Let's take the path that
leads over the duck pond ocean. That's shorter, and we can get to your
bungalow before the fox can catch us. He won't dare come across the
bridge over the duck pond, for Old Dog Percival will come out and bite
him if he does."
"Very well," said Uncle Wiggily, "over the bridge we will go."
But alas! Also sorrowfulness and sadness! When the three friends got
to the bridge it wasn't there. The wind had blown the bridge down, and
there was no way of getting across the duck pond ocean, for neither
Uncle Wiggily nor the squirrel boys could swim very well.
"Oh, what are we going to do?" cried Billie, sadly.
"We must get across somehow!" chattered Johnnie, "for here comes the
fox!"
And, surely enough the fox was coming, having by this time gotten all
the water out of his eyes, so he could see very well.
"Oh, if we only had a boat!" exclaimed Uncle Wiggily, looking along the
shore of the pond, but there was no boat to be seen.
Nearer and nearer came the fox! Uncle Wiggily and the squirrel boys
were just going to jump in the water, whether or not they could swim,
when, all at once, a big white birch tree on the edge of the woods near
the pond, said:
"Listen, Uncle Wiggily and I will save you. Strip off some of my bark.
It will not hurt me, and you can make a little canoe boat of it, as the
Indians used to do.
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