“What happened to you, Squinty?” asked Wuff-Wuff.

“Oh, I had a fine swim in a brook,” said Squinty.

“I wish that had happened to me,” said Wuff-Wuff.  “What else?”

“I found a nice field of corn,” went on Squinty, “but I did not like the taste of it.  I got lost in the cornfield.”

“That’s too bad,” said Wuff-Wuff.  “Did anything else happen?”

“Yes, I found some pig weed, and ate that, and some little potatoes.”

“Oh, how nice!” exclaimed Twisty Tail.  “I wish that had happened to me.  Did you do anything else, Squinty?”

“Yes,” said the comical little pig.  “I saw something I thought was a potato, and it jumped away from me.  It was a hoptoad.”

“That was funny,” said Squealer.  “I wish I had seen it.  Did anything else happen?”

“Yes,” said Squinty.  “I thought I saw another potato, but when I bit on it I found it was only a stone, and it hurt my teeth.”

“That’s too bad,” said Wuff-Wuff.  “I am glad that did not happen to me.  Tell us what else you saw.”

But just then Mrs. Pig grunted out: 

“Come, now!  All you little pigs must keep quiet and go to sleep.  Go to sleep at once!”

So Squinty and the others cuddled closer together, snuggled down in the soft straw, and soon were fast asleep.  Now and then they stirred, or grunted during the night, but they did not wake up until morning.  They were running around the pen before breakfast, squealing as loudly as they could, for the farmer to come and feed them.  But the farmer had his cows and horses and chickens to feed, as well as the pigs, and he did not get to the pen until last.  And when he did, all the pigs were so hungry, even Mr. and Mrs. Pig, that they were squealing as hard as they could.

“Yes, yes!” cried the farmer, as though he were talking to the pigs.  “I’m coming as fast as I can.”

Soon the farmer poured some sour milk and corn meal down into the trough, and how eagerly Squinty and the others did eat it!  Some of the smaller pigs even put two feet in the trough, they were so anxious to get their share.  Squinty had an especially good appetite, from having run away, so perhaps he got a little more than the others.

But finally the breakfast was all gone, and the pigs had nothing more to do until dinner time—­that is, all they had to do was to lie down and rest, or get up now and then to scratch a mosquito, or a fly bite.

“Well, I guess none of you will get out again,” said the farmer, after a while, as he nailed a bigger board over the hole by which Squinty had gotten out.  “Don, watch these pigs,” the farmer went on.  “If they get out, grab them by the ear, and bring them back.”

“Bow wow!” barked Don, and that meant he would do as his master had told him.

For several days after this nothing happened in the pigs’ pen except that they were washed off with the hose now and then, to clean them of mud and make them cool.  Once in a while the farmer would take a corn cob and scratch the back of Mr. or Mrs. Pig, and they liked this very much.  The other pigs were almost too little for the farmer to reach over the top of the pen.