Bunny had been told so many times by Mr. Treadwell just what other things to say that this time he did not waste a second.  So, almost as soon as the impersonator, dressed as General Grant, had rushed out, grabbed the pony’s bridle, and called on Bunny and Sue to surrender, Bunny answered: 

“All right, General Grant.  I’ll surrender if—­if it takes all summer!”

Bunny didn’t know why some of the old men in the audience laughed so hard when he said this, but later on his father told him that some of them, like Uncle Tad, had fought under General Grant in the Civil War and that he had said words that were a “take-off” of one of General Grant’s real speeches.

So, in less time than I have taken to tell you about it, the danger was over, Mr. Treadwell had turned the pony around so that it was headed back toward the make-believe barn, Peter, the crowing rooster had been taken from the back of the little horse, and the play was going on as usual.

Lucile came out and sang another song, Mart did some acrobatic feats, and the other boys and girls did their parts in the play, while “General Grant” appeared again and amused the audience.

“Dear me, Mrs. Brown!” exclaimed Mrs. Newton, who sat next to the mother of Bunny and Sue, “I thought at first that was an accident—­the way the pony started off the stage when the rooster got on his back—­but I guess it was all part of the play.”

“It was clever of them to get up something to fool us like that—­almost too real and life-like, I think, though,” said the mother of one of the little boys in the play.

Mrs. Brown knew, from the looks on the faces of Bunny and Sue, that it was an accident, and not intended, but she said nothing, for she did not want to spoil any one’s pleasure in the show.

And so the performance went on, the boys and girls doing simple little things they had been taught by Mr. Treadwell.  There were dances and drills, for it was a sort of mixed-up play, without very much of what grown folks call “plot.”  But it was just the thing for Bunny Brown and his sister Sue, and the only sort of play they could have given, for they were not very old.

In one scene George Watson, Harry Bentley, and Charlie Star played leapfrog, jumping over one another’s backs.  Bunny also had a part in this.

George tried to get his rooster to do a little trick in the barnyard scene.  The boy stood near the barn door and held a piece of bread in his hand.  He wanted Peter, the rooster, to fly up, perch on his head, and eat the crumbs of bread.  But the rooster seemed to think he had done enough by perching on the pony’s back, and he wouldn’t fly on top of George’s head at all.  So they had to leave that trick out of the second act.

Then the curtain went down on the second act, the barnyard scene, and the boy and girls got ready for the last, the third act, in the orchard.  This was to be the prettiest of all, for it was supposed to be in apple-blossom time, and the scene was a beautiful one, though it was cold, snowy, and wintry weather outside.  Mr. Treadwell had done his best on this act.