s down to the ground. And when the men
in it want to go up again, they have to toss out some of the bags of
sand, or ballast, they carry to make the balloon so light that the gas
in it will take it up again.

The men began tossing out the bags of sand. Squinty saw them, but he was
not afraid. Why should he be? for no men or boys had ever been cruel to
him.

"Uff! Uff!" grunted Squinty, getting up and going over to one of the
bags of sand. "Maybe that is good to eat!" he thought. "If it is I will
take a bite. I am hungry."

"Oh, look at that pig!" suddenly called one of the men in the balloon
basket.

"Sure enough, it is a pig!" exclaimed the other. "And what a comical
little chap he is!" he went on. "See the funny way he looks at you."

At that moment Squinty looked up, as he often did, with one eye partly
closed, the other open, and with one ear cocked frontwards, and the
other backwards.

"Say, he's a cute one all right," said the first man. "Let's take him
along."

"What for?" asked his friend. "We'd only have to toss out as much sand
as he weighs so we could go up."

"Oh, let's take him along, anyhow," insisted the other. "Maybe he'll be
a mascot for us."

"Well, if he's a mascot, all right. Then we'll take him. We need some
good luck on this trip."

Squinty did not know what a mascot was. Perhaps he thought it was
something good to eat. But I might say that a mascot is something which
some persons think brings them good luck. Often baseball nines, or
football elevens, will have a small boy, or a goat, or a dog whom they
call their mascot. They take him along whenever they play games,
thinking the mascot helps them to win. Of course it really does not, but
there is no harm in a mascot, anyhow.

"Yes, we'll take him along in the balloon with us," said the taller of
the two men. "See, he doesn't seem to be a bit afraid."

"No, and look! He must be a trick pig! Maybe he got away from some
circus!" cried the other man. For, at that moment Squinty stood up on
his hind legs, as the boy had taught him, and walked over toward the big
balloon basket. What he really wanted was something to eat, but the men
did not know that.

"He surely is a cute little pig!" cried the tall man. "I'll lift him in.
You toss out another bag of sand, and we'll go up."

[Illustration: The next moment Squinty felt himself lifted off the
ground.]

The next moment, before he could get out of the man's grasp if he had
wanted to,