But Jimmie didn’t catch the ball!  No, sir!  The strangest thing happened!  At that moment if along didn’t fly the kind fish hawk; and he swooped down and caught that ball up in his strong bill, and sailed away up in the air with it, and Buddy ran on and on as fast as he could go, around the bases, and toward home plate, and he got there in time to win the game.  And then the fish hawk dropped the ball, and Jimmie caught it, but it was too late to put Buddy out.

“That’s not fair!” cried Sammie Littletail.  “The bird took the ball up in the air.”  All his side said it wasn’t fair, but Uncle Wiggily, the umpire, decided that it was fair, and Buddy’s side won the game, but they wouldn’t have if it hadn’t been for the fish hawk, and they were very thankful to him.

Now I think I’m going to tell you in the next story about Brighteyes and Sister Sallie—­that is if no one takes our door mat to use for a pen wiper.

STORY V

BRIGHTEYES PIGG AND SISTER SALLIE

Brighteyes Pigg had finished doing the dishes, and had put on her clean dress, her new tan shoes, which matched her brown and white fur, and her hair was tied with a pink ribbon—­you know the kind—­the ones that stick out so with a bow on each side.  Well, she looked just too nice for anything, and she asked her mother: 

“May I go out and take a walk?”

“Yes,” replied Mrs. Pigg.  “Where are you going?  Is Buddy going with you?”

“No, he has gone off to play ball again.  I guess he thinks the fish hawk will catch up the ball once more and help him to make a home run.  No, I’m not going with Buddy.  I thought I’d go over and see Sister Sallie, I haven’t called on her in some time.”

“Very well,” said Mrs. Pigg, and Dr. Pigg called to his little girl: 

“Give my regards to Mr. Bushytail, and tell him that if he sees Uncle Wiggily Longears to mention that I have a new cure for rheumatism, that I will send him.”

“I’ll be sure to tell him,” said Brighteyes Pigg.  “Poor Uncle Wiggily, his rheumatism bothers him a great deal.”  Well, she went on through the woods to see Sister Sallie, who, I hope you remember, was the little sister that Billie and Johnnie Bushytail, the two boy squirrels, once found at the foot of the tree where their nest was.

Brighteyes found Sister Sallie just finishing helping Mrs. Bushytail do up the housework, and Sister Sallie was singing: 

  Hippity-hop to the barber-shop,
    To buy a lolly-pop lally. 
  One for me, and one for thee
    And one for Sister Sallie.

“Can you come out and play?” asked Brighteyes.

“Indeed I can,” replied the little squirrel.  “Shall I bring my doll?”

“Yes, but I haven’t any,” answered the little guinea pig girl, as Sallie brought out the corncob doll, that her brothers and Grandma Lightfoot had made for her.