Bobby and the Big Road  by Maud Lindsay

The Little Log Cabin

T HE same Big Road that passed the little brown house where Bobby and his mother and father lived ran by the ox-wagon man's house, too.

His house was made of logs piled upon each other, with plaster in the cracks to keep the wind out. There were only two rooms in the house, with a wide, open hall between them. The ox-wagon man and his wife and Johnny ate their breakfast, dinner, and supper in the hall; and while they were eating they could look right out into their flower garden. Red princes'-feathers and orange marigolds, purple bachelor's buttons, and pretty-by-nights that never open their cups till the sun is going down, grew in their garden. Touch-me-nots and hollyhocks and sweet spice pinks grew there, too.

The ox-wagon man said that his wife was a master hand with flowers. As for Johnny, he was a master hand with pets. He had a bantam hen, and a spotted calf, and the yellow dog whose name was Towser.

On the days when the ox-wagon man carried his kindling-wood to sell in town Johnny and Towser always went out to watch for him just as the pretty-by-nights opened their cups, and the sun was going down. The ox-wagon man said that he wouldn't feel as if he were getting home if Johnny were not waiting by the road to call to him, and Towser to bark.

One evening Johnny and Towser spied the ox-wagon man coming with a package in his hand. He held it up for them to see before he was in calling distance.

That was almost sure to mean that it was something for Johnny.

"Oh, Daddy, what have you brought me?" called Johnny.

"Bow-wow!" barked Towser.

Both of them hurried down the road to meet the ox-wagon man. They could not wait for him to come with slow Buck and Bright.

"It's a present from the little fellow I've been telling you about," called the ox-wagon man.

Johnny's fingers trembled so that he could scarcely open the package, but at last he got the string off and unfolded the paper. And there was the picture-book!

He sat down on the doorstone in front of the log cabin and looked at every picture in the book.

Which page do you think he liked best? The one with Bobby's picture on it.