 It seems to Mrs. Frisby, the widowed head of a family of field mice, that her youngest son must die, either by the farmer s spring plough or of pneumonia in his flight to safety. In her quest for a cure she frees a young crow from some string in which he has foolishly tied himself, at the mercy of the farmer s cat Dragon. In return for her risking her life to save his, he takes her to the creature all birds know is the wisest: a great owl. Owls eat mice, but when this owl learns Mrs. Frisby s name he sets her on a path to earning a noble solution to her predicament - which is the secret of NIMH...