when i thought about it afterwards it seemed strange that i should not be allowed to dig holes when digging holes was what i was for. but every time i did it some one, william or the master or the mistress, came up and said “no, no, fritz! naughty dog! mustn’t dig up the ground.” it was most discouraging. (discouraging is a long word, and if you don’t know what it means i shan’t tell you. any one as old as you are ought to know.) freya never got in trouble that way. she didn’t seem to care much for doing the things i did, like digging for badgers in the orchard or for foxes on the front lawn. (i know now that i should not have expected to find a fox under the lawn, but then one place seemed as good as another.) freya liked to stay around the back door and look hungry and coax delia or cook to give her things to eat. when she wasn’t doing that she was most always asleep somewhere. she got very fat and lazy and it was all i could do to get her to go hunting with me. she wasn’t much good at hunting, anyway. she always got tired just when the fun began.

we used to go down to the pond and the brook and hunt frogs. frogs aren’t good to eat, but it is a lot of fun chasing them. you creep up on them very quietly along the edge of the pond and try to get them before they can jump back into the water. most always you miss them, because their eyes are in the wrong place, being on the top of their head, and they can see behind them. but sometimes you catch one. when you do you play with it awhile and let it go. freya, though, never would play with them. she said they were ugly-looking and she didn’t like the smell of them. girl-dogs are like that, though, sort of finicky and fussy about little things.

you wouldn’t think that such a silly, no-account animal as a frog could get a decent dog into trouble, would you? it can, though, and it did. and i was the dog. i’ll tell you about it because it may be a warning to you some time when you are hunting frogs.

one afternoon when it was very hot weather and we had all kept very quiet in the shade most of the day i got tired of keeping still and told freya to get up and we’d hunt frogs. she didn’t want to at all, being, as i’ve said, fat and lazy, but i nipped her ear and made her. so we trotted down the road and across the meadow, and when we were still a long way from the pond i saw a frog. i told freya to be quiet and then i stole ahead very softly and there he was in the grass just sitting and looking at me out of two big goggly eyes. he was quite different from any frog i’d ever seen before, being fatter and uglier and having more warts.

freya whispered, “oh, isn’t he horrid? don’t touch him, fritz!” but i wasn’t going to let any frog make faces at me and so i jumped for him and caught him. he tried to get away but i took him in my mouth and shook him just in play, of course, and then—oh dear, the most awful thing happened! the inside of my mouth got on fire and i dropped that frog and ran as hard as ever i could run to the pond and stuck my head right into the water!

but water didn’t do much good. my mouth and my tongue were hot and stingy and smarty and felt just as though they were burning up. i drank water and shook my head and pawed my mouth and howled just as loud as i could. freya ran around and asked what the matter was and got awfully excited. i was too busy trying to stop the pain to tell her what was wrong. besides, when i wasn’t gulping water or pawing at my mouth i was howling! father and mother heard me and came running down to the pond. but i couldn’t tell them what the matter was and so freya showed them the frog. i was still sitting up to my neck in the pond and howling frightfully when they came back.

“stop making that noise,” said father, “and keep your mouth in the water.”

so i did it and whimpered instead of howled and my mouth began to feel better. but my tongue was swollen all up and when i tried to talk i just made funny noises. after a while i crawled out of the pond and shook myself, feeling sort of ashamed because i had made such a fuss. but mother licked my face, and freya, who had been lying nearby whining, came running up and leaped about and barked. even father seemed sorry for me.then he took us back to the frog, which was still sitting where i had left him, and said:

“have a good look at him, children.”

so we looked at the frog and the frog blinked at us and seemed to be laughing. i growled and backed away from him.

“the next time you take a frog in your mouth,” said father, “be sure it is a frog and not a toad. toads are very unhealthy for dogs and that thing there is a toad. when you took him up he put poison in your mouth. it was a good thing you were near the pond, for water is the only thing i know of that will help. i heard of a dog once who was poisoned by a frog and there was no water around and so he ran for home. the poison made froth in his mouth and two-legged folks thought he was mad and a policeman tried to shoot him. luckily for him the policeman aimed wrong and the dog got away. now do you think you will know a toad the next time you see one?”

i said i was sure of it and then we went home and i crawled behind the flower-pots and stayed there a long time. i didn’t want any supper that day. you wouldn’t have wanted any, either, if your mouth had felt the way mine did. i think it is quite wrong to have things look so much alike as frogs and toads do; and flies and bees, too. how is a puppy to know?

when it was almost dark i crept out from behind the flower-pots and went to get a drink of water. ju-ju was outside, playing with a beetle, and when she saw me she grinned. she must have found out somehow about that toad. i hate cats.