Bully and Bawly No-Tail Part 15

"No," replied Bawly, "I certainly did not. But perhaps I can get the corn up for you. I'll reach down and try."

So he stretched out on the bank of the pond, and reached his front leg down into the water as far as it would go, but he couldn't touch the corn, for it was scattered out of the basket, all over the floor, or bottom, of the pond.

"That will never do!" cried Bawly. "I guess I'll have to dive down for that corn."

"Dive down!" exclaimed Arabella. "Oh, if you dive down under water you'll get all wet. Wait, and perhaps the water will all run out of the pond and we can then get the corn."

"Oh I don't mind the wet," replied the frog boy. "My clothes are made purposely for that. I'm so sorry I spilled the corn." So into the water Bawly popped, clothes and all, just as when you fall out of a boat, and down to the bottom he went. But when he tried to pick up the corn he had trouble. For the kernels were all wet and slippery and Bawly couldn't very well hold his paw full of corn, and swim at the same time. So he had to let go of the corn, and up he popped.

"Oh!" cried Arabella, when she saw he didn't have any corn. "I'm so sorry! What shall we do? We need the corn for supper."

"I'll try again," promised Bawly, and he did, again and again, but still he couldn't get any of the corn up from under the water. And he felt badly, and so did Arabella, and even eating what they had left of the candy didn't make them feel any better.

"I tell you what it is!" cried Bawly, after he had tried forty-'leven times to dive down after the corn, "what I need is something like an ash sieve. Then I could scoop up the corn and water, and the water would run out, and leave the corn there."

"But you haven't any sieve," said Arabella, "and so you can never get the corn, and we won't have any supper, and-- Oh, dear! Boo-hoo!

Hoo-boo!"

"Oh, please don't cry," begged Bawly, who felt badly enough himself.

"Here, wait, I'll see if I can't drink all the water out of the pond, and that will leave the ground dry so we can get the corn."

Well, he tried, but, bless you, he couldn't begin to drink all the water in the pond. And he didn't know what to do, until, all of a sudden, he saw, coming along the road, Aunt Lettie, the nice old lady goat. And what do you think she had? Why, a coffee strainer, that she had bought at the five-and-ten-cent store. As soon as Bawly saw that strainer he asked Aunt Lettie if he could take it.

She said he could, and pretty soon down he dived under the water again, and with the coffee strainer it was very easy to scoop up the corn from the bottom of the pond, and soon Bawly got it all back again, and the water hadn't hurt it a bit, only making it more tender and juicy for cooking.

And just as Bawly got up the last of the corn in the coffee strainer, down swooped a big owl, and he tried to grab Bawly and Arabella and the corn and sieve and Aunt Lettie, all at the same time. But the old lady goat drove him away with her sharp horns, and then Bawly and Arabella thanked her very kindly and went home, the frog boy carrying the corn he had gotten up from the pond, and taking care not to spill it again. And so every one was happy but the owl.

Now in case the fish man doesn't paint the gla.s.s of the parlor windows sky-blue pink, so I can't see Uncle Wiggily Longears when he rings the door bell, I'll tell you next about Bully and Dottie Trot.

STORY XX

BAWLY AND ARABELLA CHICK.

One day Bully No-Tail, the frog boy, was hopping along through the woods, and he felt so very fine, and it was such a nice day, that, when he came to a place where some flowers grew up near an old stump, nodding their pretty heads in the wind, the frog boy sang a little song.

"I love to skip and jump and hop, I love to hear firecrackers pop, I love to play The whole long day, I love to spin my humming top."

That's what Bully sang, and if there had been a second, or a third, or a forty-'leventh verse he would have sung that too, as he felt so good.

Well, after he had sung the one verse he hopped on some more, and pretty soon he came to the place where the mouse lady lived, whose basket of chips Bully had once picked up, when she hurt her foot on a thorn. I guess you remember about that story.

"Ah, how to you do, Bully?" asked the mouse lady, as the frog boy hopped along.

"Thank you, I am very well," he answered politely. "I hope you are feeling pretty good."

"Well," she made answer, "I might feel better. I have a little touch of cat-and-mouse-trap fever, but I think if I stay in my hole and take plenty of toasted cheese, I'll be better. But here is a nice sugar cookie for you," and with that the nice mouse lady went to the cupboard, got a cookie, and gave it to the frog boy.

Bully ate it without getting a single crumb on the floor, which was very good of him, and then, saving a piece of the cookie for his brother Bawly, he hopped on, after bidding the mouse lady good-by and hoping that she would soon be better.

Along and along hopped Bully, and all of a sudden the big giant jumped out of the bushes-Oh, excuse me, if you please! there is no giant in this story. The giant went back to the circus, but I'll tell you a story about him as soon as I may. As Bully was hopping along, all of a sudden out from behind a bush there jumped a savage, ugly wolf, and he had gotten out of his circus cage again, and was looking around for something to eat.

"Ah, ha! At last I have found something!" cried the wolf, as he made a spring for Bully, and he caught the frog boy under his paws and held him down to the earth, just like a cat catches a mouse.

"Oh, let me go! Please let me go! You are squeezing the breath out of me!" cried poor Bully.

"Indeed I will not let you go!" replied the wolf, real unpleasant-like.

"I have been looking for something to eat all day and now that I've found it I'm not going to let you go. No, indeed, and some horseradish in a bottle besides."

"Are you really going to eat me?" asked Bully, sorrowfully.

"I certainly am," replied the wolf. "You just watch me. Oh, no, I forgot. You can't see me eat you, but you can feel me, which is much the same thing."

Then the wolf sharpened his teeth on a sharpening stone, and he got ready to eat up the frog boy. Now Bully didn't want to be eaten, and I don't blame him a bit; do you? He wanted to go play ball, and have a lot of fun with his friends, and he was thinking what a queer world this is, where you can be happy and singing a song, and eating a sugar cookie one minute, and the next minute be caught by a wolf. But that's the way it generally is.

Then, as Bully thought of how good the sugar cookie was he asked the wolf:

"Will you let me go for a piece of cookie, Mr. Wolf?"

"Let me see the cookie," spoke the savage creature.

So Bully reached in his pocket, and took out the piece of cookie that he was saving for Bawly. He knew Bawly would only be too glad to have the wolf take it, if he let his brother Bully go.

But, would you ever believe it? That unpleasant and most extraordinary wolf animal s.n.a.t.c.hed the cookie from Bully's paw, ate it up with one mouthful, and only smiled.

"Well, now, are you going to let me go?" asked Bully.

"No," said the wolf. "That cookie only made me more hungry. I guess I'll eat you now, and then go look for your brother and eat him, too."

"Oh, will no one save me?" cried Bully in despair, and just then he heard a rustling in the bushes. He looked up and there he saw Dottie Trot, the little pony girl. She waved her hoof at Bully, and then the frog boy knew she would save him if she could. So he thought of a plan, while Dottie, with her new red hair ribbon tied in a pink bow, hid in the bushes, where the wolf couldn't see her, and waited.

"Well, if you are going to eat me, Mr. Wolf," said Bully, most politely, after a while, "will you grant me one favor before you do so?"

"What is it?" asked the wolf, still sharpening his teeth.

"Let me take one last hop before I die?" asked Bully.

"Very well," answered the wolf. "One hop and only one, remember. And don't think you can get away, for I can run faster than you can hop."

Bully knew that, but he was thinking of Dottie Trot. So the wolf took his paws off Bully, and the frog boy got ready to take a last big hop.

He looked over through the bushes, and saw the pony girl, and then he gave a great, big, most tremendous and extraordinarily strenuous jump, and landed right on Dottie's back!

"Here we go!" cried the pony girl. "Here is where I save Bully No-Tail!

Good-by bad Mr. Wolf." And away she trotted as fast as the wind.

"Here, come back with my supper! Come back with my supper!" cried the disappointed wolf, and off he ran after Dottie, who had Bully safely on her back.