“I’LL race you down to the big burdock, Queek,” said Squdge one day, as
he and the others started out for the river with Mother Duck.
“All right.”
“Let’s all race,” cried Buff, who could run almost as fast as her
brothers.
“Very well,” said Queek; “only we’ll have to give Fluffy and Curly-Tail
a start, because they can’t run as fast as we can.”
So Fluffy and Curly-Tail went some distance down the path, and then
Squdge shouted “Go!” and away they all raced.
“Wait for me at the burdocks!” their mother called after them. “Don’t
go down to the river without me.” But the ducklings were racing too
hard to stop to answer her.
The little ducks all reached the burdocks at about the same time,
though Squdge was a little ahead. They were so out of breath that they
were glad to drop down in the shadow to get cooled off while they
waited for their mother.
Suddenly, as they sat there, they heard, back of the burdocks, a
curious scratching and rustling, and a something that sounded like
“Cluck! cluck! cluck!”
“What’s that, Squdge?” whispered Queek.
“I don’t know what it is.”
“I’m scared,” said Buff, “it sounds so queer. Let’s run back and find
mother.”
The ducklings jumped up, but before they could run away, around from
the other side of the burdock came a great grey, feathery creature,
with hard, bright eyes and a sharp beak. She was followed by a brood
of little, downy, yellow young ones that seemed to be her children. As
soon as the young ones saw the ducklings they stopped and stared at
them wonderingly.
[Illustration: So the two fowls said good-bye to each other and
parted]
“Cluck! cluck!” cried the mother. “What have we here? Ducklings I do
believe.” Then as Squdge seemed about to come toward her she ruffled
her feathers angrily. “Don’t you come any nearer,” she cried, “if you
do I’ll peck you. I don’t allow any strange animals to come near _my_
children.”
The ducklings were quite frightened at her angry looks. They were about
to turn and run away, when to their joy they saw their mother coming
around a bend in the path.
As soon as Mother Duck saw a stranger talking to her children she
hurried forward. Then when she came a little nearer she gave a quack of
pleasure.
“Why, Mrs. Henny Penny!” she cried. “Is that you? Wherever did you come
from?”
“Well I declare if it isn’t Mrs. Duck!” replied the hen. “I brought the
children out for a walk, and we’ve come further than we expected. I’m
sure I never thought I’d find you here.”
The two fowls were so pleased to see each other that they both began
talking at once, asking questions, and givings answers, while the
little ones listened wonderingly.
“I suppose you’re still living at the farm,” said the duck. “And these
are your little ones, are they? What fine chicks they are.”
“You have some fine children, yourself,” answered the hen, much
pleased. “How exactly they look like you.”
“They’re very good children, on the whole,” said the duck, “only
sometimes they’re rather naughty, and I have to scold them a little.
But how are all the things at the farmyard? The geese and the turkeys
and the guinea-fowls? And old Mr. Tige? Is he alive still? My, my! What
a cross dog he was.”
The hen said yes, he was. “He’s alive still, and crosser than ever. Why
the other day old Mrs. Speckeldy Hen just happened to go too near his
dog house, and he jumped right out at her and pulled out a whole
mouthful of tail feathers!”
“My!” cried the duck. “Wasn’t that awful? What did Mr. Rooster say?”
“Why he said—”
Just then the duck noticed that all the little ones were standing about
and listening with open beaks.
[Illustration: “Now, children, I am going to market,” she said]
“Now, children, don’t stand there listening,” she cried. “You know I
don’t like you to listen when older creatures are talking. Run on down
to the river, and take these nice little chicks along with you—only
don’t go in till I come. Perhaps you might catch them a tadpole or so.”
“Yes, run along,” said the hen. “We’ll be along in a minute. Be sure
you don’t get your feet wet, children.”
That seemed to the ducklings a funny thing for any one to say—“Don’t
get your feet wet,”—but they and the chicks started off together, and
ran on gaily down the path toward the river, while the older fowls
followed more slowly.
As soon as the little ones reached the river Squdge, who had taken
a great fancy to a little chicken named Bright-Eyes, ran down to a
shallow where the tadpoles lived, and caught a nice fat one, and
brought it to her in his beak. Instead of taking it, however, Bright
Eyes looked quite disgusted.
“Ugh!” she cried. “Take it way. The nasty thing!”
“Nasty!” cried Squdge with surprise. “Why it’s good. Haven’t you ever
eaten a tadpole before?”
“No, and I don’t want to eat one now, either.”
All the other chickens said the same, so Squdge ate the tadpole
himself, and very good it tasted to him, too.
“I’ll tell you what,” said Queek; “I don’t believe mother would mind if
we went in here where the water is shallow, and had a swim. It’s deep
enough if we hold up our legs.”
[Illustration: On and on they went, leaping and snatching]
“But we don’t know how to swim,” cried the chickens.
Not know how to swim! The ducklings could hardly believe it. “Why, what
do you do when you go in the water?” they asked.
“We don’t go in the water!”
The ducklings stared at them with pity and surprise. They had never
heard of such a thing as not going in the water. Then Squdge had a
bright idea. “I know!” he cried; “let’s give the chicks a ride on the
river. We’ll get a big leaf and have it for a boat, and then the chicks
can get on it, and we’ll pull it.”
The chicks did not like the idea very much. They were afraid. But the
ducklings were so eager about it that they hardly knew how to say no.
Squdge found a big leaf and he and the others nipped it off with their
sharp beaks, and pulled it down into the river. “Now get on it,” they
shouted joyously.
“But we’re afraid,” whimpered the chicks.
“Oh, come on! it won’t hurt you. You’ll just love it, it’s such fun.”
Timidly the chicks stepped onto the leaf, and huddled together in the
middle of it while the ducklings pulled it out into the stream.
“Faster, faster,” cried Squdge, holding the stem with his beak, and
swimming as hard as he could. “Here! Take it around this rock.”
The water washed over the leaf, and the chickens shrieked with fear. A
moment later the boat caught on a ledge and at once tilted over so that
the chickens were upset into the water.
“Oh! oh!” cried Buff. “Look what we’ve done.”
The ducklings hurried to the help of the chicks, and pushing and
pulling they managed to get them up on the rock where they were safe.
[Illustration: “Well, you can come along with men and I’ll show it to
you”]
The chickens were dripping wet however and so frightened they hardly
knew where they were. “Oh! oh!” they wept. “We’ll be drowned! We
want to go home. Oh! Boo-hoo! Boo-hoo!”
The ducklings stood looking on in dismay, not knowing what to do or say.
At this moment a shriek sounded from the bank. “Oh, my chicks! my
chicks!”
The duck and the hen had reached the river side, and the hen had seen
her chickens far out on a rock, wet and shivering with fear. “Oh what
shall I do! What shall I do,” she shrieked. “They can never get back.”
“Yes they can, too; now don’t you be so worried,” said the duck. “I’ll
bring them back.”
“But you can’t; I know you can’t. How can you?”
“Why, easily enough. I’ll swim out to them, and they can sit on my
back, and I’ll carry them back.”
“But you’ll spill them off. I’m sure you will.”
“No I won’t either. I’ll bring one at a time. Now just you watch.”
The duck slipped off into the water, and soon reached the rock where
the chicks were standing. At first she had a great deal of trouble in
getting any one of them to climb up on her back. They were afraid of
slipping off into the water; but presently Bright-Eyes ventured to
scramble up and snuggle down against Mother Duck’s neck. As soon as she
was settled there the old duck sailed out on the water and carried the
little chick safely over to her mother.
When the other two chicks saw that Bright-Eyes was safe on shore they
were eager to clamber upon the duck’s back and have her carry them
over, too.
Oh, how thankful the hen was when she had her chicks back on dry land
again. She felt so happy and thankful that she hardly knew what to say
to the duck.
“If it hadn’t been for you they would all have been drowned,” she cried.
[Illustration: There lay old Tige in the sunshine fast asleep]
“Yes, but if it hadn’t been for my children they wouldn’t have been
out there at all,” replied the duck.
She wanted the hen to bring the chickens up to the hollow tree to rest
and get dry, but this the hen would not do. There was nothing she
wished so much now as to get her chicks safe home again. She made up
her mind that never, never would she venture away from the farmyard
again—at least until the chicks were old enough and big enough to take
care of themselves.
So the two fowls said good-bye to each other and parted, and then
Mother Duck took her children home again without allowing them to go
in for another swim. They had indeed been very naughty and disobedient
little ducklings, and Mother Duck told them that for a punishment they
would not be allowed to go down to the river again for three whole days.
That was indeed a sad thing for the little ducks. They almost cried
over it. But then it might have been worse. She might have told them
they couldn’t go back again for a week. They had been naughty enough
almost to deserve even that.
[Illustration: With a bound and a roar he was up and at the chicken]