s that?" said Dick as a lizard-like creature scuttled through
the grass some fifty yards in front of him.

"'Gator! Shoot quick, 'fore he gits t' that pond!"

Dick fired, and his bullet spattered the mud over the reptile's back
as it slid into the water.

Dick was very much chagrined at missing his quarry, but Johnny
consoled him.

"I'll git ye another shot at him. I'll call him out o' the water,
and if he don't come I'll take a stick an' go in there an' run him
out."

Johnny stood beside the pond and grunted in imitation of a young
alligator. In a few minutes two black dots appeared on the surface
of the water, and, slowly rising, disclosed the eyes and the point
of the nose of an alligator. Johnny grunted again, and the big
mouth opened wide to take in the baby 'gator which the reptile
thought he heard. Then the horny ridges of the back began to appear,
and soon the whole body of the reptile lay on the surface. Johnny
whispered to Dick:

"Shoot him in that hump behind his eyes." Dick took careful aim and
fired. The alligator rolled slowly over, with its yellow belly on
top and its four paws uplifted. Johnny waded into the pond and
dragged out the body of the reptile, which Dick helped him skin.
When this had been done Johnny cut from the creature a round strip
of white flesh, about a foot long, beginning at the hind leg and
running toward the tail.

"What's that for?" said Dick.

"Fur dinner. I told ye we'd find 'nuff t' eat."

"Do yon s'pose I'm going to eat that?"

"Sure! 'nd yer goin' ter like it."

"Then I wish I hadn't helped skin it."

Just as the boys were leaving the pond they heard a little grunt,
and turning around saw a baby alligator, less than two feet long,
lying on the surface.

"Want ter ketch that alive?" asked Johnny.

"Can you do it?"

"I'll show' yer."

And Johnny took off his shoes and waded into the pond. He waded
about the pond, feeling in the mud with his toes until he felt the
reptile, when, slipping his toes under it he lifted his foot
suddenly and brought the alligator near enough to the surface to be
able to seize him. Dick was delighted with the captive, but was
frank enough to say:

"Johnny, I said once that I could learn to do anything that you
could. I take that back. I couldn't learn to do what you did then in
a thousand years."

Johnny laughed and said:

"You'd do it this afternoon, and I'll bet on it."

Johnny tied a string around the jaws of their littl