dashing little fellow that led all the
others in daring swings and leaps was Hobson.

"Oh, if Otto could only see them!" cried the little girl. "He loves
soldiers. He wants to be one, and only think! he isn't like other boys.
His back isn't straight and he is lame, and though he is eleven you
wouldn't think him more than eight."

To be lame was worse than to be bow-legged, and Sonny Boy felt a thrill of
pity for Otto. He hoped Otto wasn't cross-eyed, and he quite longed to ask
if fractions and spelling came hard to him.

When it was nearly dark the nurse said that the next stopping-place would
be their station, and she put a newspaper over the parrot's cage and made
ready to leave the car.

The train would reach the city soon after it left their station, she said,
so Sonny Boy covered his mouse-cage with a newspaper, too, and prepared to
say good-bye to his new friend.

There was great hurry and bustle when Lena and her nurse reached their
station, but Lena ran back after she had gone down the car steps to tell
Sonny Boy that he was one of the nicest boys she had ever seen, and had
been beautifully kind all the afternoon to her and to her nurse. Sonny Boy
wished that Polly could have heard her!

In the great city station Aunt Kate's big, pompous coachman came shouting
through the crowd for "Master Peter Plummer." And Sonny Boy had to stop to
think who it was he meant, for in Poppleton he was never called anything
but Sonny Boy.

"Take your things, sir?" said the pompous footman, just as if Sonny Boy
were grown up!

"I'll take this, please," said Sonny Boy, keeping hold of the cage. "It's
full of white mice."

"Dewey! Sampson! Hobson! Cock-a-doodle-doo! Pussy! Pussy! Scat! Polly
wants a cracker!" cried a shrill voice from the cage. And the pompous
coachman stared in amazement.

[Illustration: "HE TOLD HER WHICH WERE SPANIARDS."]

"It's Lena's parrot! We must have changed cages! Oh, and she's got my
white mice!" cried Sonny Boy.

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SONNY BOY GOES IN SEARCH OF HIS WHITE MICE

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CHAPTER III

SONNY BOY GOES IN SEARCH OF HIS WHITE MICE

"My dear Sonny Boy!" Aunt Kate leaned out of her carriage, ready to take
him, big cage and all, into her arms.

"Cock-a-doodle-doo! Remember the Maine! Dewey! Sampson! Hobson!" screamed
the parrot again. And the crowd f