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Updated: May 10, 2025
"You won't always be runty, Grunty, if you eat a plenty," Mrs. Pig often told him. And then he would grunt, as if to say, "You don't need to urge me. Just give me a chance!" Grunty Pig soon learned that being the smallest of the family had one sad drawback. And they not only could; but they often did.
Perhaps Farmer Green took pains to keep the door of Grunty's pen shut. Perhaps Farmer Green made the fence outside the piggery "hog tight," as he would say. Or perhaps Grunty Pig grew so fat that he couldn't squeeze through any ordinary opening. Anyhow, Grunty never set foot inside the farmhouse again. After a while he didn't care. The bigger he was, the less he liked to roam about.
"Then " he ventured "then wouldn't it take Grunty Pig a hundred summers to dig up our tree, if he worked alone?" "No doubt!" Grandfather replied. "Or, to be on the safe side, I'll say he could uproot your tree in ninety-nine summers." "Hurrah!" Jolly Robin shouted. "Hurrah and thank you, Grandfather Mole!"
Then she asked the other children, one by one, what they had learned that very morning. There wasn't one of them that hadn't forgotten everything. "Dear me!" said unhappy Mrs. Pig. "I don't know what I'll do with all of them. But I'll treat them all alike. I have no favorite. There isn't one of them that's stupider than another." When Grunty Pig heard that he felt quite proud.
And Grunty Pig showed that he was thoughtful. He went to the trouble of picking them all up off the floor. But he forgot to drop them back into the pan. Instead, he put every one of them into his own mouth. "That Moses Mouse was all wrong," he murmured. "He complained of the food here. When I see him I'll have to tell him that he was mistaken.
"What is it," he asked, "that you intend to do to us?" "You'll find out later," said Grunty Pig. "I expect to be in the top of your apple tree before fall. And then " Jolly Robin couldn't wait for him to finish. He had to laugh right out, on the spot. And his wife, who had been listening eagerly, burst into the first giggle that had passed her bill for days and days.
It was fun to dig. Besides, he found a good many tender roots that tickled his taste. They were different from anything he had ever eaten before. After a while Grunty Pig learned something. He had always supposed that he could go on eating forever, if he were only lucky enough to have the chance. But to his surprise he found that there was a limit to the amount he could consume with comfort.
Now and then he was even late for a meal, because he was feasting his eyes on his tail when Farmer Green came to the pen with food for Mrs. Pig's family. It must be confessed that Grunty sometimes boasted before his brothers and sisters about his beautiful curly tail. And just before meal time his brother Blackie was known, upon occasion, to mention the subject of tails.
Pig nearly choked over a bit of something or other that she was eating. Grunty was gone! If she hadn't spent most of the afternoon dozing perhaps she would have missed him. And poor Mrs. Pig began to reproach herself for what wasn't really her fault at all. "I hope you'll find him," she told Farmer Green as he drove a nail into the loose board. "I hope you won't leave my son out to-night.
Although her son was certainly unharmed, she couldn't help being startled. It gave her what she called "a turn" to learn that Grunty had met a bear. "A bear!" Mrs. Pig gasped. "A bear is a terribly dangerous creature. It's a wonder that you ever got home.... What did you do when you saw him?" Mrs. Pig demanded. "I walked away," said Grunty. "He couldn't have noticed you," Mrs. Pig declared.
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