“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.

“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[63]
[64]
[65] 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.

“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.”

“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.

The chickens were dripping wet however and so frightened they hardly knew where they were. “Oh! oh!” they wept. “We’ll be drowned! We[71]
[72]
[73] 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.

“Yes, but if it hadn’t been for my children they[75]
[76]
[77] 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.