ne, for
his mother and Brighteyes had gone calling on Grandpa and Grandma
Lightfoot, the squirrels and Dr. Pigg was downtown, playing checkers or
dominoes with Uncle Wiggily Longears, so Buddy didn't have any one to
keep him company.

"I wish some of the boys would come along," he said, as he sat on the
front steps and threw stones out in the dusty road. "I'd like to have a
ball game, or some sort of fun."

But, though he sat there quite a while, none of the boys came along,
and, at last, Buddy remarked:

"Oh, I'm going off and see if I can't find Billie or Johnnie Bushytail,
or Sammie Littletail, or some one, to play with." So he locked the front
door, and put the key under the mat, where his mother would find it when
she came home, and off he started, almost as fast as when Sister Sallie
went hippity-hop to the barber shop.

Pretty soon Buddy came to the woods, and he opened his mouth real wide
and began to yell, not because he was hurt, you understand, but because
he wanted to call some of the boys. He yelled, and he hollered, and he
hooted, and then, all of a sudden, he heard some one yelling back at
him, and he saw Johnnie and Billie Bushytail, the two squirrel boys,
bounding along on the low branches of the trees.

"Hello, fellows!" cried Buddy. "Glad to see you! Let's have some fun."

"What'll we do?" asked Billie.

"I know," suggested Johnnie. "Let's make a see-saw. Here is a nice
plank, and we can put it across that old stump and have a dandy time."

So they got the plank and put it across the stump. Then Buddy got on one
end and Billie and Johnnie on the other, as they were a little smaller
than Buddy, and did not weigh so much. Then they began to go up and
down, first slowly, and then faster and faster, until they were jiggling
up and down as fast as the teakettle boils when there's company coming
to supper.

"Hi, yi!" yelled Billie and Johnnie. "Isn't this fun?"

"Wow, yow! It certainly is," agreed Buddy. "Only don't jump off too
suddenly when I'm in the air, or I'll fall and be hurt."

Well, of course, Billie and Johnnie promised that they would be
careful, and they really meant to keep their word; only, just as they
were close down to the ground on the plank, and Buddy was high up, what
should happen but that a new, green, little acorn fell off an oak tree.

It was one of the first acorns of the season, and Billie and Johnnie
each wanted to get it, so, without thinking what they were doing, t