host" any longer. It was just the "queer noise."

But they did not hear it, and they rather wanted to, for they thought
it would be fun to find out what caused it.

After two days of rain the snow was all gone. The ground was bleak and
bare, but the six little Bunkers did not mind that, for they were eager
for ice to freeze.

Then, one morning, Daddy Bunker called up the stairs:

"Come on out, everybody! The freeze has come! The pond is frozen over,
and we're all going skating!"

"Hurray!" cried Russ. "This will be more fun than snowshoes!"

Little did he guess what was going to happen.

CHAPTER XIX

THE ICE BOAT

"Now you must all eat good breakfasts," said Grandma Ford, as the six
little Bunkers came trooping downstairs in answer to their father's
call. "Eat plenty of buckwheat cakes and maple syrup, so you will not be
cold and hungry when you go out on the ice to skate."

Russ, Laddie and the others needed no second invitation, and soon there
was a rattle of knives, forks and spoons that told of hungry children
eating heartily.

The house at Great Hedge was warm and cosy, and the smell of the bacon,
the buckwheat cakes and the maple syrup would have made almost any one
hungry.

"Are we all going out skating?" asked Rose, as she ate her last cake.

"Yes, I'll take you all," said Daddy Bunker. "Dick went over to the
pond, and he says the ice is fine. It's smooth and hard."

"Is it strong enough to hold?" asked Mother Bunker. "I don't want any of
my six little Bunkers falling through the ice."

"Nor I," added Daddy Bunker. "We'll take good care that they don't. Now
wrap up well. I have skates for all but Margy and Mun Bun. I'm afraid
they are a bit too small to try to skate yet, but we'll take over sleds
for them."

"Russ and I are going to have a race!" boasted Laddie. "And if I win,
you've got to guess any riddle I ask you, Russ."

"I will, if you don't make it too hard," said the older boy with a
laugh.

As Daddy Bunker had said, there were skates for Russ, Rose, Laddie and
Vi, these having been brought from home. Russ and Rose had learned to
skate the winter before, and Laddie had made one or two attempts at it.
He felt that he could do much better now. Violet, not to be outdone by
her twin, was to learn too. Of course, the children could not skate very
far, nor very fast, but they could have fun, and, after all, that is
what skates are for, mostly.

"Could we take something to eat w