swam around in circles, and
criss-crossed and went in squares, and in triangles and all sorts of queer
figures, including eight, nine, ten, which are very difficult figures,
indeed, for little ducks.

While they were swimming away, having lots of fun, and far enough off so
that Grandfather Goosey-Gander could read his paper in peace, who should
come down to the edge of the pond but the rooster. His name was Mr. Cock
A. Doodle, and he was very proud. He walked right down to the edge of the
water, and looked at the ducks. Then he crowed as loud as he could, and
flapped his wings, just as if he were saying:

"There! I'd like to see any of you do that! Ha! Hum! Oh my, yes, indeed!"

"How do you do, Mr. Cock A. Doodle?" asked Jimmie.

"Ahem! I am pretty well, my young friend," replied the rooster. "And how
may you happen to be to-day? And how are your sisters, Lulu and Alice
Wibblewobble?"

"We are very well," answered Lulu and Alice, and Lulu went on: "Don't you
wish you could swim, Mr. Doodle?"

"I can," said the rooster, and he strutted back and forth at the edge of
the pond. "Certainly I can swim. What put the notion into your heads that
I can't?"

"We never saw you," spoke Jimmie.

"Ahem! Perhaps not. You never saw me stand on one foot and jump over a
barrel, but that doesn't prove that I can't do it," replied Mr. Doodle. "I
can swim if I choose. I have never cared to, that's all."

"Try now," suggested Lulu, for she didn't believe that rooster could swim,
no matter what he said.

"Oh, the water is too cold to go swimming now," said Mr. Doodle. "I never
swim in cold water."

"Why, it's as warm as warm can be," declared Alice, and she splashed a few
drops upon the rooster, so he could feel it.

"Well, er--ahem! The wind is blowing too much," said the rooster, when he
felt the nice, warm water.

"Why, it doesn't blow at all," answered Jimmie.

"Well, I haven't my swimming shoes on," objected Mr. Cock A. Doodle. "I
can't swim without them. You ducks have pieces of skin between your toes,
so the water won't slip through, but I haven't my webbed feet on."

"Oh, that is very easily fixed," said Lulu. "We will take some pieces of
cloth, and tie them over your claws to make them like ours. Do you think
you could swim then?"

"Yes," answered the rooster, "I think I could." You see he had no more
excuses to make. Oh, wasn't he a tricky old rooster, though, eh?

So Lulu and Jimmie got some bits of cloth, and,