"My little tame robin Just told me that you Have left in a tree, Your thousand league shoe." "That's right," answered the dwarf. "Will you sell me the one you are making?" "What will you give me for it?" asked Jim Cobbler, waxing his thread and drawing it carefully through the holes he had just punched in the leather. "Rubies and diamonds," answered the dwarf, taking a bag from his pocket. "Two diamonds and three rubies, five precious stones, the like of which you have never seen." "I will finish the boot in a short time," answered Jim Cobbler, "and then you may try it on." And he set to work, and pretty soon, not so very long, it was finished. And would you believe it, it fitted the dwarf perfectly and matched his other boot exactly. And as soon as he had paid for it, he walked outside and said in a singing way: "Boots, boots, I would be A thousand miles across the sea." And, whisk! away he went and was lost to sight before Uncle John Hare could get out his spyglass. "Well, well," laughed the wonderful shoemaker, coming to the door and shading his eyes with his hand, "it didn't take him long to walk away. Ha! ha! My boots are better than airships." I guess he thought he had done a good day's work, and maybe he had, for two diamonds and three rubies are a fair price for one boot, although it may have a stride of a thousand leagues, more or less. And just you wait until you hear what happens in the next story. FIREFLY LANTERNS Twinkle, twinkle, firefly, Like a diamond in the sky. Well, it was mighty lucky that this firefly had her tiny lantern along with her, for I don't know how the two little rabbits would have reached home if she hadn't lighted the way for them, for the Bunnymobile lantern had gone out, you see. "We must buy some new ones," said the old gentleman bunny. "We may be arrested any night, and that would be most unpleasant." So the next morning he and Little Jack Rabbit started off for Bunnyville and by and by, after a while, they crossed the bridge that spanned Rabbit River, which wasn't really much wider than a little brook, and stopped before a hardware store. "What kind of lanterns have you?" asked Uncle John Hare of the fat Turkey Gobble who kept the store. "We have Jack lanterns, and miners' lamps, and Japanese lanterns, and----" "That'll do," said the little bunny, "let's see them." And after looking at this and looking at that the old gentleman rabbit picked out two Jack Lanterns. "These will look scrumptious," he said. "I don't believe another car in town will have one." And then they started off again down the road to see little Ben Meadow. Now little Ben Meadow lived in a round house. His first name was Ben and his last name was Mouse.