Sometimes, when Bob was off to school, Don would walk around the farm, looking at the cows, horses and chickens. He was not afraid of the big red rooster now, though once he had been, when he was a little puppy. Instead the rooster was afraid of Don, though the dog would not harm even a baby chicken. All Don did was to drive the chickens out of the garden when he was told.
“How de doo――de doo!” the rooster would crow, when he saw Don outside the chicken yard. “How de doo――de doo?”
“Oh, I’m pretty well, thank you,” Don would answer. “How are you? Bow wow!”
Then they would talk together in rooster and dog language――that is, after the rooster got over being afraid of Don.
Sometimes Don would go to see if the big, black bull was safely shut up in his pasture lot. Don and the bull never got to be good friends. I guess the bull was rather angry at Don for having driven him back that time he got loose. On some days Don would go to the pen where Squinty, the comical pig, lived with his mother and brothers and sisters. Don could look through a crack in the boards and see the pigs.
“Oh, come now, I say, help me get a board off the pen and run out,” Squinty would beg of Don.
“No indeed! I’m not going to let you out,” Don would answer.
“Then I’ll get out all by myself,” Squinty would say.
And one day he did. With his strong, rubbery nose Squinty pushed and pushed on a loose board of his pen, until the board came off, and Squinty was out in the garden. He had a good time, as I have told you in the book about the comical little pig, so I will not put his adventures in here. For this book is to be about Don, or, at least, mostly about him.
Then the farmer found out that Squinty was loose.
“Here Don! Don!” called Bob’s father, for Bob was off to school. “There’s a pig loose, Don! Drive him back to his pen!”
“Bow wow! I will!” cried Don, and he ran up to take Squinty by the ear and lead him back. Don did not bite Squinty, though the comical little pig squealed as though he were badly hurt. But Don took him safely back to the pen.
Then, one day, Squinty got out again, and this time he wandered off a long distance before Don was sent after him. When the dog did find the little pig, Don saw a strange sight. Along the country road were rumbling big red, green and golden colored wagons, drawn by many horses.