One day Mrs. No-Tail, the frog lady, looked in the pantry to see what
there was to eat for dinner and there wasn’t a single thing. No, just
like Mother Hubbard’s cupboard, the pantry was bare, though there was a
bone in it that was being saved for some time when Peetie and Jackie Bow
Wow, the puppie-dog boys, might come on a visit.

“Oh, some one will have to go to the store to get something for supper,”
said Mrs. No-Tail. “Do you feel able to go, Grandpa Croaker?”

“Well, I could go,” said the old frog gentleman, in his deepest bass
voice, which sounded like the rumble of thunder over the hills and far
away, “but I promised I would go over and play a game of checkers with
Uncle Wiggily Longears. He has just finished the playhouse for Sammie
and Susie, and he wants to show me that. So I don’t see how I can go to
the store very well.”

“If Bully and Bawly were here they’d go,” said their mamma. “I wish
they’d come. Oh, here they are now,” she went on, as she looked out of
the window and saw the two frog boys coming home from school. “Hurry!”
she called to them. “I want you to go to the store.”

“All right,” they both answered, and they were so polite about it that
Mrs. No-Tail gave them each a penny, though, of course, they would have
gone without that, for they always liked to help their mamma.

“I want some sugar, and molasses, and bread, and butter, and some corn
meal, and bacon and watercress salad,” said the mother frog, and Bully
and Bawly each took a basket in which to carry the things. Then they
hopped on toward the store.