Uncle Dick and Lisa's Old Time Animal Tales

     Probably one of the greatest problems of the age is the mule. Although volumes have been written on the mule yet the accident statistics show that he is as little understood as ever. How to mix kindness and firmness in the proper proportions and then apply the concoction successfully to an energetic mule is one of “those things no fellow can find out.” The mule is deceitful and desperately wicked. It knows no North, no South, no West, no East, in the rigid impartially with which it bestows no favors. In trying to solve the mule problem many very wise men have been baffled, and likewise knocked into a demoralized heap from which the mule stood. And yet how strange it is that after all these years of ineffectual research the true solution of this vexed question should be discovered by a small boy. This little fellow lives in Richmond, Va., and while playing near a mule was, by means of that animal’s method of rapid transit, suddenly landed in a neighboring field. When he recovered from the emotion caused by so unexpected an event, he managed to insinuate himself into the mule’s affections, taking care, however, always to keep at the correct end of the mule. Finally the innocent and unsuspicious quadruped was firmly tied to a tree, under whose shades were several hives of bees The mule brought disaster upon himself by kicking over a hive just by way of recreation. The combat that ensued was dreadful to behold. The boy is not quite certain whether the bees or the mule won the victory. He thinks that it was the mule, because when the owner came after the body, there was not a vestige of the hives to be seen, and the bees had all disappeared, while the remains of the mule still occupied the battle-field.-Detroit Free Press.