How a visit to Beastland cured a little boy of cruelty to animals.

This is a story of a little boy who made a visit to Beastland where all the animals go when they die. The boy’s name was Benjamin, but everybody called him Benny. He was a cruel little boy, and threw stones at all the dogs, and cats and birds that he saw. Sometimes he hurt the poor animals, and often he killed the little birds.

After a while the animals all ran, and the birds flew away when he came in sight. The dogs would not play with him, but ran under the house when they saw him coming; the cats climbed up the trees or over the fence, and the birds flew over into the next yard. “We will not stay near such a cruel little boy,” they all said.

One day a poor dog passed in front of Benny’s house. The dog was very tired and hungry, and not knowing Benny he stopped as if he would ask for a bone or a piece of bread. But Benny picked up a big rock and threw it at him and broke the poor dog’s leg. Then he ran away and hid to keep from hearing the poor dog howl with pain.

That night Benny could not sleep. He covered his head up in the bed clothes, and shut his eyes tight, and put his fingers in his ears, but he still saw the poor dog and heard his pitiful cries. After a while, as he lay very still trying to go to sleep, he heard a scratching at the window sill, and looking up he saw a big dog climbing in the window.

“What do you want?” he asked.

The dog stood up on his hind legs and said: “I have come to take you to Beastland.”

Then he took a rope out of a bag he carried, and tied poor Benny hand and foot. Throwing him across his back he went out of the window, out of the yard and way off up the side of a mountain. At last they came to a land where there was nothing but animals and they were all talking about boys and girls.

The big dog who carried Benny took him to the Court House and brought him before Judge Lion and a jury of cats and dogs. He was to be tried for cruelty. There were ever so many witnesses against poor Benny. All the dogs he had stoned; all the cats he had chased; all the birds he had killed rose up against him. Finally Judge Lion said: “Tie a tin can to him and chase him through town.” Then the big dog tied an old tin can to Benny’s foot, and all the dogs and animals ran him and ran him, and barked and snapped until he was chased out of Beastland and right into his little bed. He woke up with a start and exclaimed:

“My! But that was an awful feeling!” But he was kind to all animals ever afterwards.