But to all Winkie’s calls there came no answer from any of her family. She did not see Blinkie nor Blunk, and her father and mother might have been a hundred miles away for all she knew.
Once, indeed, she met another woodchuck, a fat, lazy old man of a ground-hog, and at first Winkie thought he might be her grandfather. But he was not, and this woodchuck knew nothing of Winkie’s family.
“But I can tell you where to get a good meal of clover,” said the lazy old ground-hog.
“Where?” eagerly asked Winkie.
“Go straight along the way you are headed, and on the edge of the woods you will see a field,” was the answer. “Crawl under the fence and you’ll find some clover.”
Winkie thanked him, and waddled on. She found the clover just where she had been told it would be and ate her fill. She ate so much she felt sleepy, and about sunset she curled up in a hollow log and slept all night.
When morning came Winkie started on her travels again. By this time she was getting rather used to wandering around alone. Not that she liked it, but it was the best she could do. She would have been very glad to have had a game of tag with Blinkie or Blunk, but this was not to happen for a long time.
That noon Winkie found a field where a farmer was raising some carrots, and, as she saw no man in sight, and no dogs, and did not hear any dogs barking, Winkie went into the field, dug up some carrots, and ate them. It was because of this that, a few days later, something dreadful happened to Winkie.
For she liked the carrots so much that she looked for more everywhere she went. One day Winkie, who was very hungry at the time, saw another carrot—a large yellow one—in a fence corner.
“Some one must have left this carrot here specially for me!” thought Winkie. “How kind of him!”