The Tale of Johnny Town-Mouse

To Aesop in the shadows

A brown mouse who is not wearing anything stands on a table and pours a glass of water for another brown mouse from a blue and white jug. The other mouse is wearing tan trousers, a white shirt, and a light blue jacket with ruffed wrists.
A mouse sits in a flowerbed next to a path, and watches a large wicker hamper that sits just inside a wrought iron gate set between two stone walls.

Johnny Town-mouse was born in a cupboard. Timmy Willie was born in a garden. Timmy Willie was a little country mouse who went to town by mistake in a hamper. The gardener sent vegetables to town once a week by carrier; he packed them in a big hamper.

The gardener left the hamper by the garden gate, so that the carrier could pick it up when he passed. Timmy Willie crept in through a hole in the wickerwork, and after eating some peas⁠—Timmy Willie fell fast asleep.

Timmy Willie lies sleeping in a mostly empty pea pod.
A brown cart horse with a white nose has been hitched to a covered two-wheel cart and stands in a country lane between stone walls. Three white ducks walk past in front.

He awoke in a fright, while the hamper was being lifted into the carrier’s cart. Then there was a jolting, and a clattering of horse’s feet; other packages were thrown in; for miles and miles⁠—jolt⁠—jolt⁠—jolt! and Timmy Willie trembled amongst the jumbled up vegetables.

At last the cart stopped at a house, where the hamper was taken out, carried in, and set down. The cook gave the carrier sixpence; the back door banged, and the cart rumbled away. But there was no quiet; there seemed to be hundreds of carts passing. Dogs barked; boys whistled in the street; the cook laughed, the parlour maid ran up and downstairs; and a canary sang like a steam engine.

The cart has pulled in to a courtyard, and the driver is handing over a hamper to a lady wearing a pink dress and white pinafore. Two small brown dogs play behind the cart.
The lady kneels downs to open the hamper and inspect the contents.

Timmy Willie, who had lived all his life in a garden, was almost frightened to death. Presently the cook opened the hamper and began to unpack the vegetables. Out sprang the terrified Timmy Willie.

Up jumped the cook on a chair, exclaiming “A mouse! a mouse! Call the cat! Fetch me the poker, Sarah!” Timmy Willie did not wait for Sarah with the poker; he rushed along the skirting board till he came to a little hole, and in he popped.

Timmy Willie sprints towards a small hole in the skirting board with his tail flying out behind him.
Timmy Willie crouches on a table set with a clean white tablecloth, cutlery, plates and glasses. The mice around the table, all of whom are dressed in expensive looking jackets and shirts, have stood up and look shocked.

He dropped half a foot, and crashed into the middle of a mouse dinner party, breaking three glasses.⁠—“Who in the world is this?” inquired Johnny Town-mouse. But after the first exclamation of surprise he instantly recovered his manners.

With the utmost politeness he introduced Timmy Willie to nine other mice, all with long tails and white neckties. Timmy Willie’s own tail was insignificant. Johnny Town-mouse and his friends noticed it; but they were too well bred to make personal remarks; only one of them asked Timmy Willie if he had ever been in a trap?

The mice have taken their places at the table again, and Timmy Willie has been found his own place.
Timmy Willie stands up in his chair looking worried and insignificant. Another mouse hands him a plate of food.

The dinner was of eight courses; not much of anything, but truly elegant. All the dishes were unknown to Timmy Willie, who would have been a little afraid of tasting them; only he was very hungry, and very anxious to behave with company manners. The continual noise upstairs made him so nervous, that he dropped a plate. “Never mind, they don’t belong to us,” said Johnny.

“Why don’t those youngsters come back with the dessert?” It should be explained that two young mice, who were waiting on the others, went skirmishing upstairs to the kitchen between courses. Several times they had come tumbling in, squeaking and laughing; Timmy Willie learnt with horror that they were being chased by the cat. His appetite failed, he felt faint. “Try some jelly?” said Johnny Town-mouse.

Two mice sprint across the hallway flagstones carrying plates of food. A cat stares at them through the doorway to the hall.
The cat stands on its hind legs and checks behind a yellow cushion on a red sofa. The room is decorated with a blue rug and a pale curtain with a flower pattern and red trim.

“No? Would you rather go to bed? I will show you a most comfortable sofa pillow.”

The sofa pillow had a hole in it. Johnny Town-mouse quite honestly recommended it as the best bed, kept exclusively for visitors. But the sofa smelt of cat. Timmy Willie preferred to spend a miserable night under the fender.

It was just the same next day. An excellent breakfast was provided⁠—for mice accustomed to eat bacon; but Timmy Willie had been reared on roots and salad. Johnny Town-mouse and his friends racketted about under the floors, and came boldly out all over the house in the evening. One particularly loud crash had been caused by Sarah tumbling downstairs with the tea-tray; there were crumbs and sugar and smears of jam to be collected, in spite of the cat.

A group of mice in jackets walk towards the bottom of the red-carpeted stairs.
Timmy Willie sits in his nest sorting wheat from chaff with a sieve. Next to him are a couple of full sacks, a jug, and a basket. Through the entrance to the burrow a robin stares in.

Timmy Willie longed to be at home in his peaceful nest in a sunny bank. The food disagreed with him; the noise prevented him from sleeping. In a few days he grew so thin that Johnny Town-mouse noticed it, and questioned him. He listened to Timmy Willie’s story and inquired about the garden. “It sounds rather a dull place? What do you do when it rains?”

“When it rains, I sit in my little sandy burrow and shell corn and seeds from my Autumn store. I peep out at the throstles and blackbirds on the lawn, and my friend Cock Robin. And when the sun comes out again, you should see my garden and the flowers⁠—roses and pinks and pansies⁠—no noise except the birds and bees, and the lambs in the meadows.”

Timmy Willie stands in a flowerbed and shelters under a large leaf that he’s holding like an umbrella.
In the coal cellar Johnny Town-mouse gestures to Timmy Willie, who has his head in his hands.

“There goes that cat again!” exclaimed Johnny Town-mouse. When they had taken refuge in the coal-cellar he resumed the conversation; “I confess I am a little disappointed; we have endeavoured to entertain you, Timothy William.”

“Oh yes, yes, you have been most kind; but I do feel so ill,” said Timmy Willie.

“It may be that your teeth and digestion are unaccustomed to our food; perhaps it might be wiser for you to return in the hamper.”

“Oh? Oh!” cried Timmy Willie.

“Why of course for the matter of that we could have sent you back last week,” said Johnny rather huffily⁠—“did you not know that the hamper goes back empty on Saturdays?”

The lady lifts the hamper into the back of the carriage while the cat looks on.
Timmy Willie waves out of the hamper he’s just climbed into at the four mice leaning over the edge and looking at him.

So Timmy Willie said goodbye to his new friends, and hid in the hamper with a crumb of cake and a withered cabbage leaf; and after much jolting, he was set down safely in his own garden.

Sometimes on Saturdays he went to look at the hamper lying by the gate, but he knew better than to get in again. And nobody got out, though Johnny Town-mouse had half promised a visit.

Timmy Willie touches the corner of the wicker hamper.
Timmy Willie sits at the entrance to his burrow looking out over the fields and rolling hills. Next to him a small picnic basket has been unpacked.

The winter passed; the sun came out again; Timmy Willie sat by his burrow warming his little fur coat and sniffing the smell of violets and spring grass. He had nearly forgotten his visit to town. When up the sandy path all spick and span with a brown leather bag came Johnny Town-mouse!

Timmy Willie received him with open arms. “You have come at the best of all the year, we will have herb pudding and sit in the sun.”

“H’m’m! it is a little damp,” said Johnny Town-mouse, who was carrying his tail under his arm, out of the mud.

Timmy Willie and Johnny Town-mouse sit on little red stools in his burrow, holding knives and forks. In between them is a table made of a piece of branch, on which is a white plate with a herb pudding.
Timmy Willie holds a blue jug with a white stripe, and watches the highland cattle in the next field.

“What is that fearful noise?” he started violently.

“That?” said Timmy Willie, “that is only a cow; I will beg a little milk, they are quite harmless, unless they happen to lie down upon you. How are all our friends?”

Johnny’s account was rather middling. He explained why he was paying his visit so early in the season; the family had gone to the seaside for Easter; the cook was doing spring cleaning, on board wages, with particular instructions to clear out the mice. There were four kittens, and the cat had killed the canary.

Johnny Town-mouse runs out of a house carrying a suitcase and his hat. In the kitchen a maid has emptied out a cupboard, and four kittens play with each other around the table.
Timmy Willie walks down a little path between tufts of grass with a sack slung over his shoulder. In the background, in front of some large trees, a man is mowing the lawn.

“They say we did it; but I know better,” said Johnny Town-mouse. “Whatever is that fearful racket?”

“That is only the lawn-mower; I will fetch some of the grass clippings presently to make your bed. I am sure you had better settle in the country, Johnny.”

“H’m’m⁠—we shall see by Tuesday week; the hamper is stopped while they are at the seaside.”

“I am sure you will never want to live in town again,” said Timmy Willie.

Timmy Willie and Johnny Town-mouse site next to each other and feast on ears of corn.

But he did. He went back in the very next hamper of vegetables; he said it was too quiet!!

Timmy Willie holds a daisy and waves it at the departing cart.
Timmy Willie finishes eating a strawberry while holding a strawberry leaf and sitting next to another strawberry that is nearly as big as he is.

One place suits one person, another place suits another person. For my part I prefer to live in the country, like Timmy Willie.