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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Mouse and The Moonbeam + +Author: Eugene Field + +Release Date: January 4, 2009 [EBook #27697] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MOUSE AND THE MOONBEAM *** + + + + +Produced by Louise Hope, David Edwards and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<p class = "page"> </p> + +<h5>THE MOUSE<br> +AND THE MOONBEAM</h5> + +<p class = "page"> </p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<img src = "images/frontis.png" width = "361" height = "522" +alt = "frontispiece"> +</p> + +<p class = "page"> </p> + +<h4>THE MOUSE<br> +AND THE MOONBEAM</h4> + +<h6>BY<br> +EUGENE FIELD</h6> + +<p> </p> + +<h6>NEW YORK<br> +1919</h6> + +<div class = "verso"> + +<p class = "center">Copyright, 1912<br> +by Charles Scribner’s Sons</p> + +<p class = "space"> +Through the courtesy of Charles Scribner’s Sons, we were permitted +to print this small private edition.</p> + +<p> </p> + +<p class = "center">GIFT</p> + +</div> + +<span class = "pagenum">[7]</span> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<img src = "images/header.png" width = "386" height = "113" +alt = "decoration"> +</p> + + + +<h6 class = "space">THE MOUSE AND THE MOONBEAM</h6> + + +<p><img src = "images/capW.png" width = "156" height = "155" +align = "left" alt = "W"> +<span class = "firstword">hilst</span> you were sleeping, little +Dear-my-soul, strange things happened; but that I saw and heard them, +I should never have believed them. The clock stood, of course, in +the corner, a moonbeam floated idly on the floor, and a little +mauve mouse came from the hole in the chimney corner and frisked and +scampered in the light of the moonbeam upon the floor. The little mauve +mouse was particu­larly merry; sometimes she danced upon two legs +and sometimes upon four legs, but always very daintily and always very +merrily.</p> + +<p>“Ah, me!” sighed the old clock, “how different mice +are nowadays from the mice we used to have in the good old times! Now +there was your grandma, Mistress Velvetpaw, +<span class = "pagenum">[8]</span> +and there was your grandpa, Master Sniff­whisker,—how grave +and dignified they were! Many a night have I seen them dancing upon the +carpet below me, but always the stately minuet and never that crazy +frisking which you are executing now, to my surprise—yes, and to +my horror, too.”</p> + +<p>“But why shouldn’t I be merry?” asked the little +mauve mouse. “Tomorrow is Christmas, and this is Christmas +eve.”</p> + +<p>“So it is,” said the old clock. “I had really +forgotten all about it. But, tell me, what is Christmas to you, little +Miss Mauve Mouse?”</p> + +<p>“A great deal to me!” cried the little mauve mouse. +“I have been very good a very long time: I have not used +any bad words, nor have I gnawed any holes, nor have I stolen any canary +seed, nor have I worried my mother by running behind the flour-barrel +where that horrid trap is set. In fact, I have been so good that I +am very sure Santa Claus will bring me something very pretty.”</p> + +<p>This seemed to amuse the old clock mightily; in fact the old clock +fell to laughing so heartily that in an unguarded moment she struck +twelve instead of ten, which was exceed­ingly careless and therefore +to be repre­hended.</p> + +<span class = "pagenum">[9]</span> +<p>“Why, you silly little mauve mouse,” said the old clock, +“you don’t believe in Santa Claus, do you?”</p> + +<p>“Of course I do,” answered the little mauve mouse. +“Believe in Santa Claus? Why shouldn’t I? Didn’t Santa +Claus bring me a beautiful butter-cracker last Christmas, and a lovely +ginger­snap, and a delicious rind of cheese, +and—and—lots of things? I should be very ungrateful if +I did <i>not</i> believe in Santa Claus, and I certainly shall not +disbelieve in him at the very moment when I am expecting him to arrive +with a bundle of goodies for me.</p> + +<p>“I once had a little sister,” continued the little mauve +mouse, “who did not believe in Santa Claus, and the very thought +of the fate that befell her makes my blood run cold and my whiskers +stand on end. She died before I was born, but my mother has told me all +about her. Perhaps you never saw her: her name was Squeak­nibble, +and she was in stature one of those long, low, rangy mice that are +seldom found in well-stocked pantries. Mother says that +Squeak­nibble took after our ancestors who came from New England, +where the malignant ingenuity of the people and the ferocity of the cats +rendered life precarious indeed. Squeak­nibble seemed to inherit +many ancestral traits, +<span class = "pagenum">[10]</span> +the most conspi­cuous of which was a dispo­sition to sneer at +some of the most respected dogmas in mousedom. From her very infancy she +doubted, for example, the widely accepted theory that the moon was +composed of green cheese; and this heresy was the first intima­tion +her parents had of the sceptical turn of her mind. Of course her parents +were vastly annoyed, for their maturer natures saw that this youthful +scepti­cism portended serious, if not fatal, conse­quences. Yet +all in vain did the sagacious couple reason and plead with their +headstrong and heretical child.</p> + +<p>“For a long time Squeak­nibble would not believe that there +was any such archfiend as a cat; but she came to be convinced to the +contrary one memorable night, on which occasion she lost two inches of +her beautiful tail, and received so terrible a fright that for fully an +hour afterward her little heart beat so violently as to lift her off her +feet and bump her head against the top of our domestic hole. The cat +that deprived my sister of so large a percentage of her vertebral +colophon was the same brindled ogress that nowadays steals ever and anon +into this room, crouches treacher­ously behind the sofa, and feigns +to be asleep, hoping, forsooth, that some of us, heedless of her hated +<span class = "pagenum">[11]</span> +presence, will venture within reach of her diabolical claws. So enraged +was this ferocious monster at the escape of my sister that she ground +her fangs viciously together, and vowed to take no pleasure in life +until she held in her devouring jaws the innocent little mouse which +belonged to the mangled bit of tail she even then clutched in her +remorse­less claws.”</p> + +<p>“Yes,” said the old clock, “now that you recall the +incident, I recollect it well. I was here then, in this very +corner, and I remember that I laughed at the cat and chided her for her +awkward­ness. My reproaches irritated her; she told me that a +clock’s duty was to run itself down, <i>not</i> to be +depreci­ating the merits of others! Yes, I recall the time; +that cat’s tongue is fully as sharp as her claws.”</p> + +<p>“Be that as it may,” said the little mauve mouse, +“it is a matter of history, and therefore beyond dispute, that +from that very moment the cat pined for Squeak­nibble’s life; +it seemed as if that one little two-inch taste of +Squeak­nibble’s tail had filled the cat with a consuming +passion, or appetite, for the rest of Squeak­nibble. So the cat +waited and watched and hunted and schemed and devised and did +every­thing possible for a cat—a cruel cat—to do in +order to gain her murderous ends. One +<span class = "pagenum">[12]</span> +night—one fatal Christmas eve—our mother had undressed the +children for bed, and was urging upon them to go to sleep earlier than +usual, since she fully expected that Santa Claus would bring each of +them something very palatable and nice before morning. Thereupon the +little dears whisked their cunning tails, pricked up their beautiful +ears, and began telling one another what they hoped Santa Claus would +bring. One asked for a slice of Roquefort, another for Neuf­chatel, +another for Sap Sago, and a fourth for Edam; one expressed a +prefer­ence for de Brie, while another hoped to get Parmesan; one +clamored for imperial blue Stilton, and another craved the fragrant boon +of Caprera. There were fourteen little ones then, and conse­quently +there were diverse opinions as to the kind of gift which Santa Claus +should best bring; still, there was, as you can readily under­stand, +an enthusi­astic unanimity upon this point, namely, that the gift +should be cheese of some brand or other.</p> + +<p>“‘My dears,’ said our mother, ‘what matters +it whether the boon which Santa Claus brings be royal English cheddar or +fromage de Bricquebec, Vermont sage, or Herkimer County skim-milk? We +should be content with what­soever Santa Claus bestows, so long as +it be +<span class = "pagenum">[13]</span> +cheese, disjoined from all traps what­soever, unmixed with Paris +green, and free from glass, strych­nine, and other harmful +ingre­dients. As for myself, I shall be satisfied with a cut of +nice, fresh, Western reserve; for truly I recognise in no other viand or +edible half the fragrance or half the gustful­ness to be met with in +one of these pale but aromatic domestic products. So run away to your +dreams now, that Santa Claus may find you sleeping.’</p> + +<p>“The children obeyed,—all but Squeak­nibble. +‘Let the others think what they please,’ said she, +‘but I don’t believe in Santa Claus. I’m not going to +bed either. I’m going to creep out of this dark hole and have a +quiet romp, all by myself, in the moonlight.’ Oh, what a vain, +foolish, wicked little mouse was Squeak­nibble! But I will not +reproach the dead; her punish­ment came all too swiftly. Now listen: +who do you suppose overheard her talking so disrespect­fully of +Santa Claus?”</p> + +<p>“Why, Santa Claus himself,” said the old clock.</p> + +<p>“Oh, no,” answered the little mauve mouse. “It was +that wicked, murderous cat! Just as Satan lurks and lies in wait for bad +children, so does the cruel cat lie in wait for naughty little mice. And +you can depend upon it that, +<span class = "pagenum">[14]</span> +when that awful cat heard Squeak­nibble speak so +disrespect­fully of Santa Claus, her wicked eyes glowed with joy, +her sharp teeth watered, and her bristling fur emitted electric sparks +as big as marrowfat peas. Then what did that blood-thirsty monster do +but scuttle as fast as she could into Dear-my-Soul’s room, leap up +into Dear-my-Soul’s crib, and walk off with the pretty little +white muff which Dear-my-Soul used to wear when she went for a visit to +the little girl in the next block! What upon earth did the horrid old +cat want with Dear-my-Soul’s pretty little white muff? Ah, the +duplicity, the diabolical ingenuity of that cat! Listen.</p> + +<p>“In the first place,” resumed the little mauve mouse, +after a pause that testified eloquently to the depth of her +emotion,—“in the first place, that wretched cat dressed +herself up in that pretty little white muff, by which you are to +under­stand that she crawled through the muff just so far as to +leave her four cruel legs at liberty.”</p> + +<p>“Yes, I under­stand,” said the old clock.</p> + +<p>“Then she put on the boy doll’s fur cap,” said the +little mauve mouse, “and when she was arrayed in the boy +doll’s fur cap and Dear-my-Soul’s pretty little white muff, +of course +<span class = "pagenum">[15]</span> +she didn’t look like a cruel cat at all. But whom did she look +like?”</p> + +<p>“Like the boy doll,” suggested the old clock.</p> + +<p>“No, no!” cried the little mauve mouse.</p> + +<p>“Like Dear-my-Soul?” asked the old clock.</p> + +<p>“How stupid you are!” exclaimed the little mauve mouse. +“Why, she looked like Santa Claus, of course!”</p> + +<p>“Oh, yes; I see,” said the old clock. “Now I begin +to be inter­ested; go on.”</p> + +<p>“Alas!” sighed the little mauve mouse, “not much +remains to be told; but there is more of my story left than there was of +Squeak­nibble when that horrid cat crawled out of that miserable +disguise. You are to under­stand that, contrary to her sagacious +mother’s injunc­tion, and in notorious derision of the mooted +coming of Santa Claus, Squeak­nibble issued from the friendly hole +in the chimney corner, and gambolled about over this very carpet, and, +I dare say, in this very moonlight.”</p> + +<p>“I do not know,” said the moonbeam faintly. +“I am so very old, and I have seen so many things—I do +not know.”</p> + +<p>“Right merrily was Squeak­nibble gambolling,” +continued the little mauve mouse, “and she had just turned a +double back somer­sault without the use of what remained of her tail +<span class = "pagenum">[16]</span> +when, all of a sudden, she beheld, looming up like a monster ghost, +a figure all in white fur! Oh, how frightened she was, and how her +little heart did beat! ‘Purr, purr-r-r,’ said the ghost in +white fur. ‘Oh, please don’t hurt me!’ pleaded +Squeak­nibble. ‘No; I’ll not hurt you,’ said the +ghost in white fur; ‘I’m Santa Claus, and I’ve brought +you a beautiful piece of savory old cheese, you dear little mousie, +you.’ Poor Squeak­nibble was deceived; a sceptic all her +life, she was at last befooled by the most palpable and most fatal of +frauds. ‘How good of you!’ said Squeak­nibble. +‘I didn’t believe there was a Santa Claus, +and—’ but before she could say more she was seized by two +sharp, cruel claws that conveyed her crushed body to the murderous mouth +of mousedom’s most malignant foe. I can dwell no longer upon +this harrowing scene. Suffice it to say that ere the morrow’s sun +rose like a big yellow Herkimer County cheese upon the spot where that +tragedy had been enacted, poor Squeak­nibble passed to that bourn +whence two inches of her beautiful tail had preceded her by the space of +three weeks to a day. As for Santa Claus, when he came that Christmas +eve, bringing morceaux de Brie and of Stilton for the other little mice, +he heard with sorrow +<span class = "pagenum">[17]</span> +of Squeak­nibble’s fate; and ere he departed he said that in +all his experi­ence he had never known of a mouse or of a child that +had prospered after once saying that he didn’t believe in Santa +Claus.”</p> + +<p>“Well, that is a remark­able story,” said the old +clock. “But if you believe in Santa Claus, why aren’t you in +bed?”</p> + +<p>“That’s where I shall be presently,” answered the +little mauve mouse, “but I must have my scamper you know. It is +very pleasant, I assure you, to frolic in the light of the moon; +only I cannot under­stand why you are always so cold and so solemn +and so still, you pale, pretty little moonbeam.”</p> + +<p>“Indeed, I do not know that I am so,” said the moonbeam. +“But I am very old, and I have travelled many, many, leagues, and +I have seen wondrous things. Sometimes I toss upon the ocean, sometimes +I fall upon a slumbering flower, sometimes I rest upon a dead +child’s face. I see the fairies at their play, and I hear +mothers singing lullabies. Last night I swept across the frozen bosom of +a river. A woman’s face looked up at me; it was the picture +of eternal rest. ‘She is sleeping,’ said the frozen river. +‘I’ll rock her to and fro, and sing to her. Pass gently by, +O moonbeam; pass gently by, lest you awaken her.’”</p> + +<span class = "pagenum">[18]</span> +<p>“How strangely you talk,” said the old clock. “Now, +I’ll warrant me that, if you wanted to, you could tell many a +pretty and wonderful story. You must know many a Christmas tale; pray, +tell us one to wear away this night of Christmas watching.”</p> + +<p>“I know but one,” said the moonbeam. “I have +told it over and over again, in every land and in every home; yet I do +not weary of it. It is very simple. Should you like to hear +it?”</p> + +<p>“Indeed we should,” said the old clock; “but before +you begin, let me strike twelve; for I shouldn’t want to interrupt +you.”</p> + +<p>When the old clock had performed this duty with somewhat more than +usual alacrity, the moonbeam began its story:</p> + +<p>“Upon a time—so long ago that I can’t tell how long +ago it was—I fell upon a hill-side. It was in a far distant +country; this I know, because, although it was the Christmas time, it +was not in that country as it is wont to be in countries to the north. +Hither the snow-king never came; flowers bloomed all the year, and at +all times the lambs found pleasant pasturage on the hill-sides. The +night wind was balmy, and there was a fragrance of cedar in its breath. +There were violets on the hill-side, and I fell amongst them and lay +there. I kissed them, and +<span class = "pagenum">[19]</span> +they awakened. ‘Ah, is it you, little moonbeam?’ they said, +and they nestled in the grass which the lambs had left uncropped.</p> + +<p>“A shepherd lay upon a broad stone on the hill-side; above him +spread an olive-tree, old, ragged, and gloomy; but now it swayed its +rusty branches majestic­ally in the shifting air of night. The +shepherd’s name was Benoni. Wearied with long watching, he had +fallen asleep; his crook had slipped from his hand. Upon the hill-side, +too, slept the shepherd’s flock. I had counted them again and +again; I had stolen across their gentle faces and brought them +pleasant dreams of green pastures and of cool water-brooks. I had +kissed old Benoni, too, as he lay slumbering there; and in his dreams he +seemed to see Israel’s King come upon earth, and in his dreams he +murmured the promised Messiah’s name.</p> + +<p>“‘Ah, is it you, little moonbeam?’ quoth the +violets. ‘You have come in good time. Nestle here with us, and see +wonderful things come to pass.’</p> + +<p>“‘What are these wonderful things of which you +speak?’ I asked.</p> + +<p>“‘We heard the old olive-tree telling of them +to-night,’ said the violets. ‘Do not go to sleep, little +violets,’ said the old olive-tree, ‘for +<span class = "pagenum">[20]</span> +this is Christmas night, and the Master shall walk upon the hill-side in +the glory of the midnight hour.’ So we waited and watched; one by +one the lambs fell asleep; one by one the stars peeped out; the shepherd +nodded and crooned, and crooned and nodded, and at last he, too, went +fast asleep, and his crook slipped from his keeping. Then we called to +the old olive-tree yonder, asking how soon the midnight hour would come; +but all the old olive-tree answered was ‘Presently, +presently,’ and finally we, too, fell asleep, wearied by our long +watching, and lulled by the rocking and swaying of the old olive-tree in +the breezes of the night.</p> + +<p>“‘But who is this Master?’ I asked.</p> + +<p>“‘A child, a little child,’ they answered. +‘He is called the little Master by the others. He comes here +often, and plays among the flowers of the hill-side. Sometimes the +lambs, gambolling too care­lessly, have crushed and bruised us so +that we lie bleeding and are like to die; but the little Master heals +our wounds and refreshes us once again.’</p> + +<p>“I marvelled much to hear these things. ‘The midnight +hour is at hand,’ said I, ‘and I will abide with you to see +this little Master of whom you speak.’ So we nestled among the +<span class = "pagenum">[21]</span> +verdure of the hill-side, and sang songs one to another.</p> + +<p>“‘Come away!’ called the night wind; +‘I know a beauteous sea not far hence, upon whose bosom you +shall float, float, float, away out into the mists and clouds, if you +will come with me.’</p> + +<p>“But I hid under the violets and amid the tall grass, that the +night wind might not woo me with its pleading. ‘Ho, there, old +olive-tree!’ cried the violets; ‘do you see the little +Master coming? Is not the midnight hour at hand?’</p> + +<p>“‘I can see the town yonder,’ said the old +olive-tree. ‘A star beams bright over Bethlehem, the iron +gates swing open, and the little Master comes.’</p> + +<p>“Two children came to the hill-side. The one, older than his +comrade, was Dimas, the son of Benoni. He was rugged and sinewy, and +over his brown shoulders was flung a goat-skin; a leathern cap did +not confine his long, dark curly hair. The other child was he whom they +called the little Master; about his slender form clung raiment white as +snow, and around his face of heavenly innocence fell curls of golden +yellow. So beautiful a child I had not seen before, nor have I ever +since seen such as he. And as they came together to the hill-side, +<span class = "pagenum">[22]</span> +there seemed to glow about the little Master’s head a soft white +light, as if the moon had sent its tenderest, fairest beams to kiss +those golden curls.</p> + +<p>“‘What sound was that?’ cried Dimas, for he was +exceeding fearful.</p> + +<p>“‘Have no fear, Dimas,’ said the little Master. +‘Give me thy hand and I will lead thee.’</p> + +<p>“Presently they came to the rock whereon Benoni, the shepherd, +lay; and they stood under the old olive-tree, and the old olive-tree +swayed no longer in the night wind, but bent its branches +rever­ently in the presence of the little Master. It seemed as if +the wind, too, stayed in its shifting course just then; for suddenly +there was a solemn hush, and you could hear no noise, except that in his +dreams Benoni spoke the Messiah’s name.</p> + +<p>“‘Thy father sleeps,’ said the little Master, +‘and it is well that it is so; for that I love thee Dimas, and +that thou shalt walk with me in my Father’s Kingdom, I would +show thee the glories of my birth­right.’</p> + +<p>“Then all at once sweet music filled the air, and light, +greater than the light of day, illumined the sky and fell upon all that +hill-side. The heavens opened, and angels, singing joyous songs, walked +to the earth. More wondrous +<span class = "pagenum">[23]</span> +still, the stars, falling from their places in the sky, clustered upon +the old olive-tree, and swung hither and thither like colored lanterns. +The flowers of the hill-side all awakened, and they, too, danced and +sang. The angels, coming hither, hung gold and silver and jewels and +precious stones upon the old olive, where swung the stars; so that the +glory of that sight, though I might live forever, I shall never see +again. When Dimas heard and saw these things he fell upon his knees, and +catching the hem of the little Master’s garment, he +kissed it.</p> + +<p>“‘Greater joy than this shall be thine, Dimas,’ +said the little Master; ‘but first must all things be +fulfilled.’</p> + +<p>“All through that Christmas night did the angels come and go +with their sweet anthems; all through that Christmas night did the stars +dance and sing; and when it came my time to steal away, the hill-side +was still beautiful with the glory and the music of heaven.”</p> + +<p>“Well, is that all?” asked the old clock.</p> + +<p>“No,” said the moonbeam; “but I am nearly done. The +years went on. Sometimes I tossed upon the ocean’s bosom, +sometimes I scampered o’er a battle-field, sometimes I lay upon a +dead child’s face. I heard the voices of Darkness and +<span class = "pagenum">[24]</span> +mothers’ lullabies and sick men’s prayers—and so the +years went on.</p> + +<p>“I fell one night upon a hard and furrowed face. It was of +ghostly pallor. A thief was dying on the cross, and this was his +wretched face. About the cross stood men with staves and swords and +spears, but none paid heed unto the thief. Somewhat beyond this cross +another was lifted up, and upon it was stretched a human body my light +fell not upon. But I heard a voice that somewhere I had heard +before,—though where I did not know,—and this voice blessed +those that railed and jeered and shame­fully entreated. And suddenly +the voice called ‘Dimas, Dimas!’ and the thief upon whose +hardened face I rested made answer.</p> + +<p>“Then I saw that it was Dimas; yet to this wicked criminal +there remained but little of the shepherd child whom I had seen in all +his innocence upon the hill-side. Long years of sinful life had seared +their marks into his face; yet now, at the sound of that familiar voice, +somewhat of the old-time boyish look came back, and in the yearning of +the anguished eyes I seemed to see the shepherd’s son again.</p> + +<p>“‘The Master!’ cried Dimas, and he stretched forth +his neck that he might see him that spake.</p> + +<p>“‘O Dimas, how art thou changed!’ cried +<span class = "pagenum">[25]</span> +the Master, yet there was in his voice no tone of rebuke save that which +cometh of love.</p> + +<p>“Then Dimas wept, and in that hour he forgot his pain. And the +Master’s consoling voice and the Master’s presence there +wrought in the dying criminal such a new spirit, that when at last his +head fell upon his bosom, and the men about the cross said that he was +dead, it seemed as if I shined not upon a felon’s face, but upon +the face of the gentle shepherd lad, the son of Benoni.</p> + +<p>“And shining on that dead and peaceful face, I bethought +me of the little Master’s words that he had spoken under the old +olive-tree upon the hill-side: ‘Your eyes behold the promised +glory now, O Dimas,’ I whispered, ‘for with the +Master you walk in Paradise.’”</p> + +<p class = "space"> +Ah, little Dear-my-Soul, you know—you know whereof the moonbeam +spake. The shepherd’s bones are dust, the flocks are scattered, +the old olive-tree is gone, the flowers of the hill-side are withered, +and none knoweth where the grave of Dimas is made. But last night, +again, there shined a star over Bethlehem, and the angels descended from +the sky to earth, and the stars sang together in glory. And the +bells,—hear them, little Dear-my-Soul, +<span class = "pagenum">[26]</span> +how sweetly they are ringing,—the bells bear us the good tidings +of great joy this Christmas morning, that our Christ is born, and that +with him he bringeth peace on earth and good-will toward men.</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Mouse and The Moonbeam, by Eugene Field + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MOUSE AND THE MOONBEAM *** + +***** This file should be named 27697-h.htm or 27697-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/2/7/6/9/27697/ + +Produced by Louise Hope, David Edwards and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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