WHEN the other birds are sound asleep in their nests, with their little heads tucked comfortably under their feathers, Sister Nightingale, they say, may not rest, but still sounds the notes of her beautiful song in grove and thicket.  
Why does she sing thus, all night long as well as through the day? It is because she dares not go to sleep on account of the Blindworm, who is waiting to catch her with her eyes closed.
 
Once upon a time, when the world was very new, the Blindworm was not quite blind, but had one good eye. Moreover, in those days the Nightingale also had but one eye. As for the Blindworm, it mattered very little; for he was a homely creature, content to crawl about in the dark underground, or under wood and leaves, where nobody saw him and nobody cared. But the Nightingale's case was really quite too pitiful! Fancy the sweetest singer among all the birds, the favorite chorister, going about with but one eye, while every one else, even the tiniest little Humming Bird of all, had two.
 
The Nightingale felt very sore about this matter, and tried to conceal her misfortune from the other birds. She managed to cock her head the other way whenever she met a friend, and she always flew past any stranger so fast that he never saw the empty socket where her other pretty eye should be.
 
But one day there was great excitement among the birds. Miss Jenny Wren was going to be married to young Cock Robin. There was to be a grand wedding; every one was invited, and of course the Nightingale was needed to lead the bridal chorus of feathered songsters. But the poor Nightingale was set in a flutter of anxiety by the news.
 
"Oh, dear me!" she said, "I do want to go to Jenny's wedding, oh, of course I do! But how can I go? If I do, the other birds will discover that I have but one eye, and then how the disagreeable creatures will laugh at me. Oh dear, oh dear! What shall I do? I cannot go, no, I really cannot. But what excuse can I give? Oh, it is not right that the sweetest singer in all Birdland should be laughed at, merely because she has the misfortune to lack one poor little eye!"
 
The Nightingale sat on the branch, singing so mournfully that all the creatures on the ground below went sorrowfully about their daily business. Just then the Nightingale spied a silvery gleam among the dead leaves. It was the Blindworm, a spotted gray streak, writhing noiselessly along towards the decayed wood of a fallen tree, in which he loved to burrow. And the Blindworm was not sad like the others, neither seemed he to care in the least about the Nightingale's music. Worms think little of sweet sounds. He cocked his one eye up towards the Nightingale and winked maliciously. He alone of all creatures knew the Nightingale's secret.
 
"Good-day, Sister Nightingale," he said. "How is your eye this morning? We have a goodly pair between us; though I think that mine is rather the better of the two."
 
Then he disappeared into a tiny opening. For though the Blindworm is nearly a foot long he is so smooth and slippery that he can enter a hole which is almost smaller than himself.
 
The Nightingale was very indignant at being addressed in this familiar way by a miserable, crawling creature who not only could not fly, but who could not sing a note, and did not know do from fa. Besides, it made her angry to think that he knew her secret and talked aloud about it so that any one might hear.
 
"The idea!" she cried. "It is bad enough that I cannot go to the wedding of my dear friend Jenny. But to be jeered at by this creature, it is more than I can bear. Ha! I have an ide............