ning. The bridge over the stream seemed
to have broken in the middle, just as the heavy truck got to that spot,
and the auto's front wheels being lower than the rear ones, had slid the
load of picnic merrymakers into a heap.

"Oh! Oh!" screamed Grace Lavine. "What is going to happen?"

"You'll be all right if you just keep quiet!" called the driver of the
auto in a loud voice. "The bridge has only sagged a little! It isn't
going to fall!"

This was good news provided it was true.

"All of you get off, and do it quietly," advised the driver. "You'll be
all right."

"Are you sure?" asked Mrs. Simpson, one of the ladies in charge of the
children.

"Oh, yes, ma'am. There's no danger," declared the man. He had jumped
from his seat and was looking at the floor of the bridge under the front
wheels of the truck.

"Keep quiet, every one!" ordered Mr. Blake, one of the gentlemen who had
agreed to help the ladies look after the children. "Don't scream or
cry, and move as quietly as you can. The easier you move the less danger
there will be. The bridge hasn't quite broken in two yet."

But it was in grave danger of doing that, as Mr. Blake saw, and he was
fearful that a bad accident would soon happen.

However, the thing to do now was to get all the children off the truck,
over the bridge, and safe on solid ground. After that it might be
possible to get the truck over and keep on to the picnic.

One by one the children, including the Bobbsey twins, started to get off
the truck. They moved as carefully as they could, for they felt that
they were like skaters on thin ice. The least quick movement might break
something.

The truck that had gotten safely over the bridge had come to a stop, and
children and grown folks were piling off it to see what they could do to
save those in danger on the broken bridge.

And while the work of rescue is going on I will take a moment or two to
tell my new readers something about the Bobbsey twins. Those of you who
have read the other books in this series do not need to be introduced to
Bert, Nan, Flossie and Freddie.

Those were the names of the four children. Bert and Nan were the older
twins, and Flossie and Freddie the younger. You are first told about
them in the book called "The Bobbsey Twins," and in that you learn that
the Bobbsey family, consisting of Mr. and Mrs. Richard Bobbsey and their
four children, lived in Lakeport, an eastern city on the shore of Lake
Metoka, where Mr