the mist and the moon touched with a lingering,
wistful kiss the clear green water of the Clear Green River.
So they stood looking, the Wooden Indian with his copper face and
wooden feathers, and the Shaghorn Buffalo with his big head and heavy
shoulders slumping down close to the ground.
[Illustration: So they stood looking]
And after they had looked a long while, and each of them got an eyeful
of the high hill, the big bend and the moon mist on the river all blue
and white and soft, after they had looked a long while, they turned
around and the Shaghorn Buffalo put his head down and ran like a
prairie wind down Main Street till he was exactly in front of the
cigar store and the haberdasher shop. Then whisk! both of them were
right back like they were before, standing still, taking whatever
comes.
This is the story as it came from the night policeman of the Village
of Cream Puffs. He told the people the next day, "I was sitting on the
steps of the cigar store last night watching for burglars. And when I
saw the Wooden Indian step down and the Shaghorn Buffalo step out, and
the two of them go down Main Street like the wind, I says to myself,
marvelish, 'tis marvelish, 'tis marvelish."
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6. Four Stories About
Dear, Dear Eyes
_People_: The White Horse Girl
The Blue Wind Boy
The Gray Man on Horseback
Six Girls With Balloons
Henry Hagglyhoagly
Susan Slackentwist
Two Wool Yarn Mittens
Peter Potato Blossom Wishes
Her Father
Many Shoes
Slippers
A Slipper Moon
[Illustration]
The White Horse Girl and the Blue Wind
Boy
When the dishes are washed at night time and the cool of the evening
has come in summer or the lamps and fires are lit for the night in
winter, then the fathers and mothers in the Rootabaga Country
sometimes tell the young people the story of the White Horse Girl and
the Blue Wind Boy.
The White Horse Girl grew up far in the west of the Rootabaga Country.
All the years she grew up as a girl she liked to ride horses. Best of
all things for her was to be straddle of a white horse loping with a
loose br
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