<p>6. Four Stories About
Dear, Dear Eyes</p>
<table border='0' width='500' cellpadding='2' cellspacing='0' summary='Contents' style='margin:1em auto'>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'><i>People</i>:</span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'>The White Horse Girl</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'>The Blue Wind Boy</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'>The Gray Man on Horseback</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'>Six Girls With Balloons</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'>Henry Hagglyhoagly</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'>Susan Slackentwist</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'>Two Wool Yarn Mittens</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'>Peter Potato Blossom Wishes</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'>Her Father</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'>Many Shoes</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'>Slippers</span></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align='right'><span style='font-size:small'> </span></td>
<td align='left'><span style='font-size:small'>A Slipper Moon</span></td>
</tr>
</table>
<div class='figcenter'>
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_159' name='page_159'></SPAN>159</span>
<ANTIMG src='images/g041.jpg' alt='' title='' /><br/>
<p class='caption' style='text-align:center;'>
<br/></p>
</div>
<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
<SPAN name='THE_WHITE_HORSE_GIRL_AND_THE_BLUE_WIND_BOY' id='THE_WHITE_HORSE_GIRL_AND_THE_BLUE_WIND_BOY'></SPAN>
<h2>The White Horse Girl and the Blue Wind<br/>Boy</h2></div>
<p>When the dishes are washed at night time
and the cool of the evening has come in summer
or the lamps and fires are lit for the night
in winter, then the fathers and mothers in the
Rootabaga Country sometimes tell the young
people the story of the White Horse Girl and
the Blue Wind Boy.</p>
<p>The White Horse Girl grew up far in the
west of the Rootabaga Country. All the years
she grew up as a girl she liked to ride horses.
Best of all things for her was to be straddle
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_160' name='page_160'></SPAN>160</span>
of a white horse loping with a loose bridle
among the hills and along the rivers of the west
Rootabaga Country.</p>
<p>She rode one horse white as snow, another
horse white as new washed sheep wool, and another
white as silver. And she could not tell
because she did not know which of these three
white horses she liked best.</p>
<p>“Snow is beautiful enough for me any time,”
she said, “new washed sheep wool, or silver
out of a ribbon of the new moon, any or either
is white enough for me. I like the white
manes, the white flanks, the white noses, the
white feet of all my ponies. I like the forelocks
hanging down between the white ears of
all three—my ponies.”</p>
<p>And living neighbor to the White Horse
Girl in the same prairie country, with the same
black crows flying over their places, was the
Blue Wind Boy. All the years he grew up as
a boy he liked to walk with his feet in the dirt
and the grass listening to the winds. Best of
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_161' name='page_161'></SPAN>161</span>
all things for him was to put on strong shoes
and go hiking among the hills and along the
rivers of the west Rootabaga Country, listening
to the winds.</p>
<p>There was a blue wind of day time, starting
sometimes six o’clock on a summer morning or
eight o’clock on a winter morning. And there
was a night wind with blue of summer stars
in summer and blue of winter stars in winter.
And there was yet another, a blue wind of the
times between night and day, a blue dawn and
evening wind. All three of these winds he
liked so well he could not say which he liked
best.</p>
<p>“The early morning wind is strong as the
prairie and whatever I tell it I know it believes
and remembers,” he said, “and the night wind
with the big dark curves of the night sky in it,
the night wind gets inside of me and understands
all my secrets. And the blue wind of the
times between, in the dusk when it is neither
night nor day, this is the wind that asks me
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_162' name='page_162'></SPAN>162</span>
questions and tells me to wait and it will bring
me whatever I want.”</p>
<p>Of course, it happened as it had to happen,
the White Horse Girl and the Blue Wind Boy
met. She, straddling one of her white horses,
and he, wearing his strong hiking shoes in the
dirt and the grass, it had to happen they should
meet among the hills and along the rivers of
the west Rootabaga Country where they lived
neighbors.</p>
<p>And of course, she told him all about the
snow white horse and the horse white as new
washed sheep wool and the horse white as a
silver ribbon of the new moon. And he told
her all about the blue winds he liked listening
to, the early morning wind, the night sky wind,
and the wind of the dusk between, the wind
that asked him questions and told him to wait.</p>
<p>One day the two of them were gone. On
the same day of the week the White Horse Girl
and the Blue Wind Boy went away. And their
fathers and mothers and sisters and brothers
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_163' name='page_163'></SPAN>163</span>
and uncles and aunts wondered about them and
talked about them, because they didn’t tell anybody
beforehand they were going. Nobody at
all knew beforehand or afterward why they
were going away, the real honest why of it.</p>
<p>They left a short letter. It read:</p>
<div class='blockquot'>
<p><i>To All Our Sweethearts, Old Folks and Young
Folks:</i></p>
<p><i>We have started to go where the white horses
come from and where the blue winds begin. Keep
a corner in your hearts for us while we are gone.</i></p>
</div>
<div class='ra'>
<p style='text-align: right; '><i>The White Horse Girl.</i></p>
<p style='text-align: right; '><i>The Blue Wind Boy.</i></p>
</div>
<p>That was all they had to guess by in the west
Rootabaga Country, to guess and guess where
two darlings had gone.</p>
<p>Many years passed. One day there came riding
across the Rootabaga Country a Gray Man
on Horseback. He looked like he had come a
long ways. So they asked him the question
they always asked of any rider who looked like
he had come a long ways, “Did you ever see the
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_164' name='page_164'></SPAN>164</span>
White Horse Girl and the Blue Wind Boy?”</p>
<p>“Yes,” he answered, “I saw them.</p>
<p>“It was a long, long ways from here I saw
them,” he went on, “it would take years and
years to ride to where they are. They were
sitting together and talking to each other, sometimes
singing, in a place where the land runs
high and tough rocks reach up. And they were
looking out across water, blue water as far as
the eye could see. And away far off the blue
waters met the blue sky.</p>
<p>“‘Look!’ said the Boy, ‘that’s where the
blue winds begin.’</p>
<p>“And far out on the blue waters, just a little
this side of where the blue winds begin, there
were white manes, white flanks, white noses,
white galloping feet.</p>
<p>“‘Look!’ said the Girl, ‘that’s where the
white horses come from.’</p>
<p>“And then nearer to the land came thousands
in an hour, millions in a day, white horses, some
white as snow, some like new washed sheep
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_165' name='page_165'></SPAN>165</span>
wool, some white as silver ribbons of the new
moon.</p>
<p>“I asked them, ‘Whose place is this?’ They
answered, ‘It belongs to us; this is what we
started for; this is where the white horses come
from; this is where the blue winds begin.’”</p>
<p>And that was all the Gray Man on Horseback
would tell the people of the west Rootabaga
Country. That was all he knew, he said,
and if there was any more he would tell it.</p>
<p>And the fathers and mothers and sisters and
brothers and uncles and aunts of the White
Horse Girl and the Blue Wind Boy wondered
and talked often about whether the Gray Man
on Horseback made up the story out of his head
or whether it happened just like he told it.</p>
<p>Anyhow this is the story they tell sometimes
to the young people of the west Rootabaga
Country when the dishes are washed at night
and the cool of the evening has come in summer
or the lamps and fires are lit for the night in
winter.</p>
<div class='figcenter'>
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_167' name='page_167'></SPAN>167</span>
<ANTIMG src='images/g042.jpg' alt='' title='' /><br/>
<p class='caption' style='text-align:center;'>
<br/></p>
</div>
<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
<SPAN name='WHAT_SIX_GIRLS_WITH_BALLOONS_TOLD_THE_GRAY_MAN_ON_HORSEBACK' id='WHAT_SIX_GIRLS_WITH_BALLOONS_TOLD_THE_GRAY_MAN_ON_HORSEBACK'></SPAN>
<h2>What Six Girls with Balloons Told the<br/>Gray Man on Horseback</h2></div>
<p>Once there came riding across the Rootabaga
Country a Gray Man on Horseback. He
looked as if he had come a long ways. He
looked like a brother to the same Gray Man on
Horseback who said he had seen the White
Horse Girl and the Blue Wind Boy.</p>
<p>He stopped in the Village of Cream Puffs.
His gray face was sad and his eyes were gray
deep and sad. He spoke short and seemed
strong. Sometimes his eyes looked as if they
were going to flash, but instead of fire they
filled with shadows.
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_168' name='page_168'></SPAN>168</span></p>
<p>Yet—he did laugh once. It did happen once
he lifted his head and face to the sky and let
loose a long ripple of laughs.</p>
<p>On Main Street near the Roundhouse of the
Big Spool, where they wind up the string that
pulls the light little town back when the wind
blows it away, there he was riding slow on his
gray horse when he met six girls with six fine
braids of yellow hair and six balloons apiece.
That is, each and every one of the six girls had
six fine long braids of yellow hair and each
braid of hair had a balloon tied on the end. A
little blue wind was blowing and the many
balloons tied to the braids of the six girls swung
up and down and slow and fast whenever the
blue wind went up and down and slow and fast.</p>
<p>For the first time since he had been in the
Village, the eyes of the Gray Man filled with
lights and his face began to look hopeful. He
stopped his horse when he came even with the
six girls and the balloons floating from the
braids of yellow hair.
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_169' name='page_169'></SPAN>169</span></p>
<p>“Where you going?” he asked.</p>
<p>“Who—hoo-hoo? Who—who—who?” the
six girls cheeped out.</p>
<p>“All six of you and your balloons, where you
going?”</p>
<p>“Oh, hoo-hoo-hoo, back where we came
from,” and they all turned their heads back and
forth and sideways, which of course turned all
the balloons back and forth and sideways because
the balloons were fastened to the fine
braids of hair which were fastened to their
heads.</p>
<p>“And where do you go when you get back
where you came from?” he asked just to be
asking.</p>
<p>“Oh, hoo-hoo-hoo, then we start out and go
straight ahead and see what we can see,” they
all answered just to be answering and they
dipped their heads and swung them up which
of course dipped all the balloons and swung
them up.</p>
<p>So they talked, he asking just to be asking
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_170' name='page_170'></SPAN>170</span>
and the six balloon girls answering just to be
answering.</p>
<p>At last his sad mouth broke into a smile and
his eyes were lit like a morning sun coming
up over harvest fields. And he said to them,
“Tell me why are balloons—that is what I want
you to tell me—why are balloons?”</p>
<p>The first little girl put her thumb under
her chin, looked up at her six balloons floating
in the little blue wind over her head, and said:
“Balloons are wishes. The wind made them.
The west wind makes the red balloons. The
south wind makes the blue. The yellow and
green balloons come from the east wind and the
north wind.”</p>
<p>The second little girl put her first finger next
to her nose, looked up at her six balloons dipping
up and down like hill flowers in a small
wind, and said:</p>
<p>“A balloon used to be a flower. It got tired.
Then it changed itself to a balloon. I listened
one time to a yellow balloon. It was talking
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_171' name='page_171'></SPAN>171</span>
to itself like people talk. It said, ‘I used to be
a yellow pumpkin flower stuck down close to the
ground, now I am a yellow balloon high up in
the air where nobody can walk on me and I can
see everything.’”</p>
<p>The third little girl held both of her ears like
she was afraid they would wiggle while she
slid with a skip, turned quick, and looking up at
her balloons, spoke these words:</p>
<p>“A balloon is foam. It comes the same as
soap bubbles come. A long time ago it used
to be sliding along on water, river water, ocean
water, waterfall water, falling and falling
over a rocky waterfall, any water you want.
The wind saw the bubble and picked it up and
carried it away, telling it, ‘Now you’re a balloon—come
along and see the world.’”</p>
<p>The fourth little girl jumped straight into
the air so all six of her balloons made a jump
like they were going to get loose and go to the
sky—and when the little girl came down from
her jump and was standing on her two feet
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_172' name='page_172'></SPAN>172</span>
with her head turned looking up at the six balloons,
she spoke the shortest answer of all, saying:</p>
<p>“Balloons are to make us look up. They help
our necks.”</p>
<p>The fifth little girl stood first on one foot,
then another, bent her head down to her knees
and looked at her toes, then swinging straight
up and looking at the flying spotted yellow and
red and green balloons, she said:</p>
<p>“Balloons come from orchards. Look for
trees where half is oranges and half is orange
balloons. Look for apple trees where half is
red pippins and half is red pippin balloons.
Look for watermelons too. A long green balloon
with white and yellow belly stripes is a
ghost. It came from a watermelon said good-by.”</p>
<p>The sixth girl, the last one, kicked the heel
of her left foot with the toe of her right foot,
put her thumbs under her ears and wiggled all
her fingers, then stopped all her kicking and
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_173' name='page_173'></SPAN>173</span>
wiggling, and stood looking up at her balloons
all quiet because the wind had gone down—and
she murmured like she was thinking to herself:</p>
<p>“Balloons come from fire chasers. Every
balloon has a fire chaser chasing it. All the
fire chasers are made terrible quick and when
they come they burn quick, so the balloon is
made light so it can run away terrible quick.
Balloons slip away from fire. If they don’t
they can’t be balloons. Running away from
fire keeps them light.”</p>
<p>All the time he listened to the six girls the
face of the Gray Man kept getting more hopeful.
His eyes lit up. Twice he smiled. And
after he said good-by and rode up the street,
he lifted his head and face to the sky and let
loose a long ripple of laughs.</p>
<p>He kept looking back when he left the Village
and the last thing he saw was the six girls
each with six balloons fastened to the six braids
of yellow hair hanging down their backs.</p>
<p>The sixth little girl kicked the heel of her
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_174' name='page_174'></SPAN>174</span>
left foot with the toe of her right foot and
said, “He is a nice man. I think he must be
our uncle. If he comes again we shall all ask
him to tell us where he thinks balloons come
from.”</p>
<p>And the other five girls all answered, “Yes,”
or “Yes, yes,” or “Yes, yes, yes,” real fast like
a balloon with a fire chaser after it.</p>
<div class='figcenter'>
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_175' name='page_175'></SPAN>175</span>
<ANTIMG src='images/g043.jpg' alt='' title='' /><br/>
<p class='caption' style='text-align:center;'>
<br/></p>
</div>
<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
<SPAN name='HOW_HENRY_HAGGLYHOAGLY_PLAYED_THE_GUITAR_WITH_HIS_MITTENS_ON' id='HOW_HENRY_HAGGLYHOAGLY_PLAYED_THE_GUITAR_WITH_HIS_MITTENS_ON'></SPAN>
<h2>How Henry Hagglyhoagly Played the<br/>Guitar with His Mittens On</h2></div>
<p>Sometimes in January the sky comes down
close if we walk on a country road, and turn
our faces up to look at the sky.</p>
<p>Sometimes on that kind of a January night
the stars look like numbers, look like the arithmetic
writing of a girl going to school and just
beginning arithmetic.</p>
<p>It was this kind of a night Henry Hagglyhoagly
was walking down a country road on
his way to the home of Susan Slackentwist, the
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_176' name='page_176'></SPAN>176</span>
daughter of the rutabaga king near the Village
of Liver-and-Onions. When Henry
Hagglyhoagly turned his face up to look at the
sky it seemed to him as though the sky came
down close to his nose, and there was a writing
in stars as though some girl had been doing
arithmetic examples, writing number 4 and
number 7 and 4 and 7 over and over again
across the sky.</p>
<p>“Why is it so bitter cold weather?” Henry
Hagglyhoagly asked himself, “if I say many
bitter bitters it is not so bitter as the cold wind
and the cold weather.”</p>
<p>“You are good, mittens, keeping my fingers
warm,” he said every once in a while to the wool
yarn mittens on his hands.</p>
<p>The wind came tearing along and put its
chilly, icy, clammy clamps on the nose of Henry
Hagglyhoagly, fastening the clamps like a nipping,
gripping clothes pin on his nose. He put
his wool yarn mittens up on his nose and rubbed
till the wind took off the chilly, icy, clammy
clamps. His nose was warm again; he said,
“Thank you, mittens, for keeping my nose
warm.”</p>
<div class='figcenter'>
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_177' name='page_177'></SPAN>177</span>
<SPAN name='linki_10' id='linki_10'></SPAN>
<ANTIMG src='images/g009.jpg' alt='' title='' /><br/>
<p class='caption' style='text-align:center;'>
It seemed to him as though the sky came down close<br/>
to his nose
<br/></p>
</div>
<div><span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_179' name='page_179'></SPAN>179</span></div>
<p>He spoke to his wool yarn mittens as though
they were two kittens or pups, or two little cub
bears, or two little Idaho ponies. “You’re my
chums keeping me company,” he said to the
mittens.</p>
<p>“Do you know what we got here under our
left elbow?” he said to the mittens, “I shall
mention to you what is here under my left
elbow.</p>
<p>“It ain’t a mandolin, it ain’t a mouth organ
nor an accordion nor a concertina nor a fiddle.
It is a guitar, a Spanish Spinnish Splishy guitar
made special.</p>
<p>“Yes, mittens, they said a strong young man
like me ought to have a piano because a piano
is handy to play for everybody in the house and
a piano is handy to put a hat and overcoat on or
books or flowers.</p>
<p>“I snizzled at ’em, mittens. I told ’em I
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_180' name='page_180'></SPAN>180</span>
seen a Spanish Spinnish Splishy guitar made
special in a hardware store window for eight
dollars and a half.</p>
<p>“And so, mittens—are you listening, mittens?—after
cornhusking was all husked and
the oats thrashing all thrashed and the rutabaga
digging all dug, I took eight dollars and a half
in my inside vest pocket and I went to the hardware
store.</p>
<p>“I put my thumbs in my vest pocket and I
wiggled my fingers like a man when he is proud
of what he is going to have if he gets it. And
I said to the head clerk in the hardware store,
‘Sir, the article I desire to purchase this evening
as one of your high class customers, the article
I desire to have after I buy it for myself, is the
article there in the window, sir, the Spanish
Spinnish Splishy guitar.’</p>
<p>“And, mittens, if you are listening, I am taking
this Spanish Spinnish Splishy guitar to go
to the home of Susan Slackentwist, the daughter
of the rutabaga king near the Village of
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_181' name='page_181'></SPAN>181</span>
Liver-and-Onions, to sing a serenade song.”</p>
<p>The cold wind of the bitter cold weather
blew and blew, trying to blow the guitar out
from under the left elbow of Henry Hagglyhoagly.
And the worse the wind blew the
tighter he held his elbow holding the guitar
where he wanted it.</p>
<p>He walked on and on with his long legs
stepping long steps till at last he stopped, held
his nose in the air, and sniffed.</p>
<p>“Do I sniff something or do I not?” he asked,
lifting his wool yarn mittens to his nose and
rubbing his nose till it was warm. Again he
sniffed.</p>
<p>“Ah hah, yeah, yeah, this is the big rutabaga
field near the home of the rutabaga king and
the home of his daughter, Susan Slackentwist.”</p>
<p>At last he came to the house, stood under the
window and slung the guitar around in front of
him to play the music to go with the song.</p>
<p>“And now,” he asked his mittens, “shall I
take you off or keep you on? If I take you off
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_182' name='page_182'></SPAN>182</span>
the cold wind of the bitter cold weather will
freeze my hands so stiff and bitter cold my
fingers will be too stiff to play the guitar. <i>I
will play with mittens on.</i>”</p>
<p>Which he did. He stood under the window
of Susan Slackentwist and played the guitar
with his mittens on, the warm wool yarn mittens
he called his chums. It was the first time
any strong young man going to see his sweetheart
ever played the guitar with his mittens
on when it was a bitter night with a cold wind
and cold weather.</p>
<p>Susan Slackentwist opened her window and
threw him a snow-bird feather to keep for a
keepsake to remember her by. And for years
afterward many a sweetheart in the Rootabaga
Country told her lover, “If you wish to marry
me let me hear you under my window on a
winter night playing the guitar with wool yarn
mittens on.”</p>
<p>And when Henry Hagglyhoagly walked
home on his long legs stepping long steps, he
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_183' name='page_183'></SPAN>183</span>
said to his mittens, “This Spanish Spinnish
Splishy guitar made special will bring us luck.”
And when he turned his face up, the sky came
down close and he could see stars fixed like
numbers and the arithmetic writing of a girl
going to school learning to write number 4 and
number 7 and 4 and 7 over and over.</p>
<div class='figcenter'>
<ANTIMG src='images/g044.jpg' alt='' title='' /><br/></div>
<div class='figcenter'>
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_185' name='page_185'></SPAN>185</span>
<ANTIMG src='images/g045.jpg' alt='' title='' /><br/>
<p class='caption' style='text-align:center;'>
<br/></p>
</div>
<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
<SPAN name='NEVER_KICK_A_SLIPPER_AT_THE_MOON' id='NEVER_KICK_A_SLIPPER_AT_THE_MOON'></SPAN>
<h2>Never Kick a Slipper at the Moon</h2></div>
<p>When a girl is growing up in the Rootabaga
Country she learns some things to do, some
things <i>not</i> to do.</p>
<p>“Never kick a slipper at the moon if it is
the time for the Dancing Slipper Moon when
the slim early moon looks like the toe and the
heel of a dancer’s foot,” was the advice Mr.
Wishes, the father of Peter Potato Blossom
Wishes, gave to his daughter.</p>
<p>“Why?” she asked him.</p>
<p>“Because your slipper will go straight up, on
and on to the moon, and fasten itself on the
moon as if the moon is a foot ready for dancing,”
said Mr. Wishes.
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_186' name='page_186'></SPAN>186</span></p>
<p>“A long time ago there was one night when
a secret word was passed around to all the shoes
standing in the bedrooms and closets.</p>
<p>“The whisper of the secret was: ‘To-night
all the shoes and the slippers and the boots of
the world are going walking without any feet
in them. To-night when those who put us on
their feet in the daytime, are sleeping in their
beds, we all get up and walk and go walking
where we walk in the daytime.’</p>
<p>“And in the middle of the night, when the
people in the beds were sleeping, the shoes and
the slippers and the boots everywhere walked
out of the bedrooms and the closets. Along the
sidewalks on the streets, up and down stairways,
along hallways, the shoes and slippers and the
boots tramped and marched and stumbled.</p>
<p>“Some walked pussyfoot, sliding easy and
soft just like people in the daytime. Some
walked clumping and clumping, coming down
heavy on the heels and slow on the toes, just
like people in the daytime.
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_187' name='page_187'></SPAN>187</span></p>
<p>“Some turned their toes in and walked
pigeon-toe, some spread their toes out and held
their heels in, just like people in the daytime.
Some ran glad and fast, some lagged slow and
sorry.</p>
<p>“Now there was a little girl in the Village
of Cream Puffs who came home from a dance
that night. And she was tired from dancing
round dances and square dances, one steps and
two steps, toe dances and toe and heel dances,
dances close up and dances far apart, she was
so tired she took off only one slipper, tumbled
onto her bed and went to sleep with one slipper
on.</p>
<p>“She woke up in the morning when it was
yet dark. And she went to the window and
looked up in the sky and saw a Dancing Slipper
Moon dancing far and high in the deep blue sea
of the moon sky.</p>
<p>“‘Oh—what a moon—what a dancing slipper
of a moon!’ she cried with a little song to
herself.
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_188' name='page_188'></SPAN>188</span></p>
<p>“She opened the window, saying again, ‘Oh!
what a moon!’—and kicked her foot with the
slipper on it straight toward the moon.</p>
<p>“The slipper flew off and flew up and went
on and on and up and up in the moonshine.</p>
<p>“It never came back, that slipper. It was
never seen again. When they asked the girl
about it she said, ‘It slipped off my foot and
went up and up and the last I saw of it the slipper
was going on straight to the moon.’”</p>
<p>And these are the explanations why fathers
and mothers in the Rootabaga Country say to
their girls growing up, “Never kick a slipper
at the moon if it is the time of the Dancing
Slipper Moon when the ends of the moon look
like the toe and the heel of a dancer’s foot.”
<span class='pagenum'><SPAN id='page_189' name='page_189'></SPAN>189</span></p>
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