his little mistress when they were walking about in the
afternoon, or sneaked away after his morning nap in the sun. The first
time he disappeared she mourned disconsolately for him all day. But late
in the afternoon, as she sat looking across the grain, waiting for him
hopelessly, she forgot her loss in watching a most curious thing
happening in the wheat. Away out in the broad, quiet field there was a
small, agitated spot, as if a tiny whirlwind were tossing the heads
about. The commotion was coming nearer and nearer every moment. Now it
was a quarter of a mile away--now it was only a few rods--now it was
almost on the edge. The little girl scrambled to her feet, half inclined
to run, when out of the tall stalks rolled Badgy, growling at every step
and wagging his tired head from side to side!

Often, after that, he did not come home until late at night, when she
would hear him snarling and scratching at the cellar doors, and creep
out to let him in. Her big brothers at last warned her that there would
come a day when Badgy would go, never to return. So she fitted a collar
to his neck and led him when she went out, and kept him tied the rest of
the time. This restriction wore upon him and he grew noticeably thin.

One morning, after having been carefully locked in the cellar the night
before, he did not respond to the little girl's call from the doors. She
went down to the bin, half fearing to find him dead. He was not there.
She ran about the cellar looking for him. He was nowhere to be found.
She returned to the bin to search there again. As she looked in, she
caught sight of a great heap of dirt in one corner. She jumped over the
side and ran to it, divining at once what it meant. Sure enough, beyond
the heap was a hole, freshly dug, that led upward--and out!

The little girl sat back on the heap of dirt and pathetically viewed the
hole. It was not that he would not come back--she knew that he would.
But he had made her break her promise that there was to be no burrowing.
She resolved to say nothing about the hole, however; and, after closing
it completely with a stone, started off on the prairie in search of
him, his chain in her hand.

When she came back late, she found him in the bin and gave him a good
scolding. He answered it with angry grunts, and to punish him she locked
him up supperless. But it was probably no hardship, for he was an adept
in foraging for frogs and water-snakes.

He was in his place ne