Then Jane gnawed out a little crutch for grandfather to walk with, as he was a trifle lame, and what do you think?  Why, Susie Littletail found his glasses for him; and Sammie and Jimmie rubbed his back so nicely that the pain all went out of that.  Now I call that doing something don’t you?

Well, Grandfather Goosey-Gander started for home, and Jimmie and Lulu asked Sammie and Susie to come and play with them.  Nurse Jane Fuzzy-Wuzzy said they might, and they had a fine time under the trees in the woods, playing tag of all kinds; cross-tag, wood-tag, dirt-tag, leaf-tag, stump-tag, and a new kind, called acorn-tag, which I will explain about later.  Then the bunny children went home with their nurse and Jimmie and Lulu also went home and about two days after that a very funny thing happened.

What it was you shall hear to-morrow night if the trolley car doesn’t get off the track, but I’ll let you know this much—­it’s going to be about the rooster trying to swim.

STORY X

THE ROOSTER TRIES TO SWIM

Grandfather Goosey-Gander was quite lame the next day from having been caught in the brush pile, and could not go very far away from the duck pen.  He did manage to hobble around on the crutch which Nurse Jane Fuzzy-Wuzzy made for him, and he sat in a sunny corner, reading the newspaper with his glasses which Susie Littletail found.  He was reading away as Alice, Lulu and Jimmie Wibblewobble were playing about on the edge of the pond, and the little duck children made so much noise that the old grandfather could not understand what was in the papers.

“Can’t you children play something quiet?” he asked for Papa and Mamma Wibblewobble had gone visiting, and Grandfather Goosey-Gander was left to mind the house.  “Play some nice, easy game,” he suggested.

“Let’s play acorn tag,” said Lulu.

“All right, you’re it,” answered Jimmie.  So they each took an acorn which they found in the woods and put it in their bills.  Then Lulu had to chase after Jimmie and Alice, and when she touched either one of them with her wing she had to call out:  “You can’t run a little bit, I’ve tagged you, and now you’re it.”  Yes, that’s what she had to call, and she had to do it without letting the acorn fall out of her bill.  Now, if you think that’s a very easy thing to do, just you try it, that’s all.

Lulu didn’t have much trouble putting her wing on Jimmie or Alice, but, every time she tried to call out the little verse the acorn would roll out of her bill and she’d have to start all over again, or it wouldn’t have been fair.  So it was some time before she got over being “it,” and then it was Jimmie’s turn.

Well, they played acorn tag for quite a while, and, when they got tired of that they all went in swimming.  They swam around in circles, and criss-crossed and went in squares, and in triangles and all sorts of queer figures, including eight, nine, ten, which are very difficult figures, indeed, for little ducks.