would go and get him."

"I don't know," said Jonas, "what he would do; but I should not have
wanted to tell such a boy any thing about him."

Rollo began to be alarmed. He went back to his father, and asked him to
let him and Jonas go on before the rest, to see if their bird was safe.
His father told him he might go. "But," said he, "I am afraid you have
lost your bird; when a boy allows himself to get into bad company, he
does not know how many troubles he plunges himself into."

Rollo and Jonas ran on, and soon disappeared among the trees. Rollo
found it hard to keep up, as the road was not very smooth, though they
had got down the steepest part of the mountain. Jonas kept hold of
Rollo's hand, and went on running and walking alternately, until they
got down to the end of the trees and bushes, and then they came out in
sight of the place where the horses were tied.

It was fortunate for poor Mosette, and for Rollo too, that they did thus
run on before, for it happened that Jim, and the boys with him, had come
down the mountain by another road, and were just going up to the place
as Jonas and Rollo came out of the woods.

"There they are," said Jonas. "You stay here; I must run on." And he let
go of Rollo's hand, sprang forward, and ran with all his might. Rollo
tried to follow, but soon stopped and looked on.

Jim and his boys did not see Jonas coming, and they went to work looking
around the bushes and stones after Mosette. In a few minutes, one
smaller boy came out from the bushes, close by the place where Rollo
recollected the nest was hid, with something in his hand, and Rollo
could distinctly hear him calling out,

"Here he is, Jim--I have got him, Jim."

Just that moment, Jonas came running up among the boys, calling out,

"Let that bird alone!--Let that bird alone!" The boys, terrified at
this unexpected onset, started and ran in every direction. The boy who
had the nest, dropped it upon the ground, and dodged back into the
bushes. Jonas took it up carefully, put little Mosette, who had fallen
out, back in the nest, and walked out into the road to meet Rollo, who
was coming down as fast as he could come, on the other side.

They saw Jim and his comrades no more, and Rollo said he believed he
should never again want to have any thing to do with bad boys.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Rollo at Play, by Jacob Abbott

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROLLO AT PLAY ***

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