een corn.

"Well, I have the whole day to myself!" thought Squinty. "I can do as I
please, and not go back until night. Let me see, what shall I do first?
I guess I will go to sleep in the shade."

So he stretched out in the shade of a big potato vine, and, curling up
in a little pink ball, he closed his eyes, the squinty one as well as
the good one. But first Squinty looked all around to make sure Don, the
dog, was not in sight. He saw nothing of him.

When Squinty awakened he felt hungry, as he always did after a sleep.

"Now for some more of those nice potatoes!" he said to himself. He liked
them, right after his first taste. He did not look around for the little
ones that might have fallen out of the hills themselves. No, instead,
Squinty began rooting them out of the earth with his strong, rubbery
nose, made just for digging.

I am not saying Squinty did right in this. In fact he did wrong, but
then he was a little pig, and he knew no better. In fact it was the
first time he had really run away so far, and he was quite hungry. And
potatoes were better than pig weed.

Squinty ate as many potatoes as he wanted, and then he said to himself,
in a way pigs have:

"Well, I guess I'll go on to the brook, and cool off in the water. That
will do me good. After that I'll look around and see what will happen
next."

Squinty had a good nose for smelling, as most animals have, and, tilting
it up in the air, Squinty sniffed and snuffed. He wanted to smell the
water, so as to take the shortest path to the brook.

"Ha! It's right over there!" exclaimed Squinty to himself. "I can easily
find the water to take a bath."

Across the potato field he went, taking care to keep well down between
the rows of green vines, for he did not want to be seen by the dog, or
the farmer.

Once, as Squinty was walking along, he saw what he thought was another
potato on the ground in front of him. He put his nose out toward it,
intending to eat it, but the thing gave a big jump, and hopped out of
the way.

"Ha! That must be one of the hop toads I heard my mother tell about,"
thought Squinty. "I must not hurt them, for they are good to catch the
flies that tickle me when I try to sleep. Hop on," he said to the toad.
"I won't bother you."

[Illustration: "Hop on," he said to the toad, "I won't bother you."]

The toad did not stop to say anything. She just hopped on, and hid under
a big stone. Maybe she was afraid of Squinty, but he wou