Tale of the Pie and the Patty-Pan, The The. Beatrix Potter

      

      THE TALE OF THE PIE AND THE PATTY-PAN

      By

      BEATRIX POTTER

      This edition published by Dreamscape Media LLC, 2017

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       About Beatrix Potter:

      Helen Beatrix Potter (28 July 1866 – 22 December 1943) was an English writer, illustrator, natural scientist, and conservationist best known for her children's books featuring animals, such as those in The Tale of Peter Rabbit.

      Born into a privileged household, Potter was educated by governesses and grew up isolated from other children. She had numerous pets and spent holidays in Scotland and the Lake District, developing a love of landscape, flora, and fauna, all of which she closely observed and painted.

      Though Potter was typical of women of her generation in having limited opportunities for higher education, her study and watercolors of fungi led to her being widely respected in the field of mycology. In her thirties, Potter published the highly successful children's book, The Tale of Peter Rabbit. Potter began writing and illustrating children's books full-time.

      With the proceeds from the books and a legacy from an aunt, in 1905 Potter bought Hill Top Farm in Near Sawrey, a village in the Lake District, which at that time was in Lancashire. Over the following decades, she purchased additional farms to preserve the unique hill country landscape. In 1913, at the age of 47, she married William Heelis, a respected local solicitor from Hawkshead. Potter was also a prize-winning breeder of Herdwick sheep and a prosperous farmer keenly interested in land preservation. She continued to write and illustrate, and to design spin-off merchandise based on her children's books for British publisher Warne, until the duties of land management and her diminishing eyesight made it difficult to continue.

      Potter wrote about 30 books; the best known being her 24 children's tales. She died of pneumonia and heart disease on 22 December 1943 at her home in Near Sawrey at age 77, leaving almost all her property to the National Trust. She is credited with preserving much of the land that now constitutes the Lake District National Park. Potter's books continue to sell throughout the world in many languages with her stories being retold in song, film, ballet, and animation, and her life depicted in a feature film and television film.

      Source: Wikipedia

Once upon a time there was a Pussy-cat called Ribby, who invited a little dog called Duchess, to tea. “Come in good time, my dear Duchess,” said Ribby’s letter, “and we will have something so very very nice. I am baking it in a pie-dish – a pie-dish with a pink rim. You never tasted anything so good! And you shall eat it all! I will eat muffins, my dear Duchess!” wrote Ribby.

THE INVITATION Duchess read the letter and wrote an answer: “I will come with much pleasure at a quarter past four. But it is very strange. I was just going to invite you to come here, to supper, my dear Ribby, to eat something most delicious. “I will come very punctually, my dear Ribby,” wrote Duchess; and then at the end she added – “I hope it isn’t mouse?” And then she thought that did not look quite polite; so she scratched out “isn’t mouse” and changed it to “I hope it will be fine,” and she gave her letter to the postman. But she thought a great deal about Ribby’s pie, and she read Ribby’s letter over and over again. “I am dreadfully afraid it will be mouse!” said Duchess to herself – “I really couldn’t, couldn’t eat mouse pie. And I shall have to eat it, because it is a party. And my pie was going to be veal and ham. A pink and white pie-dish! and so is mine; just like Ribby’s dishes; they were both bought at Tabitha Twitchit’s.”