Chapter IV: Part 4

“Well, if you wish you had my hoofs, I wish I had your short hair, for I am almost suffocated with my long coat, besides the air in this altitude is hard to breathe. One gets out of breath so easily and feels as if there was nothing to the air. Phew! what’s that terrible odor? It smells as if a whole factory of sulphur matches had gone off at once. Hark! What is that rumbling noise? It sounds like thunder, but it can’t be that for the sky is without a cloud and is as blue as blue can be. Say, Stubby, did you feel the earth shake then? If we were down on the level I should think it were an earthquake. Gracious! did you hear that explosion and feel the earth shake again? We had better get out of this.”

Just then the smoke rolled away for a minute and they saw they were within a few feet of the top so they decided they would not give up, bad as the sulphur and smoke were, until they had taken one peep into the crater.

This one peep nearly cost Stubby his life, for just as he had crawled to the very brink and was looking down, down, down into the very bowels of the earth where lava was boiling and steam hissing, an extra whiff of sulphur arose from the boiling, seething mass below which choked and strangled him so he could not move.

Billy had jumped back barely in time to escape it and was just starting on a run down the cone away from this dangerous place when he heard a little whine and saw Stubby drop over on his side as if dead. With a bound Billy was back, and grabbing him by the nape of his neck, as a cat carries her kittens, he carried him down the volcano’s side to safety.

It took Stubby a long while to come to and when he did so he found his poor little torn and bleeding feet as well as his nose resting in the cool sands of a little stream, and all he had to do, if he wanted a drink, was to stick out his tongue and let the water run through his mouth.

“Well, Stubby, are you feeling better?” he heard Billy say when he tried to open his eyes to see where he was.

“How in the world did I get here? Can you tell me that? for I had given up the hope of ever getting off that hot volcano again.”

“Indeed, I can, for I carried you every step of the way in my mouth, and when I got here I thought every tooth in my head would drop out, and instead of the little light weight dog I started with, I thought I was carrying an elephant, you got so heavy.”

“Billy, old fellow, you are a brick. That’s what you are.”

The next day Stubby was all right, and noticing that this little stream flowed toward the west, they followed it for two reasons. One, because they thought it would eventually run into the ocean; and the other, because they were afraid to leave it for fear of not finding any more water, and it was impossible to travel in this dry, hot country without having lots of water.

This little stream proved a perfect godsend to them as it quenched their thirst, cooled their aching feet and bodies and saved them many a long climb as it always kept its course and flowed straight on.

Had they followed the mountain trail it would have led them up hill and down and over many stones and brambles. Now, when they came to a precipice that shut off their path by its steep side they took to the stream and either waded or swam around it. In this way they reached the seashore days before they had expected to and with happy eyes they looked over the peaceful, blue bosom of the Pacific Ocean.

“Stubby, I feel as if I had escaped from prison to get out of that lonesome country full of insects, snakes and centipedes. Oh! how refreshing this salt breeze smells.”

“Yes, but I smell something sweeter to doggie nostrils and that’s the smell of frying meat. There must be a fisherman’s cottage around that bend. Good-bye, I’m off for some of it, and I mean to have some, even if I have to steal it from the red hot stove.”

“Don’t be in such a hurry and I’ll go with you.”

“No, you had better stay here. You are so big they will see you, while I am little and so near the color of the sand that I can sneak in and not be seen, and after finding out who lives there and getting a piece of meat, I will come back and tell you all about it.”

“Very well, but bring me back a bunch of carrots or a cabbage if you find any for I am as tired of eating leaves as you are of going without meat.”

Stubby crept cautiously round the bend and then laid down behind a bush out of sight so that he could watch and see who lived in the house. On the doorstep sat a stoop-shouldered man smoking a stubby pipe, while in front of him on the sand played three or four little children, bare-headed, bare-footed, with only faded calico slips on.

Through the open door Stubby could see the wife and mother leaning over the stove cooking, yes, he knew it by the smell, the selfsame steak he was longing for. He sneaked cautiously and quietly round to the back of the cottage and there--Oh, be joyful--he spied the remnants of the heifer that had been killed so that the family could have a taste of fresh meat, which was as great a treat to them as to Stubby, for they generally lived on salt meat and fish, which the father caught, for he was a fisherman, and took to a little town ten miles up the coast for shipment to large cities.

After Stubby had eaten all he wanted of the fresh meat he ran back to Billy and told him there was a small garden of vegetables back of the cottage where he could go as soon as it was dark and have a feast.

The tired, sleepy heads of the fisherman and his family had hardly touched their pillows when a large, black goat could have been seen in the midst of a vegetable garden, eating cabbages, turnips and lettuce, while a little yellow dog sat on a brown speckled rock and licked his chops after a meal of fresh beef and cold boiled potatoes he had found just inside the kitchen door, nicely chopped for breakfast.

Presently Stubby gave a sudden, sharp bark of alarm which made Billy throw up his head to see what was the matter, when what should he see but the rock Stubby was sitting on, walk off with four legs with a queer flat head sticking out from one side. Stubby jumped off in a hurry and was nearly bitten in two by a quick snap of the jaws of this queer looking beast, bird or fowl. They did not know which to call it as they had never before seen or heard of a snapping turtle, and that is what this was. Stubby had taken its shell for a large stone, as it had its head and feet drawn in out of sight when he jumped upon it.

This turtle was a huge one that the fisherman had caught the day before and was going to take to town in the morning to sell to a hotel-keeper to make turtle soup of.

The next morning Billy and Stubby kept out of sight until the fisherman had loaded his wagon with fish, vegetables and his turtle, and had started on his way to town. Then they ran out of their hiding place and followed him, taking great care to keep out of sight and in this way they soon came to the seaport town and followed him down to the wharf. When they reached the town they both walked under the wagon so that people would think that they belonged to the fisherman and would let them alone.

When they arrived at the wharf where lay a vessel ready to sail for San Francisco, the fisherman got off his wagon to unload and then, for the first time, he spied Billy and Stubby who were still under it and he was very much surprised to see them there I can tell you.

One of the sailors said, “What will you take for your goat?”

Without letting on that Billy was not his or that he had never laid eyes on him before, he said, “Well! as he is pretty fine, big goat, I can’t let you have him for less than five dollars.”

“All right. It’s a go,” said the sailor, who had lots of money at present, having just received his pay and not having had a chance to spend it.

“And what will you take for the dog?” asked another.

“Well, I don’t know as I care to sell him,” said the fisherman, thinking if he held off they would give him more money.

“You can’t expect to get much for him,” said another. “He is too tarnation homely.”

“That’s a matter of taste,” drawled the fisherman. “Looks ain’t everything in this world, and you can’t find a smarter rat dog along this coast.”

He threw this remark in for he knew it would catch the sailor as the ships are always infested with rats.

“Well, I’ll give you a dollar for him.”

“No, I couldn’t think of selling him so cheap,” and he climbed into his wagon, as if he were going off and did not care to part with him.

“I’ll give you two dollars and a half, and not a cent more.”

“I don’t care to sell him, but as he has cleaned out all the rats at my place I guess I’ll let you have him.”

The sailors gave him the money for the goat and the dog, and he drove off a happy man, but he did not let the grin show on his face until he was out of sight of the sailors.

Now this was a great streak of luck for Billy and Stubby, and was just what they wanted, so they followed their new masters on board without giving any trouble and by night their ship had sailed out of port and was on her way to San Francisco.

_An Unexpected Trip._

After an uneventful trip, they sailed one day into the beautiful harbor of San Francisco, called the Golden Gate, and Billy and Stubby were looking forward to a good time on shore, and planning what they would do, when, all unexpectedly, after landing, they got mixed up in a bunch of cattle, and were driven aboard a big boat that was being loaded with live cattle for Japan, and try as he would, Billy could not extricate himself from them or avoid the long whips of the men who were driving them. As for Stubby, he could easily have slipped away, but he preferred to follow Billy, and that is how our travelers found themselves bound for Japan without a day’s rest on shore after they came up the coast from Mexico to San Francisco.

This was not at all what they wanted, for they were tired of the ocean, but they were helpless, and what was worse, Billy stood in danger of being killed and sold for mutton chops, for goat chops are often sold for such. Stubby was afraid he, too, would be killed and made into sausage, for he had heard that the Chinese eat dog meat, and if they did, why not the Japanese? So with heavy hearts they saw the shore recede farther and farther from them and the Golden Gate sink into the blue waters of the Pacific, leaving them nothing to look at but water, water all around them.

The only thing that varied the monotony of the long trip to Japan was their short stop at the Sandwich Islands, where Billy and Stubby were taken ashore for a run by the cook and his assistant, who were both Japanese and were returning home to fight for their country against Russia.

Since starting they had made great pets of both Billy and Stubby and had often given them meat and apples, and got permission for them to run on deck once in a while. Otherwise they would have been shut below with the cattle and the trip would have been unendurable to the independent, free-roving Billy.

One dark night as the steamer was ploughing the waters and they were laying in a little sheltered nook on deck, they heard the captain say to the mate:

“We are getting pretty near Port Arthur now and it is going to be mighty ticklish sailing in these waters; with the two armies, the Russians and the Japanese, banging away at each other from their battleships and the waters under us filled with hidden mines and torpedo boats. I tell you, I don’t like these submarine things floating around. Who knows but one might get loose, float off and perhaps blow up the wrong boat.”

And that is just what did happen, for while the captain was talking, a terrific explosion was heard, louder than one hundred cannons going off at once, and for a second, the heavens were lit up with a weird light in which were seen huge pieces of debris flying in the air like the eruption from a volcano, while, almost in the same second, they began falling with a sissing sound into the waters beneath, and all that was left of the Russian’s battle ship was a few splinters of wood and the mangled bodies of her officers and men floating on top of the water.

It had all been so sudden and was over so quickly that it was hard to realize that such a terrible disaster could have occurred in so short a time.

“Now, what did I tell you about the danger of sailing along here? One of these submarine mines or torpedo boats caused the blowing up of that war-ship and I tell you what, we had better get out of here as fast as ever we can or we too may be blown sky high before we know it.”

Consequently, they cautiously and softly steamed away from Port Arthur and kept a sharp lookout for every Russian boat that might be sailing round looking for some boat of the enemies to capture, but they escaped them all.

When they landed, Billy’s and Stubby’s friends, the Japs, took them home with them where they were fed and nicely housed in their back yard, and while Billy and Stubby were making friends with the beautiful pheasants that were shut in the same yard, their Japanese friends went to military headquarters to join the army and when they came back they were dressed in their uniforms with orders in their pockets to report at headquarters the next morning.

For several days after this, Billy and Stubby saw nothing of them but they were fed and looked after by a pretty, rosy faced, little Jap girl who wore a pretty flowered kimona and wore her hair in funny looking, little, smooth puffs with toy fans sticking out of it.

They had been in the yard about a week and Billy was getting tired of such close quarters with nothing to see or do, when he heard a military band marching down the street on the other side of the high fence. The little Jap girl who had just brought them some water, when she heard this, dropped her pan and ran to the gate in the fence and looked out to see the soldiers go by. Of course Billy turned and was through the gate in a flash with Stubby close at his heels and down the street they ran in the direction the band had taken, while the poor little Jap girl ran after them wringing her hands in dismay and calling to them to come back, but they only ran the faster.

Billy was as bad as any little Irish Paddy about liking to follow a parade or a band and when he caught up to it he found it was leading a regiment that was marching to the front. When Billy and Stubby dropped back to the rear who should they see but their Japanese friends, the last men of the last ranks.

When Billy spied them he made up his mind in a twinkle to follow and go to the war with them. This he bleated to Stubby and of course Stubby thought it would be great fun and agreed to go, too.

When the regiment had left the city’s cheering crowds behind, Billy and Stubby crept up closer to the soldiers and trudged on quietly after them until Stubby gave a quick little bark which one of the Japs recognized and turning his head, he saw with surprise Billy and Stubby marching behind him.

He tried to drive them back by shooing them and scolding but what cared Billy and Stubby for a shoo or a scold when they were going to the war. As the Japs could not break ranks and go for the goat and the dog, they had to let them follow, which they did, mile after mile until the regiment broke ranks for the night and went into camp.

By that time, they had traveled too far to send them back, so that night when the Japs threw themselves down by their camp-fire, a large black goat and a little yellow dog lay down with them.

And for many days and weeks and months they did this, sticking to the regiment whether it chanced to be in the thick of the fight or waiting for marching orders, and strange as it may seem, whenever this regiment was in a fight, it always won and the two Japs had fought so bravely that they had been promoted until they were no longer privates but were colonel and captain, and their regiment was known as the “Black Goat and Yellow Dog Regiment,” while Billy and Stubby had become their mascots and here we will leave them to enjoy their honors.

Billy Whiskers Series

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By FRANCES TREGO MONTGOMERY

BILLY WHISKERS

Billy Whiskers is a mischievous creature, full of wickedness and folly, whose antics have furnished fun for a million readers. The child enjoys every moment after he is introduced to the irresistible fellow.

BILLY WHISKERS’ KIDS

“Recounting the adventures of Day and Night, twin kids of the nursery-famous Billy Whiskers. This is a stirring tale of travel and trouble and mischief that will delight the little world.”--_Galveston News._

BILLY WHISKERS, JR.

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BILLY WHISKERS’ TRAVELS

In which the ever active Billy tours Europe, each city in turn furnishing ample opportunity for fun for sight-seeing Billy.

BILLY WHISKERS AT THE CIRCUS

“Everything goes well enough with Billy until a circus comes to town, and then just like the small boy, he made up his mind to go come what might and cost what it would. He made preparations for a week and went, there to meet with all manner of adventures, becoming so infatuated with the life that he joined it.”--_Des Moines Capital._

BILLY WHISKERS AT THE FAIR

In going to the Fair, Billy Whiskers didn’t leave a single prank at home. He had more fun to the minute than most others have to the hour. What he didn’t do and didn’t see is not worth relating.

Each volume bound in boards, cover and jacket in colors, six full-page
illustrations in colors, with scores of text drawings, quarto,
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DICKY DELIGHTFUL IN RAINBOW LAND by James Ball Naylor

Dicky is truly a delightful youngster, who ventures over Rainbow Road, to find himself the guest of Grandfather Gander and Grandmother Goose in the Land of the Immortals.

Dr. Naylor knows how to please boys and girls, for the story is brimming over with humor, rapid movement and lively conversation.

THE LITTLE GREEN GOBLIN by James Ball Naylor

The Little Green Goblin comes from Goblinland in his tiny featherbed balloon, administers a goblin tablet to Bob Taylor, a dissatisfied boy. The tablet shrinks him to goblin size, and away the two sail for Goblinland, which is the place where you do as you please. Upon their arrival, Bob--but to tell more would be to spoil a good story.

WITCH CROW AND BARNEY BYLOW by James Ball Naylor

Barney fell to wishing down in the haylot, along came a crow and gave him a magic penny--he would always have that much but no more. Many strange things then happened--things which cured Barney of that bad habit of wishing.

SQUEAKS AND SQUAWKS FROM FAR-AWAY FORESTS by Burton Stoner

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Charles Livingston Bull illustrates this charming book of nature stories, in which the animals speak for themselves.

JIM CROW TALES by Burton Stoner

Jim Crow was the pet of a farmer boy. He was very wise and knew all about the ways of the beasts and birds, and told them to his friend--the most interesting anecdotes of the forest folk.

TEDDY BEARS by Adah Louise Sutton

“A fanciful story of the doings of a little girl’s toys, which get into all sorts of pranks while people sleep. The doings of this interesting coterie form a pleasing tale for children.”--_Pittsburg Post._

“Full of the brand of fun that tickles children.”--_Portland Oregonian._

A LITTLE MAID IN TOYLAND by Adah Louise Sutton

Eating a piece of magic cake, a little girl becomes diminutive and goes to live among the dollies in her doll house. One day she steps through the back door and finds herself in Toyland, and thereafter adventures come thick and fast.

A CHRISTMAS WITH SANTA CLAUS by Frances Trego Montgomery

Santa carries two children to his home in his wonderful sleigh. They meet Mrs. Santa, are shown a royal good time, and then Santa brings them back when he makes his annual trip.

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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:

Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.

Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.

Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.