“I’ll tie it up for you,” said his mother.  “Perhaps you children had better not try to pick up Crabs the way Cousin Tom did,” she went on.  “You might make a mistake and get badly pinched.”

“Yes, let the children keep out of the way,” agreed Daddy Bunker.  “Cousin Tom and I will catch the crabs.”

Russ was led away, hopping on one foot, though if he had tried, he could easily have stepped on his sore foot.  He was more frightened than hurt, I think.  And then the other children followed him, though the twins would rather have staid.

It was not easy to catch the crabs, for there were so many of them, and they scurried around so fast.  But Cousin Tom picked them up in his fingers, and Daddy Bunker soon learned the trick of this.  As for Cousin Ruth, she took the crab tongs, which were two pieces of wood fastened together on one end, like a pair of fire tongs.  In these the crabs could be picked up either front or back, or even by one claw, and they could only pinch the wood, which they often did.

“There, I think we have them all,” said Cousin Tom at last.  “And now, as the water is boiling, we can cook them.”

So the crabs were cooked, and set aside to cool until morning, when the white meat would be picked out of the red shells, and made into salad.

“What makes the crabs red?” asked Violet the next morning as she saw the pile of cold, boiled creatures.  “They were a sort of brown and green color when we caught them yesterday.”

“Yes,” said her father, “crabs, lobsters and shrimps, when they are boiled, turn red.  Just why this is I don’t know.  I suppose there is something in their shells that the hot water changes.”

“Can they pinch my toe now?” asked Mun Bun, as he stood near his mother, looking at the basket full of cooked crabs.

“Nope!  They can’t hurt you now; they’re cooked,” Laddie replied.  “I’m not ’fraid!” and he picked up a big crab, holding it by one of the claws.

Vi then did the same thing.

“Go ahead and take one, Mun Bun,” urged Laddie.

“No!  I don’t guess I want to,” said the little fellow.

“I know a riddle you could make up about a crab,” said Rose, who had come to the kitchen to watch Cousin Ruth clean the shellfish.

“What is it?” Laddie demanded instantly.

“What color is a crab when it can’t pinch?” sing-songed Rose.  “And the answer is it’s red when it can’t pinch.”

“Yes, that is a pretty good riddle,” said Laddie, as, with his head on one side, he thought it over.  “But I know how to make it better,” he went on.

“How?” asked his mother.

“Let me think a minute,” he begged.  “Oh, I have it!  Why is a crab like a newspaper?”

“’Tisn’t!” exclaimed Russ who came along just then.  He was limping a bit, for his toe was sore where the crab had pinched him.

“Yes, ’tis!” declared Laddie.  “That’s the riddle.  It’s something like the one Rose told.  Why is a crab like a newspaper?”