can’t eat ’em all,” Martha told the boys, “But they’ll go good in the picnic lunch.”
What a pretty breakfast table it was! Such berries, such lettuce, such water-cress, and the radishes!
“Too bad papa had to go so early,” Bert remarked. “He just loves green stuff.”
“So does Frisky,” put in Freddie, and he wondered why everyone laughed.
After breakfast the lunch baskets were put up and while Bert and Harry, Nan and Aunt Sarah, went to invite the neighboring children, Flossie and Freddie were just busy jumping around the kitchen, where Dinah and Martha were making them laugh merrily with funny little stories.
Snoop and Fluffy had become good friends, and now lay close together on the kitchen hearth. Dinah said they were just like two babies, only not so much trouble.
“Put peaches in my basket, Dinah,” Freddie ordered.
“And strawberries in mine,” added Flossie.
“Now, you-uns jest wait!” Dinah told them; “and when you gets out in de woods if you hasn’t ’nough to eat you kin jest climb a tree an’ cut down—”
“Wood!” put in Freddie innocently, while Martha said that was about all that could be found in the woods in July.
The boys had come in from inviting the “other fellers,” when Uncle Daniel proposed a feature for the picnic.
“How would you like to take two homer pigeons along?” he asked them. “You can send a note back to Martha to say what time you will be home.”
“Jolly!” chorused the boys, all instantly making a run for the pigeon house.
“Wait!” Harry told the visitors. “We must be careful not to scare them.” Then he went inside the wire cage with a handful of corn.
“See—de—coon; see—de—coon!” called the boys softly, imitating the strange sounds made by the doves cooing.
Harry tossed the corn inside the cage, and as the light and dark homers he wanted tasted the food Harry lowered the little door, and took the birds safely in his arms.
“Now, Bert, you can get the quills,” he told his cousin. “Go into the chicken yard and look for two long goose feathers. Tom Mason, you can go in the kitchen and ask Dinah for a piece of tissue paper and a spool of silk thread.”
Each boy started off to fulfill his commission, not knowing exactly what for until all came together in the barnyard again.
“Now, Bert,” went on Harry, “write very carefully on the slip of paper the message for Martha. Have you a soft pencil?”
Bert found that he had one, and so following his cousin’s dictation he wrote on one slip:
“Have dinner ready at five.” And on the other he wrote: “John, come for us at four.”
“Now,” continued Harry, “roll the slips up fine enough to go in the goose quills.”
This was done with much difficulty, as the quills were very narrow, but the task was finally finished.
“All ready now,” concluded Harry, “to put the letters in the box,” and very gently he tied with the silken thread one quill under the wing of each pigeon. Only one feather was used to tie the thread to, and the light quill, the thin paper, and the soft silk made a parcel so very small and light in weight that the pigeons were no way inconvenienced by the messages.
“Now we’ll put them in this basket, and they’re ready for the picnic,” Harry announced to his much interested companions. Then all started for the house with Harry and the basket in the lead.
John, the stableman, was at the door now with the big hay wagon, which had been chosen as the best thing to take the jolly party in.
There was nice fresh hay in the bottom, and seats at the sides for the grown folks, while the little ones nestled in the sweet-smelling hay like live birds.
“It’s like a kindergarten party,” laughed Nan, as the “birds’ nests” reminded her of one of the mother plays.
“No, ’tain’t!” Freddie corrected, for he really was not fond of the kindergarten. “It’s just like a picnic,” he finished.
Besides the Bobbseys there were Tom Mason, Jack Hopkins, and August Stout, friends of Harry. Then, there were Mildred Manners and Mabel Herold, who went as Nan’s guests; little Roy Mason was Freddie’s company, and Bessie Dimple went with Flossie. The little pigeons kept cooing every now and then, but made no attempt to escape from Harry’s basket.
It was a beautiful day, and the long ride through the country was indeed a merry one. Along the way people called out pleasantly from farmhouses, for everybody in Meadow Brook knew the Bobbseys.
“That’s their cousins from the city,” little boys and girls along the way would say.
“Haven’t they pretty clothes!” the girls were sure to add.
“Let’s stop for a drink at the spring,” suggested August Stout, who was stout by name and nature, and always loved a good drink of water.
The children tumbled out of the wagon safely, and were soon waiting turns at the spring.
There was a round basin built of stones and quite deep. Into this the clear sprinkling water dropped from a little cave in the hill above. On top of the cave a large flat stone was placed. This kept the little waterfall clean and free from the falling leaves.
“Oh, what a cute little pond!” Freddie exclaimed, for he had never seen a real spring before.
“That’s a spring,” Flossie informed him, although that was all she knew about it.
The big boys were not long dipping their faces in and getting a drink of the cool, clear water, but the girls had to take their hats off, roll up their sleeves, and go through a “regular performance,” as Harry said, before they could make up their minds to dip into the water. Mabel brought up her supply with her hands, but when Nan tried it her hands leaked, and the result was her fresh white frock got wet. Flossie’s curls tumbled in both sides, and when she had finished she looked as if she had taken a plunge at the seashore.
“Let me! Let me!” cried Freddie impatiently, and without further warning he thrust his yellow head in the spring clear up to his neck!
“Oh, Freddie!” yelled Nan, grabbing him by the heels and thus saving a more serious accident.
“Oh! oh! oh!” spluttered Freddie, nearly choked, “I’m drowned!” and the water really seemed to be running out of his eyes, noses and ears all at once.
“Oh, Freddie!” was all Mrs. Bobbsey could say, as a shower of clean handkerchiefs was sent from the hay wagon to dry the “drowned” boy.
“Just like the flour barrel!” laughed Bert, referring to the funny accident that befell Freddie the winter before, as told in my other book “The Bobbsey Twins.”
“Only
