Chapter 9

"Now's our chance!" cried the frog. "Run, Sammie, run!" And they both scudded away as fast as they could before the alligator could catch them, or even before the boy could run out to see what the noise was. And when the alligator saw the boy the savage creature flurried and scurried away, taking his scalery-ailery tail with him, and the boy was very much surprised when he saw that the rabbit was gone.

But Sammie and Bully got safely home, and the next day Sammie went to school as usual, just as if nothing had happened, and every one said Bully was very brave to help him.

So that's all for to-night, if you please, and in case the housecleaning man gets all the ice cream up from under the sitting-room matting, and makes a snowball of it for the poll parrot to play horse with, I'll tell you next about Bully and Bawly going to the circus.

STORY XXIX

BULLY AND BAWLY AT THE CIRCUS

"Oh, mamma, may we go?" exclaimed Bawly No-Tail one day as he came home from school, and hopped into the house with such a big hop, that he hopped right up into the frog lady's lap.

"Go where?" asked Bawly's mother, wondering if the alligator were after her son.

"Oh, do please let us go!" cried Bully, hopping in after his brother. Bully tried to stand on his head, but his foot slipped and he nearly fell into the ink bottle. "Please let us go, mother?"

"Where? Where?" she asked again, as Bawly hopped out of her lap.

"To the circus!" cried Bully.

"It's coming!" exclaimed Bawly.

"Down in the vacant lots," went on Bully.

"Oh, you ought to see the posters! Lions and tigers and elephants, and men jumping in the air, and horses and--and--"

Bawly had to stop for breath then, and so he couldn't say any more. Neither could Bully. Oh, but they were excited, let me tell you.

"May we go?" they both cried out again.

"Well, I'll see," began their mother slowly. "I don't know--"

"Oh, I guess you'd better let them go," spoke up Grandpa Croaker in his deepest, rumbling voice. "I--I think I can spare the time to look after them. I don't really want to go, you know, as I was going to play a game of checkers with Uncle Wiggily Longears, but I guess I can take the boys to the circus. Ahem!"

"Oh, goody!" cried Bawly, jumping up and down.

"Where are you going?" asked their papa, just then coming in from the wallpaper factory.

"To the circus," said Bawly. "Grandpa Croaker will take us."

"Ha! Hum!" exclaimed Papa No-Tail. "I am very busy, but I guess I can spare the time to take you. We won't bother Grandpa."

"Oh, it's no bother--none at all, I assure you," quickly spoke the grandpa frog, in a thundering, rumbling voice. "We can both take them."

"Well, I never heard of such a thing!" exclaimed Mamma No-Tail. "Any one would think you two old men frogs wanted to go as much as the boys do. But I guess it will be all right."

So Bully and Bawly and their papa and their grandpa went to the circus next day. And what do you think? Just as they were buying their tickets if they didn't meet Uncle Wiggily Longears! And he had Sammie and Susie, the rabbits, with him, and there was Aunt Lettie, the old lady goat, with the three Wibblewobble children, and many other little friends of Bully and Bawly.

Well, that was a fine circus! There were lots of tents with flags on, and outside were men selling pink lemonade and peanuts for the elephant, and toy balloons, only those weren't for the elephant, you know, and there were men shouting, and lots of excitement, and there was a side show, with pictures outside the tent of a man swallowing swords by the dozen, and also knives and forks, and another picture of a lady wrapping a fat snake around her neck, because she was cold, I guess, and then you could hear the lions roaring and the elephants trumpeting, and the band was playing, and the peanut wagons were whistling like teakettles, and--and--Oh! why, if I write any more about that circus I'll want to take my typewriter, and put it away in a dark closet, and go to the show myself!

But anyhow it was very fine, and pretty soon Bully and Bawly and their papa and grandpa were in the tent looking at the animals. They fed the elephant peanuts until they had none for themselves, and they looked at the camel with two humps, and at the one with only one hump, because I s'pose he didn't have money enough to buy two, and then they went in the tent where the real show was.

Well it went off very fine. The big parade was over, and the men were doing acts on the trapeze, and the trained seals were playing ball with their noses, and the clowns were cutting up funny capers. And all at once a man, with a shiny hat on, came out in the middle of the ring, and said:

"Ladies and gentlemen, permit me to call your attention to our jumping dog, Nero. He is the greatest jumping dog in the world, and he will jump over an elephant's back!"

Well, the people clapped like anything after that, and a clown came out, leading a dog. Everybody was all excited, especially when another clown led out a big elephant. Then it was the turn of the dog to jump over the elephant. Well, he tried it, but he didn't go over. The clown petted him, and gave him a sweet cracker, and the dog tried it again, but he couldn't do it. Then he tried once more and he fell right down under the elephant, and the elephant lifted Nero up in his trunk, and set him gently down on some straw.

Then the clown took off his funny, pointed hat and said:

"Ladies and gentlemen, I am very sorry, but my poor dog is sick and he can't jump to-day, and I have nothing else that can jump over the elephant's back."

Every one felt quite disappointed at that, but still they were sorry for the poor dog. The clown led him away, and the other clown was leading the elephant off, when Bully said to Bawly:

"Don't you think we could do that jump? We once did a big jump to get away from the alligator, you know."

"Let's try it," said Bawly. "Then the people won't be disappointed. Come on." So they slipped from their seats, when their papa and grandpa were talking to Uncle Wiggily about the trained seals, and those two frog boys just hopped right into the middle of the circus ring. At first a monkey policeman was going to put them out, but they made motions that they wanted to jump over the elephant, for they couldn't speak policeman talk, you know.

"Ah ha! I see what they want," said the kind clown. "Well, I don't believe they can do it, but let them try. It may amuse the people." So he made the elephant go back to his place, and every one became interested in what Bully and Bawly were going to do.

"Are you already?" asked Bully of his brother.

"Yes," answered Bawly.

"Then take a long breath, and jump as hard as you can," said Bully. So they both took long breaths, crouched down on their hind legs, and then both together, simultaneously and most extraordinarily, they jumped. My, what a jump it was! Bigger than the time when they got away from the alligator. Right over the elephant's back they jumped, and they landed on a pile of soft straw so they weren't hurt a bit. My! You should have heard the people cheer and clap!

"Good!" cried the clown. "That was a great jump! Will you stay in the circus with me? I will pay you as much as I pay my dog."

"Oh, no! They must go home," said their papa, as Bully and Bawly went back to their seats. "That is, after the circus is over," said Mr. No-Tail.

So the frog boys saw the rest of the show, and afterward all their friends told them how brave it was to do what they had done.

And for a long time after that whenever any one mentioned what good jumpers Bully and Bawly were, Sammie Littletail would say:

"Ah, but you should have seen them in the circus one day."

And on the next page, if the lilac bush in our back yard doesn't reach in through the window, and take off my typewriter ribbon to wear to Sunday school, I'll tell you about Bully and Bawly playing Indian.

STORY XXX

BULLY AND BAWLY PLAY INDIAN

It happened, once upon a time, after the circus had gone away from the place where Bully and Bawly No-Tail, the frogs, lived that a Wild West show came along.

And my goodness! There were cowboys and cowgirls, and buffaloes and steers and men with lassos, and Mexicans and Cossacks, and Indians! Real Indians, mind you, that used to be wild, and scalp people, which was very impolite to do, but they didn't know any better; the Indians didn't I mean. Then they got tame and didn't scalp people any more. Yes, sir, they were real Indians, and they had real feathers on them!

Of course the feathers didn't belong to the Indians, the same as a chicken's feathers, or a turkey's feathers belong to them. That is, the feathers didn't grow on the Indians, even if they did seem to. No, the Indians put them on for ornaments, just as ladies put plumes on their hats with long hatpins.

Well, of course, Bully and Bawly and the other boys all went to the Wild West show, and when they got home about all they did for several days was to play cowboys or Indians. Indians mostly, for they liked them the best. And the boys gave regular warwhoop cries.

"We'll have a new game," said Bully to Bawly one day. "We'll dress up like the Indians did, and we'll go off in the woods, and we'll see if we can capture white people."

"Real?" asked Bawly.

"No, only make-believe ones. And we'll build a camp fire, and take our lunch, and sleep in the woods."

"After dark?" asked Bawly.

"Sure. Why not? Don't Indians sleep in the woods after dark?"

"Oh, but they have real guns and knives to kill the bears with," objected Bawly, "and our guns and knives will only be wooden."

"Well, maybe it will be better to only pretend it's night in the woods," agreed Bully. "We can go in a dark place under the trees, and make believe it's night, and that will do just as well."

So they agreed to do that way, and for the next few days the frog boys were busy making themselves up to look like Indians. Their mother let them take some old blankets, and they got some red and green chalk to put on their faces for war paint, and they found a lot of feathers over at the homes of Charlie and Arabella Chick, and the three Wibblewobble duck children. These feathers they put around their heads, and down their backs, as the Indians in the Wild West show did.

"Now I guess we're ready to start off and hunt make-believe white people," said Bawly one Saturday morning when there wasn't any school.

"Have you the lunch? We mustn't forget that," spoke Bully.

"Yes, I have it," his brother replied. "Take your bow and arrow, and I'll carry the wooden gun."

Off they started as brave as an elephant when he has a bag of peanuts in his trunk. They hurried to the woods, so none of their friends would see them, for Bully and Bawly wanted to have it all a surprise. And pretty soon they were under the trees where it was quite dark. Bawly gave a big hop, and landed up front beside his brother.

"You mustn't walk here," said Bully. "Indians always go in single file, one behind the other. Get behind me."

"I--I'm afraid," said Bawly.

"Of what?" asked his brother. "Indians are never afraid."

"I--I'm afraid I might scare somebody," said Bawly. "I--I look so fierce you know. I just saw myself reflected back there in a pond of water that was like a looking-glass and I'm enough to scare anybody."

"So much the better," said his brother. "You can scare the make-believe white people whom we are going to capture and scalp. Get in behind me."

"Wouldn't it be just as well if I pretended to walk behind you, and still stayed up front here, beside you?" asked Bawly, looking behind him.

"Oh, I guess so," answered his brother. So the two frog boys, who looked just like Indians, went on side by side though the woods. They looked all around them for something to capture, but all that they saw was an old lady hoptoad, going home from market.

"Shall we capture her?" asked Bawly, getting his bow and arrow ready.

"No," replied his brother. "She might tell mamma, and, anyhow, we wouldn't want to hurt any of mamma's friends. We'll capture some of the fellows." But Bully and Bawly couldn't seem to find any one, not even a make-believe white person, and they were just going to sit down and eat their lunch, anyhow, when they heard some one shouting:

"Help! Help! Oh, some one please help me!" called a voice.

"Some one's in trouble!" cried Bully. "Let's help them!"

So he and his brother bravely hurried on through the woods, and soon they came to a place where they could hear the voice more plainly. Then they looked between the bushes, and what should they see but poor Arabella Chick, and a big hand-organ monkey had hold of her, and the monkey was slowly pulling all the feathers from Arabella's tail.

"Oh, don't, please!" begged the little chicken girl. "Leave my feathers alone."

"No, I shan't!" answered the monkey. "I want the feathers to make a feather duster, to dust off my master's hand-organ," and with that he yanked out another handful.

"Oh, will no one help me?" cried poor Arabella, trying to get away. "I'll lose all my feathers!"

"We must help her," said Bawly to Bully.

"We surely must," agreed Bully. "Get all ready, and we'll shoot our arrows at that monkey, and then we'll go out with our make-believe guns, and shoot bang-bang-pretend-bullets at him, and then we'll holler like the wild Indians, and the monkey will be so frightened that he'll run away."

Well, they did that. Zip-whizz! went two make-believe arrows at the monkey. One hit him on the nose, and one on the leg, and the pain was real, not make-believe. Then out from the bushes jumped Bully and Bawly, firing their make-believe guns as fast as they could.

Then they yelled like real Indians and when the monkey saw the red and green and yellow and purple and pink and red feathers on the frog Indians and saw their colored-chalk faces he was so frightened that he wiggled his tail, blinked his eyes, clattered his teeth together, and, dropping Arabella Chick, off he scrambled up a tree after a make-believe cocoanut.

"Now, you're safe!" cried Bully to the chicken girl.

"Yes," said Bawly, "being Indians was some good after all, even if we didn't capture any make-believe white people to scalp."

So they sat down under the trees, and Arabella very kindly helped them to eat the lunch, and she said she thought Indians were just fine, and as brave as soldiers.

So now we've reached the end of this story, and as you're sleepy you'd better go to bed, and in case the piano key doesn't open the front door, and go out to play hop-scotch on the sidewalk, I'll tell you next about the Frogs' farewell hop.

STORY XXXI

THE FROGS' FAREWELL HOP

One night Papa No-Tail, the frog gentleman, came home from his work in the wallpaper factory with a bundle of something under his left front leg.

"What have you there, papa?" asked Bawly, as he scratched his nose on a rough stone; "is it ice cream cones for us?"

"No," said Mr. No-Tail, "it is not anything like that; but, anyhow, the weather is almost warm enough for ice cream."

"Is it some new kind of wallpaper that you hopped on to-day after you dipped your feet in red and green ink?" asked Bully.

"No," replied his papa. "I have here some wire to tack over the windows, to keep out the flies and mosquitoes, for it is getting to be summer now, and those insects will soon be flying and buzzing around."

So after supper Mr. No-Tail, and his two boys, Bully and Bawly, tacked the wire mosquito netting on the windows, and when they were all done Mr. No-Tail went down to the corner drug store and he bought a quart of ice cream, the kind all striped like a sofa cushion, and he and his wife and Bully and Bawly sat out on the porch eating it with spoons out of a dish, just as real as anything.

"Oh dear me! There's a mosquito buzzing around!" suddenly exclaimed Mamma No-Tail, as she ate the last of her cream. "They are on hand early this year. I'm going in the house."

"I'll go get my bean shooter, and see if I can kill that mosquito!" exclaimed Bawly, who once went hunting after the buzzers, and shot quite a number. But land sakes! it was so dark on the porch that he couldn't see the buzzing mosquitoes though he blew a number of beans about, and one hit Uncle Wiggily Longears on the nose, just as the old gentleman rabbit was hopping over to play checkers with Grandpa Croaker. But Uncle Wiggily forgave Bawly, as it was an accident, and as there was a little ice cream left, the old gentleman rabbit and Grandpa Croaker ate it up.

Well, something happened that night when they had all gone to bed. Along about 12 o'clock, when it was all still and quiet, and when the little mice were just coming out to play hide and seek and look for some crackers and cheese, Bawly No-Tail felt some one pulling him out of bed.

"Here! Hold on! Don't do that, Bully!" he cried.

"What's the matter?" asked his brother. "Are you dreaming or talking in your sleep? I'm not doing anything."

"Aren't you pulling me out of bed?" asked Bawly, and he had to grab hold of the bedpost to prevent himself falling to the floor.

"Why, no, I'm in my own bed," answered Bully. "Oh, dear me! Oh, suz dud! Some one's pulling me, too!" And he let out such a yell that Mamma No-Tail came running in with a light. And what do you think she saw?

Why two, great, big buzzing mosquitoes flew out of the window through a hole in the wire netting, and it was those mosquitoes who had been trying to pull Bully and Bawly out of bed, so they could fly away with them to eat them up.

"Oh, my! How bold those mosquitoes are this year!" exclaimed the mamma frog. "They actually bit a hole in the wire screen."

"They did, eh?" cried Papa No-Tail. "Well, I'll fix that!" So he got a hammer and some more wire, and he mended the hole which the mosquitoes had made. Then Bully and Bawly went to sleep again. They were afraid the mosquitoes would come in once more, but though the savage insects buzzed around outside for quite a while, the screen was too strong for them this time, and they didn't get in the house.

"If this keeps on," said Papa No-Tail, as he hopped off to work next morning, "we'll have to go to a place where there are no mosquitoes."

Well, that night the same thing happened. Along about 1 o'clock Bully felt some one pulling him out of bed, and he cried, and his mamma came with a light, and there was another mosquito, twice as big as before, with a long sharp bill, and long, dingly-dangly legs, and buzzy-uzzy wings, just skeddadling out of the window.

"There! They've bitten another hole in the screen!" cried Mrs. No-Tail. "Oh, this is getting terrible!"

"I'll put double screens on to-morrow," said Papa No-Tail, and he did. But would you believe it? Those mosquitoes still came. The big ones couldn't make their way through the two nets, but lots of the little ones came in. One would manage to get his head through the wire, and then all his friends would push and pull on him until he was inside, then another would wiggle in, and that's how they did it. Then they went and hid down cellar, until they grew big enough to bite.

And, though these mosquitoes couldn't pull Bully and Bawly out of bed, for the pestiferous insects weren't strong enough, they nipped the frog boys all over, until their legs and arms and faces and noses and ears smarted and burned terribly, and their mamma had to put witch hazel and talcum powder on the bites.

"I can see that we'll soon have to get away from here," said Papa No-Tail, one morning, when the mosquitoes had been very bad and troublesome in the night. "They come right through the screens," he said. "Now we'll hop off to the mountains or seashore, where there are no mosquitoes."

"Don't you s'pose Bully and I could sit up some night and kill them with our bean shooters?" said Bawly.

"You may try," said his papa. So the two frog boys tried it that night. They sat up real late, and they shot at several mosquitoes that came in, and they hit some. And then Bully and Bawly fell asleep, and the first thing you know the mosquitoes buzzing outside heard them snoring, and they bit a big hole right through the double screen this time, and were just pulling Bully and Bawly out of bed, when the frog boys' mamma heard them crying, and came with the lamp, scaring the savage insects away.

"There is no use talking!" said Papa No-Tail. "We will hop off in the morning. We'll say good-by to this place."

So the next morning the frogs packed up, and they sent word to all their friends that they were going to take their farewell hop to the mountains, where there were no more mosquitoes.

Oh such a crowd as gathered to see them hop away! There was Sammie and Susie Littletail, and Johnnie and Billie Bushytail, and Lulu and Alice and Jimmie Wibblewobble, and Munchie and Dottie Trot, and Peetie and Jackie Bow Wow, and Uncle Wiggily Longears and Nurse Jane Fuzzy-Wuzzy and Buddy Pigg and all the other animal friends.

Away hopped Papa No-Tail, and away hopped Mamma No-Tail, and then Grandpa Croaker and Bully and Bawly hopped after them, calling good-bys to all their friends. Every one waved his handkerchief and Susie Littletail and Jennie Chipmunk cried a little bit, for they liked Bully and Bawly very much, and didn't like to see them hop away.

And what do you think? Some of the mosquitoes were so mean that they flew out of the woods and tried to bite the frogs as they were hopping away. But Bully and Bawly had their bean shooters and they shot a number of the creatures, so the rest soon flew off and hid in a hollow tree.

"I'm coming to see you some time!" called Uncle Wiggily Longears to Bully and Bawly. "Be good boys!"

"Yes, we'll be good!" promised Bully.

"As good as we can," added his brother Bawly, as he tickled Grandpa Croaker with the bean shooter.

Then the No-Tail family of frogs hopped on and on, until they came to a nice place in the woods, where there was a little pond, covered with duck weed, in which they could swim.

"Here is where we will make our new home," said Papa No-Tail.

"Oh, how lovely it is," said Mrs. No-Tail, as she sat down to rest under a toadstool umbrella, for the sun was shining.

"Ger-umph! Ger-umph!" said Grandpa Croaker, in his deep, bass voice. "Very nice indeed."

"Fine!" cried Bully.

"Dandy!" said Bawly. "Come on in for a swim," and into the pond jumped the two frog boys. And they lived happily there in the woods for ever after.

So now we have come to the end of this book. But, if you would like to hear them, I have more stories to tell you. And I think I will make the next book about some goat children. Nannie and Billie Wagtail were their names, and the book will be called after them--"Nannie and Billie Wagtail." The goat children wagged their little, short tails, and did the funniest things; eating pictures off tin cans, and nibbling bill-board circus posters of elephants and lions and tigers. And there was Uncle Butter, the goat gentleman, who pasted wallpaper, and Aunt Lettie, the old lady goat, and----

But there, I will let you read the book yourself and find out all that happened to Nannie and Billie Wagtail. And until you do read that, I will just say good-bye, for a little while.

THE END

The Broncho Rider Boys Series By FRANK FOWLER

Price, 40 Cents per Volume, Postpaid

A series of stirring stories for boys, breathing the adventurous spirit that lives in the wide plains and lofty mountain ranges of the great West. These tales will delight every lad who loves to read of pleasing adventure in the open; yet at the same time the most careful parent need not hesitate to place them in the hands of the boy.

THE BRONCHO RIDER BOYS WITH FUNSTON AT VERA CRUZ; or, Upholding the Honor of the Stars and Stripes.