The army was now in the very heart of the great forest and it took a lot of hard work to get the heavy wagons and cannon through the jungle. At times a path had to be chopped through the tall grass and all this had to be done as silently as possible, for the army was now likely to run across the wild men at any time. “I don’t want these wild men to know that we are in the neighborhood,” the General warned the troops. “It is much better to surprise them, and, besides, there is no telling just what they may do to the Lady of Fashion and the Poet if they discover that we have come to rescue them.”
The path the army now followed was so rough that little headway could be made and the General had to order a halt every now and then to rest the mice and men. During one of these stops the General fell into conversation with a pert-looking little ground robin who had hopped onto the limb of a bush near by.
“Do you know just where these wild men live?” asked the General.
“I’ll say I does,” answered the robin, who used very bad grammar. “I knows more about ’em than I wants to. The nasty little scalawags! These wild men get most all the seeds hereabouts and it’s all an honest bird can do to scratch out a bare living.”
“Could you guide us for a few days?” put in the General.
 
“Gracious!” tittered the bird, “you’d never reach the wild men’s place in a few days with all those wagons and mice. They live on an island. You’ll have to have a boat or somethin’ to carry you over the water.”
“I have heard that they live on an island,” said the General, “but I mean could you show us the way to the water where we would be nearest to the island?”
“Of course I could,” answered the bird; “that is, providin’ it would be worth my time.”
“We will pay you,” said the General. “We’ll give you six sunflower seeds for your work.”
“Make it six and a half seeds and I’ll do it,” cried the bird.
The General agreed and the bird hopped along ahead of the army, jumping onto a bush occasionally to point out the best p............