We've already walked quite a distance, there are no more people to meet, we look - an elephant is approaching. There are four guys with him, running along the road. I couldn’t believe my eyes: I hadn’t seen one in the city, but here it was just walking along the road. It seemed to me that I had escaped from the zoological. The elephant saw us and stopped. We felt terrified: there was no one big with him, the guys were alone. Who knows what's on his mind. Moves its trunk once - and it's done.

And the elephant probably thought this about us: some extraordinary, unknown people are coming - who knows? And so he did. Now he bent his trunk with a hook, the older boy stood on this hook, like on a step, holding the trunk with his hand, and the elephant carefully sent it onto his head. He sat there between his ears, as if on a table.

Then the elephant, in the same order, sent two more at once, and the third was small, probably about four years old - he was only wearing a short shirt, like a bra. The elephant offers its trunk to him - go, sit down. And he does all sorts of tricks, laughs, runs away. The elder shouts to him from above, and he jumps and teases - you won’t take it, they say. The elephant did not wait, lowered his trunk and walked away - pretending that he did not want to look at his tricks. He walks, sways his trunk rhythmically, and the boy curls around his legs and makes faces. And just when he was not expecting anything, the elephant suddenly grabbed his trunk! Yes, so clever! He caught him by the back of his shirt and lifted him up carefully. With his arms and legs, like a bug. No way! None for you. The elephant picked it up, carefully lowered it onto its head, and there the guys accepted it. He was there, on an elephant, still trying to fight.

We caught up, walking along the side of the road, and the elephant was on the other side, looking at us carefully and cautiously. And the guys also stare at us and whisper among themselves. They sit, as if at home, on the roof.

This, I think, is great: they have nothing to fear there. Even if a tiger were to come across, the elephant would catch the tiger, grab it across the stomach with its trunk, squeeze it, throw it higher than a tree, and, if it doesn’t catch it with its tusks, it would still trample it with its feet until it crushed it into a cake.

And then he picked up the boy like a booger, with two fingers: carefully and carefully.

An elephant passed us: we looked, it turned off the road and ran into the bushes. The bushes are dense, prickly, and grow like walls. And he - through them, like through weeds - only the branches crunch - climbed over and went to the forest. He stopped near a tree, took a branch with his trunk and bent it down to the guys. They immediately jumped to their feet, grabbed a branch and robbed something from it. And the little one jumps up, tries to grab it for himself, fidgets as if he were not on an elephant, but standing on the ground. The elephant let go of a branch and bent another one. Same story again. Here the little one, apparently, has stepped into the role: he completely climbed onto this branch so that he too would get it, and he works. Everyone finished, the elephant let go of the branch, and the little one, lo and behold, flew off with the branch. Well, we think he disappeared - now he flew like a bullet into the forest. We rushed there. No, where is it going? Do not get through the bushes: prickly, and dense, and tangled. We look, an elephant is rummaging through the leaves with its trunk. I felt for this little one - he was apparently clinging on like a monkey - took him out and put him in his place. Then the elephant walked onto the road in front of us and walked back. We're behind him. He walks and from time to time looks around, looks sideways at us: why, they say, are some people walking behind us? So we came to the house to get the elephant. There is a fence around. The elephant opened the gate with its trunk and carefully poked its head into the yard; there he lowered the guys to the ground. In the yard, a Hindu woman started shouting something at him. She didn't notice us right away. And we stand, looking through the fence.

The Hindu woman yells at the elephant, - the elephant reluctantly turned and went to the well. There are two pillars dug in at the well, and a view between them; there is a rope wound on it and a handle on the side. We look, the elephant took the handle with its trunk and began to twirl it: it twirled it as if it was empty, and pulled it out - there was a whole tub there on a rope, ten buckets. The elephant rested the root of its trunk against the handle to prevent it from spinning, bent its trunk, picked up the tub and, like a mug of water, placed it on the side of the well. The woman fetched water and made the boys carry it too - she was just doing the laundry. The elephant lowered the tub again and twisted the full one up.

The hostess began to scold him again. The elephant put the tub into the well, shook his ears and walked away - he didn’t get any more water, he went under the canopy. And there, in the corner of the yard, a canopy was built on flimsy posts - just enough for an elephant to crawl under it. There are reeds and some long leaves thrown on top.

Here it’s just an Indian, the owner himself. He saw us. We say - we came to see the elephant. The owner knew a little English and asked who we were; everything points to my Russian cap. I say Russians. And he didn’t even know what Russians were.

Not the British?

No, I say, not the British.

He was happy, laughed, and immediately became different: he called to him.

But Indians cannot stand the British: the British conquered their country long ago, rule there and keep the Indians under their thumb.

I'm asking:

Why doesn't the elephant come out?

And he, he says, was offended, and that means it was not in vain. Now he won’t work for anything until he leaves.

We look, the elephant came out from under the canopy, through the gate - and away from the yard. We think it will go away completely now. And the Indian laughs. The elephant went to the tree, leaned on its side and, well, rubbed. The tree is healthy - everything is just shaking. He itches like a pig against a fence.

He scratched himself, collected dust in his trunk and, wherever he scratched, dust and earth as he blew! Once, and again, and again! He cleans this so that nothing gets stuck in the folds: all his skin is hard, like a sole, and in the folds it is thinner, and in the southern countries there are a lot of all kinds of biting insects.

After all, look at him: he doesn’t itch on the posts in the barn, so as not to fall apart, he even carefully makes his way there, but goes to the tree to itch. I say to the Hindu:

How smart he is!

And he laughs.

Well,” he says, “if I had lived for one and a half hundred years, I would have learned the wrong thing.” And he,” he points to the elephant, “baby-sat my grandfather.”

I looked at the elephant - it seemed to me that it was not the Hindu who was the master here, but the elephant, the elephant was the most important one here.

I speak:

Is it your old one?

No,” he says, “he’s one hundred and fifty years old, he’s just in time!” I have a baby elephant over there, his son, he’s twenty years old, just a child. By the age of forty, one begins to gain strength. Just wait, the elephant will come, you will see: he is small.

A mother elephant came, and with her a baby elephant - the size of a horse, without tusks; he followed his mother like a foal.

The Hindu boys rushed to help their mother, began jumping and getting ready somewhere. The elephant also went; the elephant and the baby elephant are with them. The Hindu explains that he is on the river. We are also with the guys.

They didn't shy away from us. Everyone tried to speak - they in their own way, we in Russian - and laughed all the way. The little one pestered us the most - he kept putting on my cap and shouting something funny - maybe about us.

The air in the forest is fragrant, spicy, thick. We walked through the forest. We came to the river.

Not a river, but a stream - fast, it rushes, it gnaws at the shore. To the water there is a cut off a yard long. The elephants entered the water and took the baby elephant with them. They put him where the water was up to his chest, and the two of them began to wash him. They will collect sand and water from the bottom into the trunk and, as if from a gut, water it. It's great - only the splashes fly.

And the guys are afraid to get into the water - the current is too fast and will carry them away. They jump on the shore and throw stones at the elephant. He doesn’t care, he doesn’t even pay attention - he keeps washing his baby elephant. Then, I look, he took some water into his trunk and suddenly he turned towards the boys and blew a stream straight into the belly of one - he sat down. He laughs and bursts out.

The elephant washes his own again. And the guys pester him even more with pebbles. The elephant just shakes his ears: don’t pester me, you see, there’s no time to play around! And just when the boys weren’t waiting, they thought he would blow water on the baby elephant, he immediately turned his trunk towards them.

They are happy and tumble.

The elephant came ashore; The baby elephant extended its trunk to him like a hand. The elephant intertwined its trunk with his and helped him climb out onto the cliff.

Everyone went home: three elephants and four children.

The next day I asked where I could see elephants at work.

At the edge of the forest, near the river, a whole city of hewn logs is fenced in: the stacks stand, each as high as a hut. There was one elephant standing right there. And it was immediately clear that he was quite an old man - his skin was completely sagging and stiff, and his trunk was dangling like a rag. The ears are kind of chewed off. I see another elephant coming out of the forest. A log is swinging in its trunk - a huge hewn beam. There must be a hundred pounds. The porter waddles heavily and approaches the old elephant. The old man picks up the log from one end, and the porter lowers the log and moves his trunk to the other end. I look: what are they going to do? And the elephants together, as if on command, lifted the log up on their trunks and carefully placed it on the stack. Yes, so smoothly and correctly - like a carpenter on a construction site.

And not a single person around them.

I later found out that this old elephant is the main worker of the artel: he has already grown old in this work.

The porter walked slowly into the forest, and the old man hung up his trunk, turned his back to the stack and began to look at the river, as if he wanted to say: “I’m tired of this, and I wouldn’t look.”

And the third elephant with a log is already coming out of the forest. We are going to where the elephants came from.

It’s downright embarrassing to tell you what we saw here. Elephants from the forest workings carried these logs to the river. In one place near the road there are two trees on the sides, so much so that an elephant with a log cannot pass. The elephant will reach this place, lower the log to the ground, tuck his knees, tuck his trunk, and with his very nose, the very root of his trunk, pushes the log forward. The earth and stones fly, the log rubs and plows the earth, and the elephant crawls and kicks. You can see how difficult it is for him to crawl on his knees. Then he gets up, catches his breath and doesn’t immediately take up the log. Again he will turn him across the road, again on his knees. He puts his trunk on the ground and rolls the log onto the trunk with his knees. How can the trunk not crush! Look, he's already up and running again. The log on its trunk swings like a heavy pendulum.

There were eight of them - all elephant porters - and each had to push the log with his nose: people did not want to cut down the two trees that stood on the road.

It became unpleasant for us to watch the old man straining at the stack, and we felt sorry for the elephants that were crawling on their knees. We didn't stay long and left.

Fluff

Georgy Skrebitsky

There was a hedgehog living in our house; he was tame. When they stroked him, he pressed the thorns to his back and became completely soft. For this we nicknamed him Fluff.

If Fluffy was hungry, he would chase me like a dog. At the same time, the hedgehog puffed, snorted and bit my legs, demanding food.

In the summer I took Pushka for a walk in the garden. He ran along the paths, caught frogs, beetles, snails and ate them with appetite.

When winter came, I stopped taking Fluffy for walks and kept him at home. We now fed Cannon with milk, soup, and soaked bread. Sometimes a hedgehog would eat enough, climb behind the stove, curl up in a ball and sleep. And in the evening he will get out and start running around the rooms. He runs around all night, stomps his paws, and disturbs everyone's sleep. So he lived in our house for more than half the winter and never went outside.

But one day I was getting ready to sled down the mountain, but there were no comrades in the yard. I decided to take Cannon with me. He took out a box, laid it with hay and put the hedgehog in it, and to make it warmer, he also covered it with hay on top. He put the box in the sled and ran to the pond where we always slid down the mountain.

I ran at full speed, imagining myself as a horse, and was carrying Pushka in a sled.

It was very good: the sun was shining, the frost stung my ears and nose. But the wind had completely died down, so that the smoke from the village chimneys did not billow, but rose into the sky in straight columns.

I looked at these pillars, and it seemed to me that this was not smoke at all, but thick blue ropes were coming down from the sky and small toy houses were tied to them by pipes below.

I rode my fill from the mountain and took the sled with the hedgehog home.

As I was driving, suddenly I met some guys: they were running to the village to look at the dead wolf. The hunters had just brought him there.

I quickly put the sled in the barn and also rushed to the village after the guys. We stayed there until the evening. They watched how the skin was removed from the wolf and how it was straightened out on a wooden spear.

I only remembered about Pushka the next day. I was very scared that he had run away somewhere. He immediately rushed into the barn, to the sled. I look - my Fluff lies curled up in a box and does not move. No matter how much I shook or shook him, he didn’t even move. During the night, apparently, he completely froze and died.

I ran to the guys and told them about my misfortune. We all grieved together, but there was nothing to do, and decided to bury Pushka in the garden, burying him in the snow in the very box in which he died.

For a whole week we all grieved for poor Fluffy. And then they gave me a live owl - he was caught in our barn. He was wild. We began to tame him and forgot about Cannon.

But spring has come, and how warm it is! One morning I went to the garden: it’s especially nice there in the spring - the finches are singing, the sun is shining, there are huge puddles all around, like lakes. I make my way carefully along the path so as not to scoop mud into my galoshes. Suddenly, ahead, in a pile of last year’s leaves, something moved. I stopped. Who is this animal? Which? A familiar face appeared from under the dark leaves, and black eyes looked straight at me.

Without remembering myself, I rushed to the animal. A second later I was already holding Fluffy in my hands, and he sniffed my fingers, snorted and poked my palm with his cold nose, demanding food.

Right there on the ground lay a thawed box of hay, in which Fluff had happily slept all winter. I picked up the box, put the hedgehog in it and brought it home in triumph.

Guys and ducklings

MM. Prishvin

A small wild teal duck finally decided to move her ducklings from the forest, bypassing the village, into the lake to freedom. In the spring, this lake overflowed far and a solid place for a nest could only be found about three miles away, on a hummock, in a swampy forest. And when the water subsided, we had to travel all three miles to the lake.

In places open to the eyes of man, fox and hawk, the mother walked behind so as not to let the ducklings out of sight for a minute. And near the forge, when crossing the road, she, of course, let them go ahead. That’s where the guys saw it and threw their hats at me. All the time while they were catching the ducklings, the mother ran after them with an open beak or flew several steps in different directions in the greatest excitement. The guys were just about to throw hats at their mother and catch her like ducklings, but then I approached.

What will you do with the ducklings? - I asked the guys sternly.

They chickened out and replied:

Let's go.

Let's "let it go"! - I said very angrily. - Why did you need to catch them? Where is mother now?

And there he sits! - the guys answered in unison. And they pointed me to a nearby hillock of a fallow field, where the duck was actually sitting with her mouth open in excitement.

Quickly,” I ordered the guys, “go and return all the ducklings to her!”

They even seemed to be delighted at my order and ran straight up the hill with the ducklings. The mother flew away a little and, when the guys left, rushed to save her sons and daughters. In her own way, she quickly said something to them and ran to the oat field. Five ducklings ran after her, and so through the oat field, bypassing the village, the family continued its journey to the lake.

I joyfully took off my hat and, waving it, shouted:

Bon voyage, ducklings!

The guys laughed at me.

Why are you laughing, you fools? - I told the guys. - Do you think it’s so easy for ducklings to get into the lake? Quickly take off all your hats and shout “goodbye”!

And the same hats, dusty on the road while catching ducklings, rose into the air, and the guys all shouted at once:

Goodbye, ducklings!

Blue bast shoe

MM. Prishvin

There are highways through our large forest with separate paths for cars, trucks, carts and pedestrians. Now, for this highway, only the forest has been cut down as a corridor. It’s good to look along the clearing: two green walls of the forest and the sky at the end. When the forest was cut down, the large trees were taken away somewhere, while small brushwood - rookery - was collected in huge piles. They wanted to take away the rookery to heat the factory, but they couldn’t manage it, and the heaps throughout the wide clearing were left to spend the winter.

In the fall, hunters complained that the hares had disappeared somewhere, and some associated this disappearance of the hares with deforestation: they chopped, knocked, made noise and scared them away. When the powder flew in and all the hare’s tricks could be seen in the tracks, the ranger Rodionich came and said:

- The blue bast shoe all lies under the heaps of the Rook.

Rodionich, unlike all hunters, did not call the hare “slash”, but always “blue bast shoe”; there is nothing to be surprised here: after all, a hare is no more like a devil than a bast shoe, and if they say that there are no blue bast shoes in the world, then I will say that there are no slanting devils either.

The rumor about the hares under the heaps instantly spread throughout our town, and on the day off, hunters led by Rodionich began to flock to me.

Early in the morning, at dawn, we went hunting without dogs: Rodionich was such a skill that he could drive a hare to a hunter better than any hound. As soon as it became visible enough that it was possible to distinguish the tracks of a fox from a hare, we took the hare's trail, followed it, and, of course, it led us to one heap of rookery, high as ours. wooden house with mezzanine. There was supposed to be a hare lying under this heap, and we, having prepared our guns, stood in a circle.

“Come on,” we said to Rodionich.

- Get out, blue bast shoe! - he shouted and stuck a long stick under the pile.

The hare did not jump out. Rodionich was dumbfounded. And, after thinking, with a very serious face, looking at every little thing in the snow, he walked around the whole pile and walked around again in a large circle: there was no exit trail anywhere.

“He’s here,” Rodionich said confidently. - Take your seats, guys, he’s here. Ready?

- Let's! - we shouted.

- Get out, blue bast shoe! - Rodionich shouted and stabbed three times under the rookery with such a long stick that the end of it on the other side almost knocked one young hunter off his feet.

And now - no, the hare did not jump out!

Such embarrassment had never happened to our oldest tracker in his life: even his face seemed to have fallen a little. We started to get into a fuss, everyone began to guess about something in their own way, stick their nose into everything, walk back and forth in the snow and so, erasing all traces, taking away any opportunity to unravel the clever hare’s trick.

And so, I see, Rodionich suddenly beamed, sat down, contentedly, on a stump at a distance from the hunters, rolled himself a cigarette and blinked, so he blinked at me and beckoned me to him. Having realized the matter, I approach Rodionich unnoticed by everyone, and he points me up, to the very top of a high pile of rookery covered with snow.

“Look,” he whispers, “the blue bast shoe is playing a trick with us.”

It took me a while to see two black dots on the white snow—the hare’s eyes and two more small dots—the black tips of long white ears. It was the head that stuck out from under the rookery and turned in different directions after the hunters: where they went, there the head went.

As soon as I raised my gun, the life of the smart hare would have ended in an instant. But I felt sorry: you never know how many of them, stupid ones, are lying under the heaps!..

Rodionich understood me without words. He crushed a dense lump of snow for himself, waited until the hunters were crowded on the other side of the heap, and, having outlined himself well, launched this lump at the hare.

I never thought that our ordinary white hare, if he suddenly stood on a heap, and even jumped two arshins up, and appeared against the sky - that our hare could seem like a giant on a huge rock!

What happened to the hunters? The hare fell straight from the sky towards them. In an instant, everyone grabbed their guns - it was very easy to kill. But each hunter wanted to kill before the other, and each, of course, grabbed it without aiming at all, and the lively hare set off into the bushes.

- Here's a blue bast shoe! - Rodionich said after him admiringly.

The hunters once again managed to hit the bushes.

- Killed! - shouted one, young, hot.

But suddenly, as if in response to “killed,” a tail flashed in the distant bushes; For some reason, hunters always call this tail a flower.

The blue bast shoe waved only its “flower” to the hunters from the distant bushes.

Brave duckling

Boris Zhitkov

Every morning the housewife brought out a full plate of chopped eggs for the ducklings. She put the plate near the bush and left.

As soon as the ducklings ran up to the plate, suddenly a large dragonfly flew out of the garden and began to circle above them.

She chirped so terribly that the frightened ducklings ran away and hid in the grass. They were afraid that the dragonfly would bite them all.

And the evil dragonfly sat on the plate, tasted the food and then flew away. After this, the ducklings did not come to the plate for the whole day. They were afraid that the dragonfly would fly again. In the evening, the hostess removed the plate and said: “Our ducklings must be sick, for some reason they are not eating anything.” Little did she know that the ducklings went to bed hungry every night.

One day, their neighbor, the little duckling Alyosha, came to visit the ducklings. When the ducklings told him about the dragonfly, he began to laugh.

What brave men! - he said. - I alone will drive away this dragonfly. You'll see tomorrow.

“You are bragging,” said the ducklings, “tomorrow you will be the first to get scared and run.”

The next morning, the hostess, as always, put a plate of chopped eggs on the ground and left.

Well, look, - said the brave Alyosha, - now I will fight with your dragonfly.

As soon as he said this, a dragonfly began to buzz. It flew straight from above onto the plate.

The ducklings wanted to run away, but Alyosha was not afraid. Before the dragonfly had time to sit on the plate, Alyosha grabbed its wing with his beak. She forcibly escaped and flew away with a broken wing.

Since then, she never flew into the garden, and the ducklings ate their fill every day. They not only ate themselves, but also treated the brave Alyosha for saving them from the dragonfly.

IN early childhood all children love fairy tales. But an age comes when parents and schools select more realistic literature for the child. Stories about animals will enrich knowledge about the world around us, expand lexicon. Today I will tell you about 5 books containing wonderful works, some of them I will analyze in detail.

For younger readers who are passionate about the animal world, I have already written in a separate article.

The Watercolor publishing house has released a wonderful book with stories by Nikolai Sladkov and illustrations by Evgeny Charushin. Our copy is in soft cover, A4 size, with matte, thick, snow-white paper. The book is only 16 pages and of course I understand that there is no point in making it a hard cover. Bit I'd like .

In this book, the stories about animals are somewhat similar to fairy tales, but do not be deceived. They tell us about real facts. Below we will look at one of the works for clarity.

The book includes stories:

• Why is November piebald? - O weather conditions In November;
• Uninvited Guests - about birds and insects drinking sweet maple sap;
• The Bear and the Sun - about how the bear wakes up in the spring;
• Forest strongmen - about mushrooms that hold leaves, snails and even a frog on their caps;
• A hedgehog ran along the path - about what a hedgehog eats and what dangers await it in the forest.

Sladkov “A hedgehog ran along the path” - read

A hedgehog ran along the path - only his heels flashed. I ran and thought: “My legs are fast, my thorns are sharp - I’ll live in the forest as a joke.” Met the Snail and said:

- Well, Snail, let's race. Whoever overtakes whom will eat him.

Stupid Snail says:

The Snail and the Hedgehog set off. Ulitka’s speed is known to be seven steps per week. And the Hedgehog, with its legs thumping and thumping, its nose grunting and grunting, caught up with the Snail, crunched and ate it.

- That's it, bug-eyed, let's race. Whoever overtakes whom will eat him.

The Frog and the Hedgehog set off. Jump-jump Frog, thump-thump-thump Hedgehog. He caught up with the frog, grabbed it by the leg and ate it.

“It’s okay,” the Hedgehog thinks, “my legs are fast, my spines are sharp. I ate the Snail, I ate the Frog - now I’ll get to the Owl!”

The brave Hedgehog scratched his well-fed belly with his paw and said casually:

- Come on, Owl, let's race. And if I catch up, I’ll eat it!

The owl narrowed his eyes and answered:

- Boo-boo-have it your way!

The Owl and the Hedgehog set off.

The Hedgehog didn’t even have time to flash his heel when the Owl flew at him, beat him with his wide wings, and screamed in a bad voice.

“My wings,” he shouts, “are faster than your legs, my claws are longer than your thorns!” I’m not your Frog and Snail - now I’ll swallow it whole and spit out the thorns!

The Hedgehog was frightened, but did not lose his head: he shrank under the roots and rolled away. I sat there until the morning.

No, you can’t live, apparently, joking in the forest. Jokes, jokes, and look!

A hedgehog ran along the path - summary

As you can see, the stories about animals in this book are quite short. They are written in lively language that attracts the child’s attention. Many kids are attracted to hedgehogs; they seem like cute creatures with an elongated muzzle and the ability to curl up like a toy ball. But as I wrote above, the moment comes when it is possible and necessary to give true information to the grown-up consciousness. Nikolai Sladkov does this superbly, without veiling the essence of this small animal.

Let's remember what is shown in all children's books as food for a hedgehog? Acorns, mushrooms, berries and fruits. Most carry this knowledge throughout their lives. But they are half true. This cute creature also feeds on snails, earthworms, a variety of insects, mice, snakes, frogs, chicks and bird eggs.

After reading Sladkov’s story “A hedgehog ran along the path,” discuss it with your child summary. Explain that the cute prickly animal does not need only insects for food. He excellent hunter and is also voracious, especially after hibernation. From the work it is clear that he eats snails and frogs; you can expand the story if you think that your child is ready to perceive this information. The author also shows us that the hedgehogs themselves have enemies. The story talks about an eagle owl, which in fact is their main enemy in nature. You can broaden your child’s horizons by telling him about other enemies: badgers, foxes, martens, wolves.

At the end you can see an interesting documentary about the life of hedgehogs. A bunch of interesting facts, excellent shooting quality. Sit down with your child and watch the video together, making comments about facts you already know or vice versa, paying attention to those that have become new. Alexander and I made popcorn and plunged into learning about the life of these animals.

Zhitkov “Mongoose”

Book in the Labyrinth

I will continue the review with this interesting story Boris Zhitkov, which fit in a thin copy published by the same publishing house Aquarelle. The book has already been described in sufficient detail by me in the article. By clicking on the link you can read a summary of the story, as well as watch the video “Mongoose vs. Cobra”. I highly recommend this work to older preschoolers and younger schoolchildren. My son and I have read it three times over the past 5 months, and each time, discussing what we read, we learned something new from the life of mongooses.

Paustovsky “The Disheveled Sparrow”

Book in the Labyrinth

Describing stories about animals, I could not leave aside the wonderful book published by the Makhaon publishing house. It was ideal for my son, who is now 5 years 11 months old, as it contains stories and fairy tales by Konstantin Paustovsky. I've been eyeing the Library of Children's Classics series for a long time. But knowing the mistakes of this publishing house, I couldn’t make up my mind for a long time. And as it turned out, it was in vain. Hard cover with embossing. The pages are not very thick, but they are not see-through either. The pictures on each spread are quite pleasant to perceive. There are 6 short stories and 4 fairy tales on 126 pages.

1. Thief cat
2. Badger nose
3. Hare's feet
4. Residents of the old house
5. Collection of miracles
6. Farewell to summer
7. Tree frog
8. Disheveled Sparrow
9. dense bear
10. caring flower

I analyzed in more detail the fairy tale that my son and I loved. It is called the same as the whole book “The Disheveled Sparrow”. I will say right away that despite the fact that the sparrow has a name and performs a truly fabulous act, this work is filled with real facts about bird life. The writing language is so beautiful and rich! And the story itself is so sentimental that reading it twice, I both cried.

Having started to write a summary, describe the main characters and main idea works, I realized that I needed to put my runaway imagination into a separate article. If you are wondering whether Paustovsky’s works are age appropriate for your child or if you have children school age, then I ask you. This fairy tale is told at school with filling reader's diary, I hope that what I have written will help your children complete their assignments.

Kitten Pushinka, or the Christmas miracle

Book in the Labyrinth

Stories about animals can be more documentary or more cute. The “Good Stories about Animals” series from the Eksmo publishing house includes precisely cute stories. They teach kindness and there is a desire to have a beautiful shaggy dog ​​at home. Author Holly Webb has written several books about kittens and puppies. Apart from what they tell us about the lives of animals, the events take place in an interesting story. The reader wants to continue reading, worries about the baby, learning along the way what different life animals.

Of the entire series, we have only one book by Holly Webb, “Fluffy the Kitten, or the Christmas Miracle,” purchased last year. I described it in a separate article, but this work was not included there because we did not have time to read it. The publisher recommends it for children over 6 years of age. You can read at 5, but then you will have to divide the reading into chapters, since it will be difficult for the baby to listen long story in one sitting. Today, when my son is almost 6 years old, it is convenient for us to read it in 2 sittings.

The font of the book is really large in size, so that reading children can read on their own without risking their eyesight. The illustrations are black and white, but very cute. The only negative is their small number. On this moment, Alexander calmly listens to the story, almost without pictures. But just a year ago, this very moment was a stumbling block.

Because of these two factors: long text and few illustrations, I recommend the book to children aged 6-8. The text itself is written in easy language and has interesting turns of events. The stories about animals by Holly Webb are close to my heart and I plan to buy another book from this series, this time about a puppy.

Summary of “Pushinka the Kitten, or the Christmas Miracle”

The main characters are the kitten Pushinka and the girl Ella. But they did not meet right away, although they experienced love for each other at first sight. It all started with the fact that on a farm, which is located on the outskirts of a small town, a cat gave birth to 5 kittens. One of the kittens turned out to be much smaller in size than his brothers and sisters. A girl and her mother, who lived on a farm, fed the kitten with a pipette in the hope that it would survive. After 8 weeks, the kittens got stronger and they needed to look for a home, for which notices were posted. Everyone except Pushinka quickly found their owners. But the smallest, weakest, but at the same time fluffy and charming cat couldn’t do it.

And then mom and Ella stopped by the farm to buy Christmas wreaths. The girl saw the kitten and was immediately ready to take it. But mom was not at all nice to this idea. Ella had to give in and leave without sweet Fluffy. But when she returned home, the girl was so sad that the parents decided to give in, provided that the daughter would properly care for the kitten. Imagine their surprise when, upon returning to the farm, they learned that Fluffy had disappeared.

Quite a lot befell the little girl, who decided to go looking for the girl, because she liked her so much! On the way, the kitten meets a rat, a dachshund and its owner, a feisty cat, and a fox who saved her life. The reader seems to be experiencing, together with the kitten, the cold of December nights, the hunger and anger of the world around him. I just want to shout: “People, stop! Look at your feet! You are preparing for the holiday of goodness, so do goodness!”

Like all Christmas stories, this one ends with a happy ending. The kind girl and sweet little Pushinka did not meet right away. But they saw each other thanks to a miracle that always happens on Christmas Eve.

Stories about animals by E. Charushin - Tyupa, Tomka and Soroka

Book in the Labyrinth

I put this book in last place, since the stories about animals written by Evgeny Charushin did not captivate us. They are really about animals and birds, but the language is not melodious to read. While reading, I kept having the feeling that I was “stumbling.” The works themselves end somehow abruptly. It was as if a sequel was supposed to happen, but the author changed his mind. However, who am I to criticize a writer whose works were included in a schoolchild’s library. Therefore, I will simply describe them in a few sentences.

The main characters of the stories are:

• Tyupa;
• Tomka;
• Magpie.

But there is not a single story where they met together. The book includes 14 works, 3 of which are about the kitten Tyupa, 1 about Soroka and 6 about the hunting dog Tomka. My son and I liked the stories about Tomka the most; they have a sense of completeness. In addition, the book contains stories about the cat Punka, two bears, fox cubs and a starling. You can learn facts from the life of animals by reading the works of E. Charushin, BUT! the parent will have to heavily supplement them with information, explanations, videos, and encyclopedic data. In general, work on them no less, or rather more, than on those that I described above.

Dear readers, this is where I will end my review today. I hope that the stories I described about animals gave you the opportunity to choose what exactly your child needs. What animals do you want to introduce him to? And how can you supplement the information received from books? I would be very grateful if you share your impressions of the article in the comments. If you think that this information will be useful for other parents to read, share it on social media. networks using the buttons below.

The stories of Konstantin Dmitrievich Ushinsky are very sincere. He wrote about what he saw around him while still a barefoot boy - about animals, about nature, about village life. Stories about animals are full of warmth and kindness; they call for treating our smaller brothers with care and respect. “Bishka” alone is worth it: in three sentences, Ushinsky expressed the entire important essence of a dog. Animals in his stories reveal themselves like people, standing on a par with us, each with their own character, and what a character! Let's get to know these animals better and read the stories. To read offline, you can download a pdf file with Ushinsky’s stories about animals at the bottom of the page. All stories with pictures!

K.D.Ushinsky

Stories about animals

Bishka (story)

Come on, Bishka, read what’s written in the book!

The dog sniffed the book and walked away.

The Lively Cow (short story)

We had a cow, but it was so characteristic and lively that it was a disaster! Maybe that’s why she had little milk.

Both her mother and sisters suffered with her. It happened that they would drive her into the herd, and she would either come home at noon or end up dead - go help her out!

Especially when she had a calf - I couldn’t help it! Once she even tore up the whole barn with her horns, she fought towards the calf, and her horns were long and straight. More than once, her father was going to saw off her horns, but somehow he kept putting it off, as if he had a presentiment of something.

And how evasive and quick she was! If he raises his tail, lowers his head, and waves, you won’t be able to catch him on a horse.

One day in the summer she came running from the shepherd, long before evening: she had a calf at home. The mother milked the cow, released the calf and said to her sister, a girl about twelve years old:

Drive them to the river, Fenya, let them graze on the bank, and be careful that they don’t get in the way. Night is still so far away that it is useless for them to stand.

Fenya took a twig and drove both the calf and the cow; she drove her to the bank, let her graze, and she sat down under a willow tree and began to weave a wreath from cornflowers that she had picked along the way in the rye; weaves and sings a song.

Fenya heard something rustling in the vines, and the river was overgrown with thick vines on both banks.

Fenya looks like something gray is pushing through the thick vines, and show the stupid girl that this is our dog Serko. It is known that a wolf is very similar to a dog, only the neck is clumsy, the tail is sticky, the muzzle is downcast, and the eyes are shining; but Fenya had never seen a wolf up close.

Fenya has already begun to beckon the dog:

Serko, Serko! - as he looks - the calf, and behind him the cow, rush straight at her like mad. Fenya jumped up, pressed herself against the willow, and didn’t know what to do; the calf to her, and the cow pressed both of them with her backside to the tree, bowed her head, roared, dug the ground with her front hooves, and pointed her horns straight at the wolf.

Fenya got scared, grabbed the tree with both hands, wanted to scream, but had no voice. And the wolf rushed straight at the cow, and jumped back - the first time, apparently, it hit him with its horn. The wolf sees that you can’t take anything unceremoniously, and he began to rush from one side to the other, in order to somehow grab a cow from the side, or grab a carcass - but wherever he rushes, horns are everywhere to meet him.

Fenya still doesn’t know what’s going on, she wanted to run, but the cow wouldn’t let her in, and kept pressing her against the tree.

Here the girl began to scream, calling for help... Our Cossack was plowing here on a hillock, he heard that the cow was braying and the girl was screaming, he threw his plow and ran to the cry.

The Cossack saw what was happening, but did not dare to attack the wolf with his bare hands - he was so big and furious; The Cossack began to call his son that he was plowing right there in the field.

When the wolf saw that people were running, he calmed down, snapped once or twice more, howled and into the vines.

The Cossacks barely brought Fenya home - the girl was so scared.

Then the father was glad that he did not saw off the cow’s horns.

In the forest in summer (story)

There is no such expanse in the forest as there is in the field; but it’s good to wear it on a hot afternoon. And what can you see in the forest! Tall, reddish pines hung their needle-like tops, and green fir trees arched their thorny branches. A white, curly birch tree with fragrant leaves flaunts; the gray aspen trembles; and the stocky oak spread its carved leaves like a tent. The little white eye of a strawberry peeks out from the grass, and next to it a fragrant berry is already turning red.

The white catkins of the lily of the valley sway between the long, smooth leaves. Somewhere a strong-nosed woodpecker is chopping; the yellow oriole screams pitifully; A homeless cuckoo is counting down the years. The gray bunny darted into the bushes; high between the branches a tenacious squirrel flashed its fluffy tail.

Far away in the thicket, something is cracking and breaking: is a clumsy bear bending an arc?

Vaska (story)

Kitty-cat - gray pubis. Vasya is affectionate and cunning; The paws are velvety, the claw is sharp. Vasyutka has sensitive ears, a long mustache, and a silk fur coat.

The cat caresses, bends over, wags its tail, closes its eyes, sings a song, but a mouse is caught - don’t be angry! The eyes are big, the paws are like steel, the teeth are crooked, the claws are protruding!

Raven and Magpie (story)

A spotted magpie jumped along the branches of a tree and chatted incessantly, and the raven sat silently.

Why are you silent, kumanek, or don’t you believe what I’m telling you? - the magpie finally asked.

“I don’t believe it well, gossip,” answered the raven, “whoever talks as much as you do probably lies a lot!”

Viper (story)

Around our farm, in the ravines and wet places, there were many snakes.

I’m not talking about snakes: we are so used to the harmless snake that we don’t even call it a snake. He has small sharp teeth in his mouth, he catches mice and even birds and, perhaps, can bite through the skin; but there is no poison in these teeth, and the snake’s bite is completely harmless.

We had a lot of snakes; especially in the piles of straw that lay near the threshing floor: as soon as the sun warms them, they will crawl out of there; they hiss when you approach, they show their tongue or sting, but it’s not the sting that snakes bite. Even in the kitchen there were snakes under the floor, and when the children would sit on the floor and slurp milk, they would crawl out and pull their heads towards the cup, and the children would hit them on the forehead with a spoon.

But we also had more than just snakes: there was also a poisonous snake, black, large, without those yellow stripes that are visible near the head of a snake. We call such a snake a viper. The viper often bit the cattle, and if they did not have time to call old grandfather Okhrim from the village, who knew some medicine against the bite of poisonous snakes, then the cattle would certainly fall - it would swell, poor, like a mountain.

One of our boys died from a viper. She bit him near the shoulder, and before Okhrim arrived, the swelling had spread from his arm to his neck and chest: the child began to become delirious, toss about, and two days later he died. As a child, I heard a lot about vipers and was terribly afraid of them, as if I felt that I would have to meet a dangerous reptile.

They mowed it behind our garden, in a dry ravine, where in the spring a stream runs every year, but in the summer it is only damp and tall, thick grass grows. Every mowing was a holiday for me, especially when the hay was raked into stacks. Here, it happened, you would start running around the hayfield and throw yourself into the haystacks with all your might and flounder in the fragrant hay until the women chased you away so that you wouldn’t break the haystacks.

That’s how this time I ran and tumbled: there were no women, the mowers had gone far away, and only our big black dog Brovko was lying on a haystack and gnawing on a bone.

I somersaulted into one heap, turned around in it twice and suddenly jumped up in horror. Something cold and slippery brushed my hand. The thought of a viper flashed through my head - so what? The huge viper, which I had disturbed, crawled out of the hay and, rising on its tail, was ready to attack me.

Instead of running, I stand petrified, as if the reptile had fascinated me with its lidless, unblinking eyes. Another minute and I would have died; but Brovko, like an arrow, flew off the hay, rushed at the snake, and a mortal struggle ensued between them.

The dog tore the snake with its teeth and trampled it with its paws; the snake bit the dog in the face, chest, and stomach. But a minute later, only scraps of the viper lay on the ground, and Brovko began to run and disappeared.

But the strangest thing is that from that day on Brovko disappeared and wandered in an unknown place.

Only two weeks later he returned home: thin, scrawny, but healthy. My father told me that dogs know the herb that they use to treat viper bites.

Geese (story)

Vasya saw a string of wild geese flying high in the air.

Vasya. Can our domestic ducks fly the same way?

Father. No.

Vasya. Who feeds the wild geese?

Father. They find their own food.

Vasya. And in winter?

Father. As soon as winter comes, wild geese fly away from us to warm countries, and return again in the spring.

Vasya. But why can’t domestic geese fly just as well and why don’t they fly away from us to warm countries for the winter?

Father. Because domestic animals have already lost part of their former dexterity and strength, and their feelings are not as subtle as those of wild animals.

Vasya. But why did this happen to them?

Father. Because people care about them and have taught them to use their own strength. From this you see that people should try to do for themselves everything they can. Those children who rely on the services of others and do not learn to do everything they can for themselves will never be strong, smart and dexterous people.

Vasya. No, now I will try to do everything for myself, otherwise, perhaps, the same thing could happen to me as to domestic geese that have forgotten how to fly.

The Goose and the Crane (story)

A goose swims on the pond and talks loudly to itself:

What an amazing bird I really am! And I walk on the ground, and swim on the water, and fly through the air: there is no other bird like this in the world! I am the king of all birds!

The crane overheard the goose and said to him:

You stupid bird, goose! Well, can you swim like a pike, run like a deer, or fly like an eagle? It’s better to know one thing, but it’s good, than everything, but it’s bad.

Two goats (story)

Two stubborn goats met one day on a narrow log thrown across a stream. It was impossible to cross the stream at both times; one had to turn back, give way to the other and wait.

“Make way for me,” said one.

- Here's another! Look, what an important gentleman,” answered the other, “backing away, I was the first to ascend the bridge.”

- No, brother, I am much older than you in years, and I have to give in to the milksucker! Never!

Here both, without thinking for a long time, collided with strong foreheads, locked horns and, resting their thin legs on the deck, began to fight. But the deck was wet: both stubborn men slipped and flew straight into the water.

Woodpecker (story)

Knock-Knock! In a deep forest, a black woodpecker is carpentering on a pine tree. It clings with its paws, rests its tail, taps its nose, and scares away ants and boogers from behind the bark.

He'll run around the trunk and won't miss anyone.

The ants got scared:

These rules are not good! They squirm in fear, hide behind the bark - they don’t want to go out.

Knock-Knock! The black woodpecker knocks with its nose, gouges the bark, pushes its long tongue into holes, drags ants around like a fish.

Playing dogs (short story)

Volodya stood at the window and looked out onto the street, where a large dog, Polkan, was basking in the sun.

A little Pug ran up to Polkan and began to rush and bark at him; he grabbed his huge paws and muzzle with his teeth and seemed to be very annoying to the large and gloomy dog.

Wait a minute, she’ll ask you! - Volodya said. - She'll teach you a lesson.

But Mops did not stop playing, and Polkan looked at him very favorably.

You see,” Volodya’s father said, “Polkan is kinder than you.” When your little brothers and sisters start playing with you, it will certainly end with you pinning them. Polkan knows that it is a shame for the big and strong to offend the small and weak.

Goat (story)

A shaggy goat is walking, a bearded one is walking, waving its faces, shaking its beard, tapping its hooves; walks, bleats, calls goats and kids. And the goats and kids went into the garden, nibbled grass, gnawed bark, spoiled young clothespins, hoarded milk for the children; and the kids, little kids, sucked milk, climbed the fence, fought with their horns.

Wait, the bearded owner will come and give you all order!

Cow (fairy tale)

The cow is ugly, but she gives milk. Her forehead is wide, her ears are to the side; there are not enough teeth in the mouth, but the faces are large; the ridge is pointed, the tail is broom-shaped, the sides are protruding, the hooves are double.

She tears grass, chews gum, drinks swill, moos and roars, calling her mistress: “Come out, mistress; take out the bin, clean toilet! I brought milk and thick cream for the kids.”

Cuckoo (story)

The gray cuckoo is a homeless sloth: it doesn’t build a nest, it lays its eggs in other people’s nests, it gives its cuckoo chicks to be raised, and it even laughs and boasts to its hubby: “Hee-hee-hee! Ha ha ha! Look, hubby, how I laid an egg for the joy of the oatmeal.”

And the tailed hubby, sitting on a birch tree, his tail unfurled, his wings lowered, his neck stretched out, swaying from side to side, calculating the years, counting out stupid people.

Swallow (story)

The killer whale swallow did not know peace, it flew all day long, carried straws, sculpted with clay, made a nest.

She made a nest for herself: she carried testicles. I applied it to the testicles: it doesn’t come off the testicles, it’s waiting for the kids.

I hatched the babies: the babies squeaked and wanted to eat.

The killer whale flies all day long, knows no peace: catches midges, feeds the crumbs.

The inevitable time will come, the babies will fledge, they will all fly apart, beyond the blue seas, beyond the dark forests, beyond the high mountains.

The killer whale swallow does not know peace: day after day it searches and searches for small children.

Horse (story)

The horse snores, curls its ears, moves its eyes, gnaws at the bit, bends its neck like a swan, and digs the ground with its hoof. The mane is wavy on the neck, the tail is a pipe at the back, bangs are between the ears, and a brush is on the legs; the wool shines silver. There is a bit in the mouth, a saddle on the back, golden stirrups, steel horseshoes.

Sit down and let's go! To distant lands, to the thirtieth kingdom!

The horse runs, the ground trembles, foam comes out of the mouth, steam comes out of the nostrils.

The Bear and the Log (story)

A bear walks through the forest and sniffs around: is it possible to profit from something edible? He smells honey! Mishka raised his face up and saw a beehive on a pine tree, under the beehive there was a smooth log hanging on a rope, but Misha didn’t care about the log. The bear climbed up the pine tree, climbed up to the log, you can’t climb higher - the log is in the way.

Misha pushed the log away with his paw; the log gently rolled back - and the bear knocked on the head. Misha pushed the log harder - the log hit Misha harder. Misha got angry and grabbed the log with all his might; the log was pumped back two fathoms - and it was enough for Misha that he almost fell out of the tree. The bear became furious, he forgot about the honey, he wanted to finish the log: well, he felled it as hard as he could, and he was never left without surrender. Misha fought with the log until he fell out of the tree, completely beaten; There were pegs stuck under the tree - and the bear paid for his insane anger with his warm skin.

Not well cut, but tightly sewn (The Hare and the Hedgehog) (fairy tale)

The white, sleek bunny said to the hedgehog:

What an ugly, scratchy dress you have, brother!

True,” answered the hedgehog, “but my thorns save me from the teeth of the dog and the wolf; does your pretty skin serve you the same way?

Instead of answering, the bunny just sighed.

Eagle (story)

The blue-winged eagle is the king of all birds. He makes nests on rocks and on old oak trees; flies high, sees far, looks unblinkingly at the sun.

The eagle has a sickle nose, hooked claws; the wings are long; bulging chest - well done.

The Eagle and the Cat (story)

Outside the village, a cat was playing happily with her kittens. The spring sun was warm, and the little family was very happy. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a huge steppe eagle: like lightning, he descended from above and grabbed one kitten. But before the eagle had time to rise, the mother had already grabbed onto it. The predator abandoned the kitten and grabbed the old cat. A battle to the death began.

Mighty wings, a strong beak, strong paws with long, curved claws gave the eagle a great advantage: he tore the skin of the cat and pecked out one of her eyes. But the cat did not lose courage, grabbed the eagle tightly with its claws and bit off its right wing.

Now victory began to lean towards the cat; but the eagle was still very strong, and the cat was already tired; however, she gathered her last strength, made a deft leap and knocked the eagle to the ground. At that very moment she bit off his head and, forgetting her own wounds, began to lick her wounded kitten.

Cockerel with his family (story)

A cockerel walks around the yard: there is a red comb on his head, and a red beard under his nose. Petya’s nose is a chisel, Petya’s tail is a wheel, there are patterns on his tail, and spurs on his legs. Petya rakes the pile with his paws and calls the hens and chicks together:

Crested hens! Busy hostesses! Motley-pockmarked! Little black and white! Gather together with the chickens, with the little children: I have saved you some grain!

The hens and chicks gathered and cackled; They didn’t share the grain - they got into a fight.

Petya the cockerel does not like unrest - now he has reconciled his family: one for the crest, that for the cowlick, he ate the grain himself, flew up onto the fence, flapped his wings, shouted at the top of his lungs:

- “Ku-ka-re-ku!”

Ducks (story)

Vasya sits on the bank, he watches how the ducks tumble in the pond: they hide their wide noses in the water, and dry their yellow paws in the sun. They ordered Vasya to guard the ducks, and they went to the water - both old and young. How can I get them home now?

So Vasya started clicking ducks:

Duck-duck-duck! Gluttonous chatterboxes, wide noses, webbed paws! You've had enough of carrying around worms, plucking grass, swallowing mud, stuffing your crops - it's time for you to go home!

Vasya’s ducklings obeyed, went ashore, walked home, shimmering from foot to foot.

The Scientist Bear (short story)

- Children! Children! - the nanny shouted. - Go see the bear.

The children ran out onto the porch, and a lot of people had already gathered there. A Nizhny Novgorod man, with a large stake in his hands, is holding a bear on a chain, and the boy is preparing to beat a drum.

“Come on, Misha,” says the Nizhny Novgorod resident, tugging the bear with a chain, “get up, rise, shift from side to side, bow to the honest gentlemen and show yourself to the pullets.”

The bear roared, reluctantly rose to its hind legs, waddled from foot to foot, bowed to the right, to the left.

“Come on, Mishenka,” continues the Nizhny Novgorod resident, “show how little kids steal peas: where it’s dry - on the belly; and wet - on your knees.

And Mishka crawled: he fell on his belly and raked it with his paw, as if he were pulling a pea.

“Come on, Mishenka, show me how women go to work.”

The bear comes and goes; looks back, scratches behind his ear with his paw.

Several times the bear showed annoyance, roared, and did not want to get up; but the iron ring of the chain, threaded through the lip, and the stake in the hands of the owner forced the poor beast to obey. When the bear had remade all his things, the Nizhny Novgorod resident said:

- Come on, Misha, now shift from foot to foot, bow to the honest gentlemen, but don’t be lazy, but bow lower! Sweat the gentlemen and grab your hat: if they put down the bread, eat it, but return the money to me.

And the bear, with a hat in its front paws, went around the audience. The children put in a ten-kopeck piece; but they felt sorry for poor Misha: blood was oozing from the lip through the ring.

Khavronya (story)

Our sow hare is dirty, dirty and gluttonous; It eats everything, crumples everything, itches on the corners, finds a puddle - like rushing into a feather bed, grunting, basking.

The sow's snout is not elegant: its nose rests on the ground, its mouth reaches to its ears; and the ears dangle like rags; Each leg has four hooves, and when it walks, it stumbles.

The sow's tail is a screw, the ridge is a hump; stubble sticks out on the ridge. She eats for three, gets fat for five; but her mistresses take care of her, feed her, and give her slop to drink; If he breaks into the garden, they will drive him away with a log.

Brave Dog (story)

Dog, why are you barking?

I scare the wolves.

The dog with its tail between its legs?

I'm afraid of wolves.

You can download this book of children's stories about animals by K. Ushinsky for free in pdf format: DOWNLOAD >>