"Puff-piff, puff-ffrr!" and he moved so quickly that the wheel was invisible.
It was two o'clock in the afternoon. The hamster that had been running since early in the morning had not had one break. He was very tired and his strength had run out. But small Ham did not give in. He tried to keep his spirits up in such a song,
"Oh, stairs up, oh, stairs up, oh how they're a lot,
My feet escape, my feet escape, and heart beats hard,
Not so lightly, not so lightly rotates the hugest wheel,
If I could reach a darling peak, it would be, oh, the biggest deal!"
So, he was running and happy.
Somebody emerged and called to him.
"Hello, chap! What are you doing?"
At the sill of the opened window was running to and fro a very brisk squirrel. It would run and suddenly curdle, run and curdle. And its tail was bending like a saxophone.
"Please, don't bother me! I'm very busy!" the hamster snapped and continued puffing like a locomotive.
"Hruph-hruph-puph..."
The squirrel jumped up on the edge of the top of window and hung with his head down.
"Stupid cuss, listen to what I have to say to you."
"I...pruph-truph...don't want to listen to you!"
The catchy squirrel thought of what to do and screamed,
"Be careful!!! Stop!!! A big bee is sitting on your belly! Stop, bulky guy!"
The scared hamster stumbled over and fell down the stairs. The untwisted wheel continued to rotate, turning him with his short tail back up, then stopped. Ham could not hold himself and flew to the floor.
The squirrel sprang to him and said,
"Now listen to me. Try to keep your spirits up, ninny! Don't dream of touching the top of the wheel! It's quite impossible. Do you not believe me?"
"How do you know?"
"My grandmother told me long ago that people invented this wheel to amuse themselves. They like to see how we uselessly try to get to the top. For us it's much better to be running in the forest. If you still want to climb up high, we can do it more easily. Let's go!"
With much difficulty the squirrel urged the hamster, and, after several times, they strolled through the wonderful woods with tall, powerful green pines and oaks. Sunny glades were strewn with plenty of various colored flowers, over which soared beautiful butterflies waving their decorated wings.
The hamster was so amazed at such a striking landscape that big tears formed in his eyes.
The squirrel didn't lie to the hamster. It was really simple and easy climbing high toward the trunk of the tree. There they chose a long, flexible branch waving from the wind.
