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He did that in the hope that Grunty would be late at the feeding trough. Sad to say, Grunty Pig was fast becoming vain. He even talked about tails with the neighbors, taking pains to explain that his own was the handsomest one on the farm. Old dog Spot sniffed when Grunty boasted about his tail one day. "Why, your tail is of no use whatsoever," Spot told him.
Around the corner of the farmhouse, near the woodshed door, old dog Spot came to a halt before a two-storied cage, the front of which was covered with fine-meshed wire netting. Stopping beside Spot, Grunty Pig peered inside the cage.
"Well, it's no wonder that he made such a mistake." "Mistake!" Jolly Robin echoed. "Do you mean that Grunty Pig won't have our apple tree down by fall?" "I do," Grandfather Mole answered. "The roots of a big, old apple tree spread out a good rod in every direction. And it would take a hundred Grunty Pigs a whole summer to dig them free." A broad smile spread over Jolly Robin's face.
To tell the truth, he seemed to feel somewhat ashamed of himself for having tried to play a trick on Grunty Pig. Or maybe he felt ashamed because he was caught at it. Down the hill, a little way from Farmer Green's house, a great beech tree stood beside the road. In the fall, when the nuts were ripe, Johnnie Green often visited the tree. And so did Frisky Squirrel.
"Yes!" said Grunty Pig. "Isn't this a fine pen? Now that I've come to the farmhouse to live I believe I'll make this pen my headquarters." "That's a good idea," Moses Mouse told him. "Farmer Green's family don't use it often. They seldom come here unless they have company."
"That's what I've always thought!" Jolly Robin exclaimed. "He can't go very deep into things, or he'd never have made such a boast," Grandfather Mole declared. "When Grunty Pig digs, does he dig right down out of sight?" "Oh, no! Never!" said Jolly Robin. "Ah! He merely scratches the surface!" Grandfather Mole remarked with a wise nod of his head.
Grunty Pig squealed for his mother. But no one answered. The fence was too high for him to look over it. It was too tight for him to peep through. "I want to get in!" Grunty cried. "Why doesn't somebody answer?" The silence from the other side of the fence was dreadful. Grunty Pig would have been glad to have his mother scold him then, just for the comfort of hearing her voice. "Oh!
"It's about Grunty Pig," Jolly Robin began. "I thought you said it was about digging," Grandfather Mole grumbled. And he started to burrow once more. "So it is!" Jolly exclaimed. "I want to know how long it will take Grunty Pig to dig up the apple tree where I live." Again Grandfather Mole paused. "It all depends," he muttered. "It all depends on how much of his time he spends at digging."
He was the smallest of seven children. At first his mother thought she would call him "Runty." But she soon changed her mind about that; for she discovered that even if he was the runt of the family, he had the loudest grunt of all. So the good lady made haste to slip a G in front of the name "Runty." "There!" she exclaimed. "'Grunty' is a name that you ought to be proud of.
He had an idea that Henrietta might go and tell his mother that she had seen him wallowing in the mud behind the barn. And he did not want to be dragged back to the pigpen. Grunty had no way of knowing that Henrietta Hen forgot all about him before she had crossed the farmyard. She fell into a loud dispute with a neighbor. And she never thought of Grunty again.
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