In a sunny spot of the forest clearing, there lived happy Benny the Bear. He was so content that his laughter rang all day long, from brwake until sundown.
Now, brwake came and rain fell, and Benny slept so soundly in his warm nest that he did not hear his friends come together as they always did before sunrise. When he awoke, he stepped to the door of his house and saw how dark and foggy it was. The clouds were hanging very low in the sky, and the drops of rain clung to the green leaves and the flowers.
Benny stepped back into his house. “It’s a very sad morning,” thought he. “My laughter would not cheer my friends.”
But when mid-day came and the rain stopped falling, and a gentle sun streamed down through the clouds, Benny stepped out of his house to seek his friends.
“How do you do, Benny?” said Frog.
“All well on land and sea!” cried Benny.
“Good day to you,” said the little birds, as they hopped and twittered on the dewy flowers and on the wet twigs.
Benny waved his paw to them all and sang in merry tune:
“I am happy, I am jolly,
All the world seems bright to me;
Joy is dancing in my heart,
Like the waves upon the sea.”
However, he found every animal he met was as sad as could be. They all knew as well as he that the day had begun in rain, and each one sighed and shook its head. And now Benny often did this himself until at last he grew dull and unhappy.
“I am in as sad a state as any of my friends,” thought he. “I can jolly no longer.”
And Benny swayed his head back and forth, and his big body from side to side, and began to cry, “Woe, woe is me!” He cried to such purpose that his tears fell faster than they did in the rain.
When the sun was almost down, Fox came by. “Hullo, Benny!” cried she to him as he stood by the roadside with his head bent.
Benny looked up, and instead of the grin that usually was on his big round face, there were deep lines of sorrow.
“Why, you don’t mean to say you are not jolly?” said Fox.
“I indeed am not,” hoarsely replied Benny. “I thought I could make my friends forget their sorrow, but we only keep our faces the longer sad the more we meet together. Come, let us go to the dance.”
When the friends were met in the forest, Fox said to them all: “Benny would cheer us with a dance.”
“Oh, Benny! oh, Benny!” cried they all, “how can we dance with sad hearts?”
But Benny merely laughed. “Come, come! Let us all be happy. You are all my friends.”
And so, with merry looks and laughter, they began to dance beside Benny. But still less merry grew his face, until Benny turned back. “I am happy, I am jolly,” shouted he; and then the rest joined in. The more they danced, the merrier they grew, and their gladness spread till Benny, when he next thought of it, found that he himself was laughing again.
“Now I am happy and jolly too,” he sang.