"Well, he reached over the fence, and lifted the latch with his teeth, that's how he opened the gate; and he shut it by backing up against it till it latched itself. Then he pulled out the wooden pin of the barn-door, and it swung open by its own weight—see?"
"Well, pa had a horse that slipped his halter and shoved up the cover of the oat-bin, when he got hungry in the night and wanted a lunch," said Sammy; "and I read about a horse the other day which turned the water-tap when he wanted a drink, and pulled the stopper out of the pipe over the oat-bin, just as he 'd seen the coachman do, so the oats would come down, and"—
"But really now," Ruth Elliot, interrupted, "interesting and wonderful as all this is, we must stop somewhere. I have another story to tell you, about a minister's horse, but it can wait over till next week. Lay aside your work, girls; it is past five o'clock."
CHAPTER IX.
TUFTY AND THE SPARROWS.
Florence Austin came early to the Society the next Wednesday afternoon, and found Miss Ruth on the piazza,
"I am glad to see you, Florence," she said. "I was just wishing for a helper. Mollie and Susie have gone on an errand, and I am alone in the house, and here is a whole family in trouble that I can't relieve."
"What is the matter?" said the little girl.
"A baby bird has fallen out of the nest, and I am too lame to-day to venture down the steps; and papa and mamma are in great distress, and the babies in the nest half-starved, and can't have their dinner because the old birds dare not leave poor chippy a moment lest some stray cat should get him. See the little thing down there in the grass just under the woodbine!"