Part 102

"I did not dig it," said Chuckie Wuckie. "I just came and looked to see if the canna had grown any through the night, but I did not dig it."

"Really?" asked her papa, very gravely.

"Really and truly, I did not put my foot on there," said Chuckie Wuckie.

Papa did not say another word. But he could not help thinking that the hole looked as if the iron spoon had neatly scooped it out.

Next morning he found the hole dug there again, and Chuckie Wuckie was still busy in her corner by the fence. He did not speak of it, however. There were prints of small feet on the edge. He only smoothed down the earth and raked the bed. He did this for three mornings, then he led Chuckie Wuckie again to the canna-bed.

"Papa," she said earnestly, "I did not dig there. Truly, I didn't. The hole is there every morning. I found it to-day before you came out, but I did not dig it." There were tears in her brown eyes.

"I believe you, Chuckie Wuckie dear," said her father, earnestly.

That night the little girl stood at the gate, watching for her father to jump off the car. She could hardly wait for him to kiss her. She took his hand and led him to the canna-bed.

"Look!" she cried eagerly.

She was pointing excitedly to a hole beside the roots of a fresh, green canna plant.

"That hole again," said her father. "There's a stone in it now, isn't there?"

"No, that's what I thought; stoop down and look close, papa!" cried Chuckie Wuckie.

It was the head of a fat hop-toad, but all that could be seen was its mouth and bright eyes. It was staring at them. Papa poked it with the point of his umbrella. It scrambled deeper into the hole, until there was nothing to be seen but the dirt. It was slowly changing to the color of the black earth.

"I watched him," cried Chuckie Wuckie, excitedly--"oh, for an hour! When I found him he was just hopping on the canna-bed. He was looking for his house. He acted as if the door had been shut in his face. Then he began to open it. He crawled and scrambled round and round, and threw up the dirt, and poked and pushed. At last he had the hole made, just as it is every morning, and he crawled in. Then he lay and blinked at me."

"Clever fellow," said papa. "Well, we won't grudge him a home, and we won't shut the door again in his face, will we, Chuckie Wuckie?"

The cannas have grown very tall now--almost as tall as Chuckie Wuckie's papa--and so thick that you cannot see where the roots are; but a fat, brown hop-toad has a snug, cool, safe little nest there, and he gratefully crawls into it when the sun grows very hot.

The Conceited Mouse

BY ELLA FOSTER CASE

Once upon a time there was a very small mouse with a very, very large opinion of himself. What he didn't know his own grandmother couldn't tell him.

"You'd better keep a bright eye in your head, these days," said she, one chilly afternoon. "Your gran'ther has smelled a trap."

"Scat!" answered the small mouse--"'s if I don't know a trap when I see it!" And that was all the thanks she got for her good advice.

"Go your own way, for you will go no other," the wise old mouse said to herself; and she scratched her nose slowly and sadly as she watched her grandson scamper up the cellar stairs.

"Ah!" sniffed he, poking his whiskers into a crack of the dining-room cupboard, "cheese--as I'm alive!" Scuttle--scuttle. "I'll be squizzled, if it isn't in that cunning little house; I know what that is--a cheese-house, of course. What a very snug hall! That's the way with cheese-houses. I know, 'cause I've heard the dairymaid talk about 'em. It must be rather inconvenient, though, to carry milk up that step and through an iron door. I know why it's so open--to let in fresh air. I tell you, that cheese is good! Kind of a reception-room in there--guess I know a reception-room from a hole in the wall. No trouble at all about getting in, either. Wouldn't grandmother open her eyes to see me here! Guess I'll take another nibble at that cheese, and go out. What's that noise? What in squeaks is the matter with the door? This is a cheese-house, I know it is--but what if it should turn out to be a--O-o-o-eeee!" And that's just what it did turn out to be.

#RHYMES CONCERNING "MOTHER"#

A BOY'S MOTHER

BY JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY

My mother she's so good to me, Ef I was good as I could be, I couldn't be as good--no, sir!-- Can't any boy be good as her.

She loves me when I'm glad er sad; She loves me when I'm good er bad; An', what's a funniest thing, she says She loves me when she punishes.