alled Russ. "This steamboat
won't ever get started. All aboard! Toot! Toot!"

Vi snatched up what she called a bathing-dress from a small trunkful of
clothes belonging to her dolls, and ran back to the place where the
"steamboat" floated in the "ten-miles-deep water," in the middle of the
playroom floor.

"Now I'm all ready, an' so's my doll," said Vi, as she climbed up in one
of the chairs behind the big, empty flour barrel that Mother Bunker had
let Russ take to make his boat. "Gid-dap, Russ!"

"Gid-dap? What you mean?" asked Russ, stopping his whistling and turning
to look at his sister.

"I mean start," answered Vi. "Don't you know what gid-dap means?"

"Sure I know! It's how you talk to a horse. It's what you tell him when
you want him to start."

"Well, I'm ready to start now," said Vi, smoothing out her dress, and
putting the bathing-suit on her doll.

"Pooh! You don't tell a steamboat to 'gid-dap' when you want _that_ to
start!" exclaimed Russ. "You say 'All aboard! Toot! Toot!'"

"All right then. Toot! Toot!" cried Vi, and Margy and Mun, who had climbed
up together in a single chair beside Vi, began to laugh.

"I know another riddle," announced Laddie, as he took his place inside the
barrel, for he was going to be the fireman, and, of course, they always
rode away down inside the steamboat. "I know a nice riddle about a horse,"
went on Laddie. "What makes a horse's shoes different from ours?" he
asked.

"Oh, we haven't time to bother with riddles now, Laddie," said Rose. "You
can tell us some other time. We're going to make-believe steamboat a long
way across the deep water now."

"A horse's shoes aren't like ours 'cause a horse doesn't wear
stockings--that's the answer," went on Laddie.

"All aboard!" cried Russ again.

"All aboard!" repeated Laddie.

"Oh, let's sing!" suddenly said Rose. She was a jolly little girl and had
learned many simple songs at school.

"Let's sing about sailing o'er the dark blue sea," went on Rose. "It's an
awful nice song, and I know five verses."

"We'll sing it after a while," returned Russ. "We got to get started now.
All ready, fireman!" he called to Laddie, who was inside the barrel.
"Start the steam going. I'm going to steer the boat," and Russ took his
place astride the front end of the barrel, and began twisting on a stick
he had stuck down in one of the cracks. The stick, you understand, was the
steering-wheel, even if it didn't look like one.

"All ab