comin’ ’round heah pretty soon and maybe I can done cotch ’em and extinguish myself.’”

“Distinguish yourself,” corrected the General.

“Yes, sah,” continued the little colored fellow. “Well, I done crawl under a leaf and waited. I done wait fo’ a long time, but pretty soon I done see fo’ of de wild men come sneakin’ along and pretty soon dey done make right fo’ de bottle. Three of ’em done crawl in de bottle and one of ’em done squat down outside by de openin’ of de bottle kinda like he was guardin’.

“‘By de great corn pone,’ I says, ‘if a couple of de Teenie Weenies was heah we could done cotch dese scalawags.’

“Pretty soon I thought to myself, ‘Why don’t you ketch ’em yourself?’ So I done sneaked out up behind de wild man what was guardin’ de mouth of de bottle and done cracked him on de head with de butt of my gun. I didn’t hit very hard—just hard enough to stun him a little—and den I grabbed a cork dat was layin’ near by and stuffed it into de bottle and braced it with a stick of wood so the scalawags couldn’t get out. I then picked up de wild man I had knocked down and brought him into camp and dat’s all.”

“A very brave deed, sergeant,” said the General. “And I will immediately send out a squad of men to bring your prisoners into camp.”

The Old Soldier was ordered to take a squad of men and go after the prisoners, while the Doctor was sent to dress the bump on the head of the wild man that Gogo had knocked down. After a great deal of work the soldiers managed to pull the three wild men out of the bottle and when they were brought into camp they were securely tied to a strong blade of grass.

Chapter Seventeen THE DUNCE IN DISGRACE

“Why are you making such a fine camp here, General?” asked the Doctor, as he noticed that the Teenie Weenies continued to improve the camp. “Won’t we have to move on pretty soon if the wild men do not attack?”

“We’ll stay right here for some time,” answered the General, taking off his tiny sword and laying it on the table which stood in front of his tent. “We are within striking distance of the wild men’s village, so the aviator tells me, and we’ll use this camp for our base of operations.”

“General,” said the Cook, saluting the commander of the Teenie Weenie army, “I beg your pardon, but there is something I must tell you.”

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