dreadful to be lost! I wonder what we can do, and how you can take us
all home at once?”
“I have it!” suddenly cried the baby’s mamma. “Down in our cellar is a
great big baby carriage, that I had once when there were twins here,
but they are now big children, and don’t need the carriage. I’m sure it
would hold you three children very easily, and then the fisherman could
wheel you home in it.”
“That’s it!” exclaimed the fisherman. “The very thing! I will soon have
the Trippertrots home now, and I hope they never wander away again.”
“No, indeed, we never will!” they all promised at once. But you just
wait for some more stories about them, and see what happens. However,
now I must tell you about the baby carriage.
“Where did you say the carriage was?” asked the fisherman.
“Down cellar,” answered the lady. “I will get it for you.”
“Oh, no, don’t trouble yourself,” said the fisherman. “I will fish it
up,” and, surely enough, he stood at the head of the cellar steps,
dangled his line down, and soon he had hooked on to the carriage, and
lifted it up. It was a very big one, and would easily hold the three
little Trippertrots.
So they got into it, and the lady wrapped a warm blanket over them, and
they said good-by to her and to the cute, cunning little baby, and off
the old fisherman started with them, wheeling the carriage down the
front steps as easily as a kittie cat can lap up her milk.
“Come and see me some time, when you aren’t lost,” called the lady
after them, as she waved her hand out of the window.
“We will,” promised Mary and Tommy and Johnny Trippertrot.
Away they went, along the street, the old fisherman wheeling them
toward their home. The Trippertrots were tired and sleepy and hungry,
for they had been away for some time now.
All of a sudden, as the fisherman was wheeling them, a lady on the
street came up and stopped them.
“Oh, may I see the pretty babies in the carriage?” she asked. “I just
love babies!”
“These aren’t babies,” said the fisherman, “they are the lost
Trippertrot children, and I am taking them home. But you may look at
them.”
So the lady looked, and she leaned over to kiss Mary, and the fur thing
the lady wore around her neck tickled Tommy so that he sneezed three
times.
“How cute!” exclaimed the lady, as she walked away.
Then they went on a little farther, and pretty soon another lady cried
out:
“Oh, may I see the pretty babies in the carriage?”
“They aren’t babies--they are the lost Trippertrot children,” said the
old fisherman. “But you may see them.”
So this lady looked, and she kissed Mary, and the fur thing she wore on
her neck tickled Johnny so that he awakened from his sleep.
“Oh, I’m so sorry,” said the lady.
Then they went on some more, and a third lady said:
“Oh, may I just have one look at the pretty babies in the carriage?”
for she couldn’t see that they weren’t babies, because they were
covered up with the blanket, you know.
“These are the lost Trippertrot children,” said the old fisherman.
“They were lost, and I am taking them home, but if you will excuse me
saying so, I’ll never get there if all the ladies want to look at them.”
Then the third lady leaned over to kiss Tommy, and the feathers in her
hat tickled Mary so that she sneezed three times, and part of another
one.
“Goodness me!” exclaimed the lady.
“Now I am going to run home with you,” said the old fisherman, and soon
he was safe at the Trippertrot house, and my! how glad Mary and Tommy
and Johnny were to get back. Their papa and mamma hugged and kissed
them, and so did Suzette, the nursemaid, and the children said they
would never go away from home again.
But, oh, dear! Just read the next story and see what happened.
ADVENTURE NUMBER THIRTEEN
THE TRIPPERTROTS AND THE OLD MAN’S HAT
One very windy day the three little Trippertrots were up in the
playroom of their house, looking out of the window and wondering what
they could do to have a good time.
“Now I do hope you children will not run off anywhere to-day,” their
mamma had said to them as she went downtown to the five-and-ten-cent
store to buy a new fur coat--excuse me, I meant a dipper. “Please stay
in the house unless something special, extra-extraordinary happens.”
“Oh, yes, we will,” promised Mary; and Tommy and Johnny, her brothers,
promised the same thing.
Well, as they were looking out of the window of the playroom, they saw
a nice old gentleman crossing the street in front of their house. The
old man was going very slowly, because he had rheumatism, I guess, or
maybe the epizootic, when all at once, the wind, which was blowing very
hard, blew right up under his tall silk hat, and blew it off his head.
It almost blew off the hair on the old gentleman’s head, and if it had
not been fastened tightly there, something like that surely would have
happened.
“Oh, there goes his hat!” cried Tommy.
“And see how it rolls along the street!” exclaimed Johnny. “It’s almost
as good as a football,” and he laughed out loud.
“Oh, you shouldn’t laugh when any one is in trouble,” spoke Mary,
kindly.
“He can’t hear me,” answered Johnny. “Besides, I am really sorry for
him.”
“If you are sorry I should think you would go out and help him catch
his hat,” spoke Tommy. And truly, the hat of the old man was now
rolling swiftly along the street, where the wind blew it, and the old
gentleman was chasing after it--after his hat, I mean, not after the
wind. Oh, my goodness me, no, and a basket of onions besides!
“We are not to leave the house--mamma said so,” spoke Mary, firmly.
“But I think this is a special, extra-extraordinary occasion,” declared
Tommy. “Mamma would want us to go out and help catch the hat for the
old man if she were here. I’m sure she would, for she always likes us
to be kind to old people, and that gentleman can’t catch his hat all by
himself. He can’t run fast enough.”
“That’s right,” agreed Johnny. “See him run! Oh, see him run!”
And, surely enough, the old gentleman was running after his hat as
fast as anything. But, no matter how fast he ran, the wind blew his
hat still faster, and it rolled along just in front of him. Every once
in a while the old man would think he had the hat, and then the wind
would come in a sudden puff, and presto-chango! away the hat would roll
again, down the street.
“Oh, we ought to help him!” exclaimed Mary Trippertrot. “There is no
one else out in the street to do it.”
“Then I will!” cried Tommy. “I’m going to get his hat for him.”
“And so am I,” added Johnny. “Come on, Mary.”
Then they got ready to run out of doors to help the old man get back
his hat.
“Oh, dear, we really oughtn’t to go,” spoke Mary, “for we will
be sure to be lost, as we always are. But I can’t let you boys go
alone. I must be with you. I suppose this is one of those special,
extra-extraordinary occasions, and mamma won’t mind very much.”
So Mary Trippertrot and her brothers, Tommy and Johnny, slipped softly
down the front stairs, so Suzette, the nursemaid, wouldn’t see them,
and out of doors they went.
“Hurry up!” called Tommy, as he ran on ahead, “the old man is nearly
around the corner chasing his hat. We must help him, or his hat will be
spoiled.”
“That’s right!” said Mary, and away they raced, forgetting everything
that their mamma had told them about not going out of the house. But
they wanted to do a kindness, you see.
Pretty soon they turned around the corner, and there, down the street,
they saw the old man still chasing after his hat. The Trippertrot
children soon caught up to him.
“Well, what do you want, little ones?” the man asked, as he turned
around and saw them.
“If you please, sir,” said Mary, “we have come to help you chase your
hat.”
“Ha! That is very kind of you,” spoke the old man, in a most polite
voice. “I am sure I will get my hat now, with so many of us after it.
If only the wind didn’t blow so hard my hat would stop rolling along
the ground, and then I could get it alone. But I am glad you have
joined me. Come on, now, we’ll see if we can’t race after that hat.”
So on ran the Trippertrots, and on ran the nice old man, after his hat,
which the wind was making go faster and faster, just like when you roll
a hoop.
“Oh, I’m afraid my hat will be ruined!” cried the old man, as he saw
it roll into a puddle of water, and bounce out again. “And it is a nice
new hat, and inside the lining is a dollar bill that I was saving to
buy a Christmas present for my little grandson.”
“Oh, then we must surely get that hat!” said Mary, and she ran on
faster than ever, and Tommy and Johnny Trippertrot also ran faster, and
the old man ran as fast as he could.
“Look out!” suddenly cried Mary. “That automobile is going to run over
your hat, and if it does it will squash it flatter than a sheet of
paper.”
“So it will!” agreed the old man, as he looked up in time to see a big
automobile rushing along the street, and his hat was almost under the
fat wheels of the car.
“Hi, there, Mr. Auto Man! Stop your machine, if you please!” cried the
old man. “Don’t run over my hat!”
And the auto man stopped his car just in time--that is, almost in
time--for he just ran over a little part of the rim of the hat, and
broke off a small piece.
“Oh, that’s too bad!” exclaimed Mary, as she made a grab for the tall
silk hat, but she was just too late.
“Oh, never mind,” spoke the old man, as the hat went rolling on down
another street, just as Tom-Tom the piper’s son ran roaring down the
street after he took the pig, you know. “I can mend the broken place
with court-plaster, if only I can get my hat.”
“We’ll help you,” said Tommy, and then the Trippertrot children ran on
faster than ever after the old man’s hat.
But the hat was blown very hard by the wind, which didn’t seem to want
to let go of it. Once the hat was nearly blown under a big, heavy
wagon, and the wheels almost rolled over it. Then, a little later, some
horses almost stepped on it, and one horse thought it was something
good to eat, and was going to chew it, only his driver wouldn’t let him.
And then, all of a sudden, along came a trolley car, and this nearly
ran over the hat, only the motorman stopped his car in time. He even
got off, and tried to grab the hat, but the wind blew it on farther
still, for the breeze was very strong.
“Oh, hadn’t we better go back home?” asked Mary, when they had been
chasing the hat for some time. “We might get lost.”
“We’re lost now,” spoke Johnny, as he looked around, though he didn’t
stop running. “We’ve never been in this part of the city before.”
“Well, if we’re lost we can’t get any more lost than we are,” said
Mary. “We might as well keep on, and try to get the hat for the old
gentleman. I like him, as he looks so much like the kind fisherman.”
“All right,” agreed Tommy and Johnny, for they also liked the old
gentleman. So on they ran, after the old man who was chasing his hat.
Once the hat blew into the canal, and got all wet, and the next minute
it blew out and went almost under the wheels of a choo-choo locomotive,
but it rolled away just in time.
And then, all of a sudden, the wind gave a big puff, as if it was
blowing out a candle, and presto-chango! the hat blew up into a tree,
and there it stuck.
“Well, it’s fast, anyhow,” said the old man, who had almost no breath
left, after running so far.
“Yes, it can’t go any more, unless the tree blows with it,” spoke
Johnny.
“But how are you going to get it down?” asked Tommy.
“Oh, I know,” said Mary. “One of you boys must climb up the tree, or we
can borrow a step-ladder from the house next door, and use that.”
“Let me climb!” cried Johnny.
“No, let me,” said his brother.
“You may both climb up,” declared the old gentleman, with a laugh. “I
want my hat as quickly as I can get it, for I am catching cold.”
So up into the tree scrambled Johnny and Tommy, and soon they had the
old man’s hat safe. It was a little bit battered and torn, by bouncing
along so much, but that didn’t hurt it much. Then the old man put it on
his head.
All of a sudden Mary began to cry.
“Why, what is the matter?” asked the nice old man. “Are you hungry?”
“No, I am not hungry,” answered Mary, “but we are--lost!”
“And we don’t know our way home!” added Tommy, and he cried, too, but
only a little.
“And we’re always getting lost,” went on Johnny, as he started to cry a
tear or two. “We’re always getting lost, and this time it was because
we chased after your hat.”
“That is too bad,” said the old man. “And, as you have been so kind
to me I will be kind to you. Come along, I will take you back home. I
know where it is, because my hat blew off right in front of there. Come
along, Trippertrots.”
So he brushed the dust off his hat, and put it on his head--put on his
hat, I mean, not the dust--and then he took hold of Mary’s hand and
Johnny’s, and Johnny took hold of Tommy’s hand, and away they started
for the Trippertrot home.
ADVENTURE NUMBER FOURTEEN
THE TRIPPERTROTS AND THE CHRISTMAS TREE
For a while they walked on silently.
“Do you think you can find our house for us?” asked Mary, of the kind
old man, as she took a closer hold of his hand.
“Oh, I am sure I can,” he said. “It was right in front of your house
that the wind blew off my hat, so I won’t easily forget it.”
“Lots of people think they can take us home after we are lost,” said
Johnny, “but, somehow or other, they don’t do it.”
“Yes,” added Tommy Trippertrot. “There was Jiggily Jig, the funny boy,
who is always dancing, or turning somersaults, and there was the nice,
little old lady, and the man who had the pink cow, and the other man
who had the dancing bears, and the milkman, and the grocery boy, and
the fireman, and the old fisherman----”
“My, my!” exclaimed the old man whose hat had been blown off by the
wind. “Do you know as many people as all that?”
“Oh, yes, and more,” spoke Mary. “You see, we are always getting lost,
and every one is kind to us, so they start to take us home. But, just
as Johnny says, we never seem to get there, except, of course, once in
a while.”
“Or, if we do get home, we run out after something or other, and we’re
lost again,” said Tommy.
“Well, don’t worry, I’ll take you safely home,” said the man, as he
put his hat on his head real tightly, so the wind couldn’t blow it off
again.
And then he and the children walked along some more, and, all at once,
they came to a toy store. And, oh, what lovely things there were in
the windows; toy boats, and toy houses, and dolls, and doll carriages,
and toy automobiles, and steam engines that really went “choo-choo!”
And there were whirligigs, and clowns that you couldn’t make lie down
straight, no matter how you tried, for they always bobbed up again,
smiling at you just like the Cheshire cat in the story.
“Oh, what a lovely place!” cried Mary. “Let’s stop here a while, and
choose things.”
“Choose things; what do you mean?” asked the man.
“Oh,” said Johnny, “when we haven’t any money we look in the toy shop
windows, and we choose the things we’d like to have and make-believe
they’re ours. But we always let Mary have first choice, because she’s a
girl, you know.”
“That is very nice and polite of you,” said the man. “Boys should
always be kind to their sisters, and all other ladies. But since you
have no money, and as you have been very kind to help me get my hat,
I will take you in the toy shop and buy you each a toy, and you may
choose whatever you like, only this will be real, and not make-believe,
for you may take the toys home with you.”
“Oh, really?” inquired Mary, in delight.
“Do you mean truly?” asked Tommy, wonderingly.
“And really-truly and truly-really?” asked Johnny, for it was such a
strange thing that he wanted to be quite sure about it.
“Oh, yes, this is in earnest,” said the kind man, with a smile. “So
come in and pick out what toys you like best. It is near Christmas
time, and you can count this as one of your Christmas presents.”
“And may Mary have first choice?” asked Johnny.
“Surely,” said the man, and he was glad that Tommy and Johnny were so
kind to their little sister, but then they were most always that way,
and I hope you are, too; but of course you are, so I needn’t have said
that last part, need I?
And if the window of the toy shop was lovely, the inside of the shop
was more beautiful still. Oh! so many toys as there were! It was
just like the place where Santa Claus makes all the nice things for
the girls and boys. In fact, some of the toys had just come from the
workshop of dear old St. Nicholas himself.
“Well, what are you going to choose, Mary?” asked Tommy, of his sister,
when they had looked around a bit.
“I--I think I’ll have that nice big doll over there,” said the little
girl, after a while, when she had examined many things.
So the toy shop clerk gave Mary the big doll, and the man, whose hat
the Trippertrot children had run after, smiled and said:
“Now, Tommy, it’s your turn.”
“I’ll take that nice sailboat,” said Tommy Trippertrot, and the toy
shop clerk gave it to him.
“And now what will Johnny have?” asked the kind man.
“Oh, I’ll take that music-box, that plays such pretty tunes,” said
the other boy, for the toy shop clerk had wound the box up while the
children were looking around, and it played “Yankee Doodle,” and “Home,
Sweet Home,” and a funny tune called “Don’t Laugh When You Sneeze, and
Don’t Give the Cat Cheese.” Oh! that last is a very fine tune, indeed.
So the toy shop clerk gave Johnny the music-box, and then each of the
Trippertrot children had a nice toy, and the man, whose hat the wind
had blown off, paid for them, and he and the children went out in the
street again.
“Now I will surely take you home,” said the kind man. “We will go down
this street, and up another, and across a third, and along a fourth,
and then we will be there.”
So along they went, the children looking at their toys, and feeling
very happy that Christmas was so near at hand, when, all at once, they
heard some one singing around the corner. Then they heard a whistle,
and a voice cried:
“Oh, there are the Trippertrot children! How glad I am to see them.
Let me take them home, if you please, Mr. Man, for I am sure they are
lost,” and there stood Jiggily Jig, the funny boy, who was always
dancing.
“Yes, we are lost again,” said Mary Trippertrot, “but this gentleman
will take us home, for I am afraid you don’t know the way.”
“Well, perhaps I might get lost, too,” admitted Jiggily. “But, what
lovely toys you have! May I see them?”
“Yes, they are Christmas presents,” said Tommy, and then Mary showed
her new doll, and Tommy showed his ship, and Johnny showed his
music-box, and played a nice little dancing tune on it.
And, no sooner did the music start than Jiggily Jig began dancing, and
away down the street he danced, turning over and over in somersaults,
until he was out of sight.
“There, you see!” exclaimed Mary, “it’s a good thing we didn’t let him
take us home, or we’d never get there.”
“I think so myself,” said the man. Then he led them on a little
farther, and, pretty soon, they met the pieman, and Simple Simon was
with him, coming from the fair, and the pieman and Simple Simon wanted
to take the Trippertrot children home, but they said the hat man had
better do it.
And then they met the old fisherman, and the nice old lady, and the
pink-cow man, and the dancing-bear man, and each and every one wanted
to take the Trippertrot children home, but Mary and her brother said
they had rather go with the man whose hat the wind had blown off. So
they did, and pretty soon, what do you think?
In a little while the man came to a long, wide street, and he looked at
his watch, and said:
“Now I needn’t go any farther, for there is your house right down
there. Besides, I haven’t time. I have to catch a train.”
“Do you catch a train just like you catch a ball?” asked Tommy, who
wanted to know about lots of things.
“Well, yes,” said the man, with a laugh; “that is, you have to run to
catch a train, and sometimes you have to run to catch a ball, so it is
much the same thing. But, tell me, can you go home now, when your house
is in plain sight?”
“Oh, yes,” answered Mary, and Tommy and Johnny said the same thing, for
there, right down the street, they could see their house, and they knew
they could easily walk to it.
So they held their toys tightly under their arms, thanked the kind man,
said good-by to him, and walked toward their house. And just when they
were almost there, and when they could look ahead, and see Suzette, the
nursemaid, waving her hand to them, what should happen but that along
came a wagon, all loaded with Christmas trees.
[Illustration: _And Down They Sat Right on the Soft Branches_]
You know the kind--nice, tall, green trees, with soft, stickery
branches; and on Christmas morning presents grow on the trees, and if
the presents are too big they fall down, and you find them on the floor
under the tree. Oh, Christmas trees are very wonderful, indeed!
“Oh, see the Christmas trees!” cried Mary, as she and her brothers
stopped to look.
“Oh, aren’t they fine!” exclaimed Tommy. And then, all of a sudden, one
of the trees fell off the wagon.
“Quick! We must tell the driver man!” shouted Johnny. “He doesn’t know
he’s lost a tree.”
“Oh, maybe we can pick it up, and take it around to the front of the
wagon to him,” said Mary. So the three Trippertrot children ran up to
the tree. But, as it happened, the tree was fast to the wagon by a
rope, and when the horses kept on going, of course they pulled the tree
along the street with the wagon, like a boy hitching his sled on behind
the milkman’s sled.
And then, bless your hearts! just as Mary and Tommy and Johnny ran up
to the tree they all stumbled and fell, and down they sat right on the
soft branches, and they were being dragged along by the wagon.
“Mercy on us!” cried Suzette, the nursemaid, who was waiting for the
children, and who had seen what happened. “Mercy! There they go off
once more!”
Then she was so afraid that the children would be carried off, and lost
again, that she ran after the wagon and the moving Christmas tree. She
grabbed up Mary and her doll, and set the little girl on her feet. Then
she ran on a little more and grabbed up Johnny and his music-box, and
she set him on his feet, and then she grabbed up Tommy and his ship,
and set him on his feet, and then the nursemaid ran to the sidewalk
with the three children.
“My! That was a narrow escape!” she exclaimed, all out of breath. “You
might all have been lost again. Come into the house at once. Where have
you been? Your mamma is waiting for you.”
“Oh, we helped the man get back his hat, that the wind blew off,” said
Tommy.
“And just now we were going to tell the man about the Christmas tree
that slipped off his wagon,” said Mary.
“Only we didn’t, because we fell down,” spoke Johnny.
“Oh, I’ll tell the man,” said Suzette, the nursemaid. So she called
to the tree man, and he stopped his horses, got down, and put the
Christmas tree back on his wagon, and he was very thankful that he
hadn’t lost it.
Then Suzette took the Trippertrots safely into the house and they
thought they would never run away again. But, bless you! just wait and
see what happens in the next story.
ADVENTURE NUMBER FIFTEEN
THE TRIPPERTROTS AND THE TOY SHIP
Up in the nursery of their house the three little Trippertrots were
having a good time. Mary was playing with her doll that the kind man
had bought for her, and Tommy was playing with his toy ship, and Johnny
was playing with his music-box, making believe he was a hand-organ man.
Only, of course, he didn’t have any monkey, except a make-believe one.
“Now come on,” said Johnny, as he played a funny tune called: “If It
Should Snow or Hail or Rain, Just Get Aboard the Choo-Choo Train.” Yes,
Johnny played that tune, and then he called out: “Come on, now, Jacko,
climb up and get the pennies.”
“Why, who in the world are you talking to?” asked his sister Mary, as
she put her doll to bed in her crib.
“Why, I am talking to my monkey,” answered Johnny. “I am a hand-organ
man, and they all have monkeys to climb up the rainpipes on houses, or
else up the front stoop to get the pennies for the masters. My monkey
doesn’t want to climb, as he is a very little monkey. But I guess he
will soon learn.”
“I don’t see any monkey,” spoke Tommy, looking all around the playroom.
“Oh, he’s only a make-believe monkey, just as I am a make-believe
hand-organ man,” explained Johnny. “Only my music-box is real, of
course, and it plays real tunes. Listen!”
Then he played another one for his brother and sister, and they liked
it very much.
“I know what I am going to do,” said Johnny, when the tune was over.
“I’m going to put a cushion down on the floor, and then my little
make-believe monkey won’t be afraid to climb up, for if he falls he
won’t get hurt.”