“And how are you going to get him in?” said Lucy.
“O, I shall leave one stake out, till I get him in,” answered Royal. “We can drive him in with long sticks. But you must not mind me; you must watch the turtle, or he will get away.”
So Royal began to drive the stakes. Presently Lucy said that the turtle was stirring. Royal looked, but he found he was not going away, and so he went on with his work; and before long he had a place fenced in with his stakes, about as large round as a boy’s hoop. It was all fenced, excepting in one place, which he left open to get the turtle through.
The two children then contrived, by means of two long sticks, which Royal cut from among the bushes, to get the turtle into his prison. The poor reptile hardly knew what to make of such treatment. He went tumbling along through the water, half pushed, half driven.
When he was fairly in, Royal drove down the last stake in the vacant space which had been left. The turtle swam about, pushing his head against the bars in several places; and when he found that he could not get out, he remained quietly in the middle.
“There,” said Royal, “that will do. Now I wish Miss Anne would come down here, and see him. I should like to see what she would say.”
Miss Anne did come down after a while; and when the children saw her descending the path, they called out to her aloud to come there and see. She came, and when she reached the bank opposite to the turtle pen, she stood still for a few minutes, looking at it, with a smile of curiosity and interest upon her face; but she did not speak a word.