do but find it so hot there
that he turned around at once and sailed for the North Pole, so he could
be nice and cool.

Then, all at once, as quickly as you can eat an ice cream cone on a hot
day, if something didn't happen. Buddy looked up, after reaching the
North Pole, and he found that the boat was adrift, floating off across
the big pond, with the wind blowing it faster, and faster, and faster.

At first Buddy thought it was fun; then, as he saw that he was getting
farther and farther from shore, he became frightened. He looked for
something with which to send the boat back to land, but there was no
sail in it, and no oars; and, if there had been, the little guinea pig
boy couldn't have used them, I don't suppose. Well, there he was, really
sailing off to some unknown country this time, in earnest, and not make
believe.

Then he began to cry, and he called out as loudly as he could:

"Help! Help! Help!" and who should come running down to the shore but
Peetie and Jackie Bow Wow, the two puppy dogs. They hadn't gone to
Asbury Park yet, you see, but they were going soon.

"What's the matter?" asked Peetie.

"The boat is taking me away off," answered Buddy.

"Jump out and swim to shore!" cried Peetie.

"I can't swim," called back Buddy.

"Oh, we'll show you how," went on Jackie, and then he and Peetie jumped
into the water and began to show Buddy how to swim, but he was too
frightened to learn, and, besides, the two puppy dogs were too far off
for him to see them plainly. Then they swam out, and they tried to pull
the boat back to shore, but they were not strong enough.

"Oh, I'll be drowned! I'll be drowned!" cried Buddy. "What shall I do?
Tell my mamma good-by for me," he said to Jackie.

"We'll tell her you're in trouble, and maybe she will know of a way to
save you," called Peetie and Jackie.

So they ran and told Mrs. Pigg, and she and Brighteyes came running down
to the shore of the pond.

"Oh, my poor little boy," cried Mamma Pigg, when she saw Buddy being
carried farther and farther away.

"Oh, how can we reach him?" wailed Brighteyes, wringing her paws. "We
must save him, somehow!"

Just then along came Billie and Johnnie Bushytail, the squirrels.

"Stick up your tail like a sail and the wind will blow you ashore!" they
cried to Buddy. "That's what we did."

"I haven't any tail," answered Buddy, real sorrowful-like.

"That's so," said the little squirrel boys, and it began to look prett