, you
shall save him. Shut your eyes, cross your front paws, and wrinkle your
nose three times and a half." So Sammie did this, and, would you
believe me? if, in another instant, the little green man hadn't changed
into a big, kind, good-natured eagle. "Get up on my back," the eagle
said to Sammie, "and we will save Billie."

So Sammie got on the eagle's back, and the big bird flew after that
hawk, and, pretty soon, it caught up to him.

"Here, you let Billie Bushytail go!" cried Sammie, and then he took a
long stick he had grabbed up, and he hit that hawk. At first the hawk
wasn't going to let go of the little squirrel, but when the eagle bit
him three times on each leg, then that bad bird was glad enough to drop
Billie and fly off. Oh, my, no, he didn't drop Billie to the ground;
that would have been too bad. He only dropped him on the eagle's back,
where Sammie was, and pretty soon the two boys were safe on the ground
once more, and the eagle had turned into a little green man again.

"I'm ever so much obliged to you for saving me, Sammie," spoke Billie.

"Oh, I couldn't have done it if it hadn't been for the green fairy,"
replied Sammie, and of course he couldn't. Then Billie thanked the
little man very kindly, and he felt sorry for not believing in fairies,
and he said he would try to, after that. So the boy squirrel and the boy
rabbit played together some more, until it was time to go home. Now, if
you don't walk in your sleep to-night, I'll tell you to-morrow about
Susie and the fairy carrot.

XXXI

SUSIE AND THE FAIRY CARROT

Susie and Sammie Littletail had been off in the woods for a walk, and to
gather some flowers, for they expected company at the underground house,
and they wanted it to look nice. Mr. and Mrs. Bushytail and Billie and
Johnnie and Sister Sallie were coming, and Susie and her brother hoped
to have a very nice time.

Well, they wandered on, and on, and on, and had gathered quite a number
of flowers, when Sammie said:

"Come on, we've got enough; let's go home."

"No," answered Susie, "I want to get some sky-blue-pink ones. I think
they are so pretty."

"I don't," answered her brother, for that color always reminded him of
the time he fell in the dye pot, when they were coloring Easter eggs.
"I'm going home. Yellow, and red, and blue, and white flowers are good
enough. I don't want any fancy colors."

"Well, you go home and I'll come pretty soon," said his sister, so while