The Tale of Tom Kitten
by Beatrix PotterOnce upon a time there were three little kittens, and their names were Mittens, Tom Kitten, and Moppet.
They had dear little fur coats of their own; and they tumbled about the
doorstep and played in the dust.
But one day their mother--Mrs. Tabitha Twitchit--expected friends to tea;
so she fetched the kittens indoors, to wash and dress them, before the
fine company arrived.
First she scrubbed their faces (this one is Moppet).
Then she brushed their fur, (this one is Mittens).
Then she combed their tails and whiskers (this is Tom Kitten).
Tom was very naughty, and he scratched.
Mrs. Tabitha dressed Moppet and Mittens in clean pinafores and tuckers;
and then she took all sorts of elegant uncomfortable clothes out of a
chest of drawers, in order to dress up her son Thomas.
Tom Kitten was very fat, and he had grown; several buttons burst off. His
mother sewed them on again.
When the three kittens were ready, Mrs. Tabitha unwisely turned them out
into the garden, to be out of the way while she made hot buttered toast.
"Now keep your frocks clean, children! You must walk on your hind legs.
Keep away from the dirty ash-pit, and from Sally Henny Penny, and from the
pig-stye and the Puddle-Ducks."
Moppet and Mittens walked down the garden path unsteadily. Presently they
trod upon their pinafores and fell on their noses.
When they stood up there were several green smears!
"Let us climb up the rockery, and sit on the garden wall," said Moppet.
They turned their pinafores back to front, and went up with a skip and a
jump; Moppet's white tucker fell down into the road.
Tom Kitten was quite unable to jump when walking upon his hind legs in
trousers. He came up the rockery by degrees, breaking the ferns, and
shedding buttons right and left.
He was all in pieces when he reached the top of the wall.
Moppet and Mittens tried to pull him together; his hat fell off, and the
rest of his buttons burst.
While they were in difficulties, there was a pit pat paddle pat! and the
three Puddle-Ducks came along the hard high road, marching one behind the
other and doing the goose step--pit pat paddle pat! pit pat waddle pat!
They stopped and stood in a row, and stared up at the kittens. They had
very small eyes and looked surprised.
Then the two duck-birds, Rebeccah and Jemima Puddle-Duck, picked up the
hat and tucker and put them on.
Mittens laughed so that she fell off the wall. Moppet and Tom descended
after her; the pinafores and all the rest of Tom's clothes came off on the
way down.
"Come! Mr. Drake Puddle-Duck," said Moppet--"Come and help us to dress
him! Come and button up Tom!"
Mr. Drake Puddle-Duck advanced in a slow sideways manner, and picked up
the various articles.
But he put them on _himself!_ They fitted him even worse than Tom Kitten.
"It's a very fine morning!" said Mr. Drake Puddle-Duck.
And he and Jemima and Rebeccah Puddle-Duck set off up the road, keeping
step--pit pat, paddle pat! pit pat, waddle pat!
Then Tabitha Twitchit came down the garden and found her kittens on the
wall with no clothes on.
She pulled them off the wall, smacked them, and took them back to the
house.
"My friends will arrive in a minute, and you are not fit to be seen; I am
affronted," said Mrs. Tabitha Twitchit.
She sent them upstairs; and I am sorry to say she told her friends that
they were in bed with the measles; which was not true.
Quite the contrary; they were not in bed: _not_ in the least.
Somehow there were very extraordinary noises over-head, which disturbed
the dignity and repose of the tea party.
And I think that some day I shall have to make another, larger, book, to
tell you more about Tom Kitten!
As for the Puddle-Ducks--they went into a pond.
The clothes all came off directly, because there were no buttons.
And Mr. Drake Puddle-Duck, and Jemima and Rebeccah, have been looking for
them ever since.
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