Just as the bell rang for school the last one was finished.
How Miss Phillips laughed when the children marched in, each one
carrying a funny Jack-o'-lantern!
She said she could not tell which one was the prettiest.
After she had been introduced to each one they were put into the hall
to wait for school to be over.
Hallowe'en night every lantern had a candle in it, and the children had
great fun trying to frighten their mothers and fathers and each other.
Of course Grandpa Hall jumped and ran when he saw a big bright face
coming at him from the barn.
Then Grandma Hall saw it in the woodshed, and she ran and hid behind
the kitchen door.
Tommy played with Humpty Dumpty for several days.
Saturday morning he was in the meadow playing with Humpty Dumpty when
Jack and Jill came to ask him to go with them to the woods.
Tommy put Humpty Dumpty up on the stone wall and ran off with the
twins.
Grandpa Hall's old white cow was in the meadow eating grass.
As she came near the wall she saw something that looked very much like
a pumpkin.
Mrs. Cow was fond of pumpkins, so she thought she would go and see what
it really was on the wall.
"Why, it surely is a pumpkin," said Mrs. Cow, "but I wonder what all
those holes are for."
Humpty Dumpty felt very much hurt to think that Mrs. Cow should speak
of his eyes and mouth as holes.
"But then, of course," thought Humpty, "she does not know that I am not
a pumpkin now."
Mrs. Cow kept putting her nose nearer and nearer to Humpty.
At last she got so near that she made him jump.
At least, I think he must have jumped, for he fell from the wall to the
ground.
When Mrs. Cow saw the pumpkin all broken in pieces she thought she
might as well eat it, and she did.
[Illustration]
At first she liked the pumpkin very much, but then she thought it
didn't taste just right.
"I don't believe pumpkins with big round holes in them are good to
eat," said Mrs. Cow.
But when Tommy found what had happened to Humpty Dumpty, he said to
Grandpa Hall, "I wonder which Mrs. Cow liked best, the Jack-o'-lantern
or the candle!"
The children in Miss Smith's room had been just as busy as bees all
day.
Now they were tired, and they could not work any more.
Mary put her head down on her desk and nearly went to sleep.
Most of the boys were looking out of the window, because they liked to
watch it snow.
It had been snowing hard all day and they were thinking of the
snowballs they would make, and of the snow forts that they would build
on the hill.
How could they study when they were thinking of all those things?
"Miss Smith," said Bo-peep, looking up from her work, "won't you please
tell us a story? It is getting so dark that I cannot see to write."
Miss Smith thought a minute and then said, "How would you like to play
at being a book?"
Every little face brightened. The boys looked at Miss Smith and forgot
about the snow forts.
Mary sat up and did not feel one bit sleepy.
"Why, Miss Smith," said Mary, "how can we be a book?"
"I will show you," said Miss Smith.
"We will play that we are the Mother Goose Book.
"You must each think of some child from Mother Goose land whom you
would like to be.
"Then each one can come to the front of the room and play at being that
little child.
"The rest of us will try to guess who the child is."
The children all thought that would be great fun, and for a few minutes
it was so quiet they could almost hear the snow falling.
At the end of five minutes Miss Smith said, "Now it is time to begin.
You may be on the first page in our book, Jack.
"You may use anything in the room you need to help you in acting your
part."
Jack went into the hall. In a minute he pushed the door open a little
way and looked in.
Then he came into the school-room. He had his books under his arm, and
as he came in very slowly he looked at the clock.
"Oh, I know!" said John. "Hickory, dickory, dock."
[Illustration: "She looked so funny as she came into the room
riding on a broom"]
"No, no," said Mary, "that is:--
'A dillar, a dollar,
A ten o'clock scholar,
What makes you come so soon?
You used to come at ten o'clock,
And now you come at noon.'"
"That is right," said Jack. "Mary guessed it."
Then it was Mary's turn to be a page in the Mother Goose Book.
When she came in she had on Miss Smith's long white apron, her hair was
done up high on her head, and she was riding on a broom.
She looked so funny that all the children laughed.
At last Edith stopped laughing and began to sing:
"Old woman, old woman,
Old woman, said I.
Oh whither, oh whither,
Oh whither so high?
To sweep the cobwebs out of the sky;
But I'll be back again by-and-by."
Yes, Edith had guessed right, so she ran out of the room.
When she came back the children all looked and looked.
Who could she be?
She hadn't changed herself one bit, and she only stood still and looked
at them.
"We are caught this time," laughed Miss Smith.
Just then a little girl in the back of the room jumped up and said:
"Oh, see the curl in the middle of her forehead! I know who she is!
'There was a little girl,
And she had a little curl.
And it hung right down on her forehead.
When she was good
She was very good indeed;
But when she was bad she was horrid.'"
Tommy went out next, and when he came back he had a little toy pig
under his arm.
"I can think of ever so many pigs in Mother Goose," said Alice. "Have
you been to market, Tommy?"
"No, no," said Tommy, "I did not buy this good fat pig."
"I know who you are, and where you got your pig," laughed Jill.
"Tom, Tom, the piper's son,
Stole a pig and away he run."
Mistress Mary came in with her watering pot to water her flowers.
Boy Blue was quickly guessed because he had a horn.
Just as Jack and Jill came in with a pail of water, the bell rang.
It was time to go home!
Every one of the children was sorry not to see all of the book.
"Some day we will play this game again," said Miss Smith. "Then we can
see the rest of the pages."
As they ran home together they were all talking of the new game.
That night they got out their Mother Goose books and read them through,
so that the next time they would be sure to guess every rhyme.