By the Roadside (Dunn and Troxell)/A Queer Pet

Johnny Brown was twelve years old. Ever since he had been old enough to play alone, he had been going out into the woods and fields and bringing home with him some of the living things he found there. Sometimes it was a turtle from the pond, and sometimes it was a bird that had hurt its wing and could not fly. Or it might be a caterpillar that had spun a cocoon about itself in the fall and then turned into a beautiful moth or butterfly in the spring.
Johnny picked the bat up carefully with a towel. He did not want to hurt it. Besides, he did not want it to nip his fingers. Then Johnny dropped the bat into a large glass jar in which he had kept tadpoles the month before, but which was now clean and dry. He tied a piece of cloth over the top of the jar and then went back to bed.
Next morning when Johnny woke up, ​the first thing he did was to look at his new pet. There it lay in the bottom of the jar, its wings very rumpled and only half spread. Poor little thing, it looked very unhappy indeed, as it lifted its funny little face, opened its mouth, and chattered its teeth.
Johnny thought the bat did not like to lie on the cold smooth glass, so he put a twig into the jar. This, he thou

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