e next story about Buddy walking a tight rope.

STORY X

BUDDY WALKS A TIGHT ROPE

One day after Buddy Pigg had been on a visit to Jackie and Peetie Bow
Wow, the two puppy dogs, who were once in a circus, he came home all
excited. He ran out in the yard, began pawing over in the woodpile, and
soon he ran into the house, where Brighteyes, his sister, was washing
the potatoes for dinner.

"Do you know where there is any wire, Brighteyes?" the little boy guinea
pig asked.

"Wire? No, I haven't seen any around the house. What do you want of it?
Are you going to wire a tail on to yourself?" and Buddy's sister smiled
just the least bit.

"Please don't remind me of that," said Buddy, for he felt a little
ashamed of the time he had tried to get a tail for himself and had been
nearly dragged into a fox's den, as I told you in the story before this
one. "No, Brighteyes, I'm not going to make a tail. I am going to do a
circus trick, and you can see me if you want to," he said.

"Oh, Buddy! are you really?" she cried, and she was interested all of a
sudden, you see, for she had never seen much of a circus.

"Yes, I'll do the trick, if I can find a bit of wire," went on Buddy.
"Jackie and Peetie Bow Wow told me how to do it; and I'm sure I can.
It's walking a tight rope, and it's very hard to do."

"Oh! then you want rope, not wire," went on Brighteyes, as she put the
pan of potatoes on the table.

"Wire is what the circus performers use," insisted her brother, "but if
you can't find any I suppose rope will do."

"I saw some up in the attic," said Brighteyes. "I'll get it for you.
But, Buddy, isn't it dangerous? Do you s'pose mamma and papa would let
you do it?"

"There's not much danger," answered Buddy. "I'll not put the rope up
very high, and I'll put some pillows on the ground underneath, so that
if I fall I won't get hurt much."

Well, Brighteyes found a long rope, and she helped Buddy tie it from one
clothes post to the other, across the yard, so that it looked like a
real tight rope in a circus.

"Oh, you can never get on that!" she cried to her brother, as she saw
how high up it was.

"Yes, I can," he replied. "You just watch me. But first I must put some
pillows underneath, in case I fall."

So he ran into the house and got a lot of feather pillows and put them
on the ground under the rope, Brighteyes helping him.

Then Buddy got some old soap boxes, piled them one on top of the other,
and, by