“I see a boat on the sand,” reported Bumble, “a very queer boat—her hull is black, her trimmings golden-yellow, her decks bright-blue and the mast and sails are green.”
“That’s the Little Dipper!” shouted Birdling, and began to run as fast as he could. He quite forgot that his great-aunt sat by the window, knitting wristlets and watching everything outside the house. She saw the tiny creature running along the beach, and as she was very old and could not see very clearly through her spectacles, she opened the window and leaned far out.
“It must be a mouse,” she decided, and hobbling across the room, she called her cat and opened the door for him.
“Mousie outside, Puss!” she said. “Go catch the Mousie, catch the Mousie!”
The big black cat never had much to eat so he was very glad to go and catch a mouse. Poor Birdling dropped his mullen-leaves and ran faster and faster, but could not run fast enough. The Cat came nearer and nearer.
“Oh, I can’t run any more!” panted Birdling at last. In another moment the Cat would have pounced upon him and devoured him—but just then the Bumble-bee came booming through the air, and stung the Cat on his big, black, S-shaped tail. The cat gave a terrible cry, turned around and ran home three times as fast as he had come.
Birdling had to sit down and rest for a while after the Cat had gone. Then he and the Bumble-bee went on, hoping to reach the Little Dipper before noon. But they had not gone one-half a fairy-mile further, when a cross, scratchy voice shouted at them: “Get off the beach!”
“I can’t,” said Birdling timidly. “There’s a board fence on one side and water on the other, and I can’t go back the way I came, because there’s a cat.”
He could not even see who was speaking. There was only a big brown hill in front of him.
“I’m not on the beach,” replied Bumble-bee. “I’m in the air. Who are you, anyway?”
“Who am I! Well, I like that—who am I? Why, I’m ME!”
The big brown hill lifted itself up a bit, and they saw that it was the back of a Horse-Shoe Crab.
“Get off the beach, you civilians, this is a parade-ground! I’m drilling the new regiment from the Deep Sea.”
Then they noticed a long line of little pink Crabs emerging from the foamy water and slowly ascending the sands.