Deep in an icy land where penguins waddled all day, there lived a little penguin named Pip. Winter was Pip’s favourite time of the year because she loved the snow and liked to make snowballs and slide on the ice.
One day, Pip was sliding along the surface near her home and looked up. A great big yellow moon was smiling down at her. “I must put something nice on my window-sill to make it merry,” thought Pip, and she decided to make a pudding to send up to the moon.
So she went to an old lady penguin who knew all sorts of recipes. And this is what the old lady said:
“Go and gather
Little snowflakes and red berries,
Take some of these brown nuts and apples,
And an orange from over the sea.
When you have mixed the whole together,
Instead of a pudding, it will be a pie.
Garnish it well with ice-jewels,
And set it away on your window-sill.”
“What shall I put into the pie when it is mixed?” asked Pip, for she had never made a pie or pudding before.
“Take a pinch of joy, a teensy bit of sorrow, then sweeten with kind deeds, and you will make it nice,” said the old lady.
So Pip went to work. Soon she had flour all over her flippers, and her beak was covered with sticky jelly and cream. At last, everything was ready, but the sun had gone to bed, and poor little Pip had no moonbeam to help her carry the heavy pie to her window-sill.
“What shall I do? What shall I do?” cried Pip, beginning to cry. Just then she heard some one crying too, and looking up saw her friend Billie Wren on the branch of a tree.
“Little Billie, what is the matter with you?” asked Pip in a gentle voice.
“I’m freezing with nothing to eat,” said Billie.
At once Pip thought of her pie, but then she said, “No, no, it is for the moon.” But Billie kept shivering, as his little warm place was all frozen from the intense cold around.
“You are welcome to part of my pie,” said Pip at last; and opening the door of her warm house, slipped inside. Billie crept in after her, and Pip set to work. She cut off the top crust of the pie and spread the rest over the floor of her little room.
Soon the whole floor was white with the good things. Before Billie had tasted it all, Pip heard a papa penguin singing outside:
“Come, little Bill Wren,” sang he.
Then followed a penguin who was a famous hunter and fisherman.
“Good-morrow, young people,” said the hunter, as Pip opened the door, and without waiting for an invitation, crept in.
With a merry peep, little Pip flew back quickly to her cupboard to get something for the stranger to eat too. In doing so, she almost tread on the head of a little mouse who lived in the drawers. He raised his sleepy little face and Pip kissed him affectionately.
“Come and have some of my pie,” she said.
But she only left a wee little piece for herself, and watched all her treasures vanish like snowdrifts in summer. When the moon looked over her window-sill, there was no pie for it to eat.
But it didn’t care. It found plenty to please it in the eyes and hearts of all the little ones it could see beaming in a thousand warm and cold places, and some bright light it hid under its own great shovel.
So from that day forth whenever the moon flies over land and sea, whenever the least caprice, the least bit of displeasure, makes the kind faces of the little penguins hold their breath, from that time forth she gives something nice up in her high place to eat, and says quite merrily, “Thank you, Cousin Pip.”
So you see it was worth while for a little penguin to give up a whole big pie to poor freezing Bill, didn’t you?