Chapter V: Part 5

"I wonder whom they are going to bring back?" thought the rich cat up the tree. And she could not help laughing a little as she thought how strange she must look. "The mouse servant and rat chauffeur will be surprised when they come back and see me here," thought the cat.

One little puppy dog boy ran away, while the other remained on guard at the foot of the tree.

"May I come down?" asked the cat lady.

"No, indeed!" growled the dog, though he did not speak impolitely. "You must stay up there!"

"Dear me!" thought the cat lady. "This is quite an unexpected adventure!"

All of a sudden she saw the puppy at the foot of the tree jump up. At the same time there was a rustling in the bushes, and along came the other puppy, with an old gentleman rabbit, who wore a tall silk hat, who had a pair of glasses on his pink, twinkling nose and who walked with a red, white and blue striped rheumatism crutch.

"There she is, Uncle Wiggily!" barked a puppy dog. "We saw her in your woods, and chased her up a tree until you could look at her. Maybe she is the Woozie Wolf or the Fuzzy Fox, dressed up like a cat."

"Indeed I am not," said the rich pussy lady up the tree. "I am the Rich Mrs. Cat, and my auto has broken. When my mousie servant girl and the rat gentleman who drives my car return, they will tell you I never harm rabbits. But are you Uncle Wiggily Longears?" she asked.

"Yes," answered the bunny, "I am. And I know you, Mrs. Cat. I heard about you from the poor dog. I am very sorry Jackie and Peetie Bow Wow chased you up a tree. They meant no harm."

"I am sure they did not," mewed the cat politely.

"But they are always on the lookout so nothing will happen to me," went on Uncle Wiggily. "I would get up and help you down, only I can't climb a tree."

"Oh, I can easily get down," said the cat lady, and she did, though her rich clothes were rather ruffled. But she had plenty of money to buy more. So don't worry about that.

"Make yourself at home in these woods--the animal folk call them mine," said Uncle Wiggily kindly. "I am sorry you had this trouble. Now I must hop away. I hope your auto will soon be mended. Come, Jackie and Peetie, if you want to help me."

"Where are you going?" asked the rich cat.

"To help a poor cat family," said Uncle Wiggily. "The cat gentleman of the house has been out of work a long time, his wife is ill and he has a number of little kittens. I was on my way to see the family when Jackie came to tell me you were up a tree."

"Well, I'm down the tree now," laughed the rich cat lady. "And will you please let me help this poor family? I have a lot of money--see!" and she showed a purse full of golden leaves which the animal folk use for money. "I can buy them food, and if Mr. Cat wants work, let him take my auto, after it is fixed, and use it for a jitney."

"What!" cried Uncle Wiggily. "Aren't you going to use that fine car any more? All it needs is a new wheel."

"Give it to the poor cat," was the answer. "I am never going to ride in it again. I feel so much better since I came to the woods--and climbed a tree--that I am going to live here for the rest of my life. I'll buy a hollow stump bungalow near you, Uncle Wiggily. I know, now, I am going to be very happy."

"Well, you will make the poor cat family happy, at any rate," said Mr. Longears.

"And to make others happy is to be happy yourself," mewed the rich cat lady.

She went with Uncle Wiggily, Jackie and Peetie to the home of the poor cat family, and when the worried cat gentleman heard that he was to have the auto for a jitney, with which he could make money, he was so glad he almost stood on his head. And his wife and the kitten children were glad also.

When the rat gentleman chauffeur and the mousie servant girl came back, in another auto, to take the rich lady home, she said:

"I am going to stay with Uncle Wiggily. From now on I am going to live in the woods and be happy and poor."

"Oh, my!" squeaked the mousie servant. "Just fancy!"

"I never heard of such a thing," said the rat gentleman. "You had much better come home and live as you did before."

But the cat lady would not change her mind, and she built herself a bungalow near Uncle Wiggily's, and lived there happily forever after.

So from this we may learn, if we will, that when a pail leaks it is best to have it mended. And if the hand-organ monkey doesn't take the squeak out of the rubber ball to make a tin horn for the rag doll, the next story will be about Uncle Wiggily and the horse.

STORY XXIII

UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE HORSE

Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy, the muskrat lady housekeeper for Uncle Wiggily Longears, the bunny rabbit gentleman, once baked a cherry pie, of which Mr. Longears was very fond. In fact, Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy baked _two_ pies.

One she put upon the shelf for Uncle Wiggily's supper. The other pie Nurse Jane wrapped in a clean napkin, put it in a basket, and then she said:

"Come on, Uncle Wiggily. We will take this pie to Grandfather Goosey Gander."

"That will be fine!" exclaimed Uncle Wiggily. So he set off with Nurse Jane, over the fields and through the woods. "And perhaps we may have an adventure," said the bunny gentleman, hopeful-like.

"Well, if we do," spoke Nurse Jane, "I hope nothing happens to this cherry pie. I baked one for you, and the other especially for Grandpa Goosey. I shouldn't like the Fuzzy Fox, nor yet the Woozie Wolf, to get this pie."

"Nor I," said Uncle Wiggily. "And I don't believe Grandpa Goosey would, either."

The rabbit gentleman and Nurse Jane hopped along together, until, after a while, Uncle Wiggily saw a horse in a field.

"Look at that poor horse!" said the bunny gentleman, coming to a stop, and peeping over the top of his pink, twinkling nose. "There he stands, all day long, with nothing to eat but grass."

"What else would he eat?" asked Nurse Jane, suspiciously.

"I don't s'pose he ever had a cherry pie," went on Uncle Wiggily reflective-like. "Poor horse! Never had any cherry pie!"

"Wiggy!" exclaimed Nurse Jane, as she took a firmer hold of the basket handle. "If you are thinking of giving Grandpa Goosey's pie to that horse----"

"Well, that's just what I'm thinking of," answered Mr. Longears. "Here, Nurse Jane, please give me that pie. You may run back home and get the one you were saving for me to give to Grandpa Goosey. I'll call this pie mine, and I'm going to give it to the horse."

"Well, I never in all my born days," exclaimed Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy, "heard the like of that!"

Still she knew Uncle Wiggily meant to be kind, so she gave the bunny rabbit gentleman the basket with the pie inside, and started back for the hollow stump bungalow to get the other.

The bunny rabbit certainly was not selfish, whatever else he was.

"Hello, Horsie!" exclaimed Uncle Wiggily, as he hopped through the field where the big animal was eating.

"Hello," answered the horse. "Oh, it's Uncle Wiggily!" he went on, as he stopped cropping the grass and looked up.

"Did you ever eat a cherry pie?" asked the bunny rabbit, beginning to take the cloth off the one in the basket.

"Cherry pie? I don't believe I ever did," slowly answered the horse. "Cherry pie! Hum! No, I never tasted any."

"Wouldn't you like to?" asked the bunny. "I should think you would get tired of eating grass all day long."

"Well, grass is my food, and I like it," neighed the horse. "But I like some oats once in a while, and some bran. Yes, and I think I'd like some cherry pie, also."

"Here! Take this one! Nurse Jane can bake more!" said generous Uncle Wiggily, and he held out the pie.

"Oh, my! That's a fine one!" whinnied the horse. "That looks most delicious."

"And it tastes as delicious as it looks," went on the bunny. "I know Nurse Jane's pies. Take a bite!"

The horse did. One bit was all that was needed to enable him to eat the whole pie, for it was only rabbit size, of course, not as large as the pies your mother bakes.

"Um!" said the horse, as the red cherry juice ran down his lips. "That was a good pie! I could eat more!"

"I'm sorry, but that's the only one I have," spoke Uncle Wiggily. "Nurse Jane has gone to get mine, that she put in the cupboard, to give to Grandpa Goosey. But to-morrow I'll have her bake you a large pie."

Just then Nurse Jane came along, with the other pie in the basket, and Uncle Wiggily said:

"The horse ate that cherry pie, Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy, and liked it very much. I have told him you'd bake him a larger one."

"Well, I s'pose I can," said the muskrat lady, looking at Uncle Wiggily in a funny way. "I s'pose I can."

"You are very kind," neighed the horse. "If I could only do you some favor----"

But just then, all of a sudden, out from behind a bush jumped the bad old Woozie Wolf.

"Ah ha!" howled the Wolf. "This is the time I have caught Nurse Jane as well as Uncle Wiggily. I shall have four ears to nibble to-day!" and he looked hungrily at the bunny and muskrat lady.

"Do you mean to say you are going to hurt good, kind Uncle Wiggily, who has just given me a cherry pie?" asked the horse quickly.

"Of course I am!" growled the Wolf. "He gave me no pie! I'm going to nibble the bunny!"

"Well, I just won't let you!" said the horse.

"How are you going to stop me?" asked the Wolf.

"Well, I have big teeth," the horse said. "They are not as sharp as yours, for they do not need to be so that I may crop the grass. But I can bite you with them, just the same."

"Ho! Ho!" sneered the Wolf. "Two can play at that game! I can bite worse than you."

"That's so, he can," whispered Uncle Wiggily to the horse. "Be careful!"

"Well, then I'll _kick_!" said the horse. "I'll rear up on my front legs and kick you with my hind ones, Mr. Wolf, if you hurt Uncle Wiggily."

"But you have no sharp toe-nails, such as I have!" growled the Wolf. "I'll scratch you with my toe-nails if you kick me."

"That's right--he will!" whispered Nurse Jane.

"I'm afraid you cannot save us," sadly said the bunny gentleman to the kind horse.

"Yes, I can!" suddenly neighed the horse. "This Wolf can do some things better than I, but he cannot run as fast. Quick! Jump up on my back, Uncle Wiggily and Nurse Jane. I'll gallop and trot, I'll gallop and trot and I'll gallop and trot--until I take you far away from this bad animal!"

"Don't you dare take Uncle Wiggily away from me!" howled the Wolf, for well he knew he could not run as fast as the horse.

"Yes, I shall! I'll save Uncle Wiggily!" whinnied the horse. "Up on my back! Quick!" he called to the bunny and Nurse Jane.

Up they leaped, before the Wolf could get them. Then the horse galloped and trotted, galloped and trotted and galloped and trotted, until the Wolf was left far, far behind. And, oh, how angry that Wolf was! And how he howled! I wish you could have heard him.

No, on second thought, it is just as well you didn't hear him. It was not very nice howling.

"There! Now you are safe, Uncle Wiggily and Nurse Jane," said the horse, as he stopped galloping and trotting, away over on the far side of the field, far, far from the Wolf.

"Thank you for saving us," spoke the bunny, as he and Nurse Jane slid off the horsie's back.

"I'll bake you the largest cherry pie that ever was," promised the muskrat lady, "just as soon as I take this one to Grandpa Goosey."

And she made such a large pie that it took the horse forty 'leven bites to eat it.

So everything came out all right, you see. And if the postman doesn't try to slip a letter through the slot in the baby's penny bank, and make the five cent piece jump over the dollar bill, I'll tell you next about Uncle Wiggily and the cow.

STORY XXIV

UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE COW

This is a story about Uncle Wiggily and the cow. Not the cow with the crumpled horn, nor yet the one that jumped over the moon, when the dish ran away with the spoon.

This was a sort of a red cow which ate green grass and gave white milk that was churned into yellow butter to be eaten on brown bread. There is no use asking me about all those colors for I don't know--nobody knows. They're just there, and that's all there is about it.

Now for the story.

One day the bunny rabbit gentleman was hopping over the fields and through the woods on his way to the store for Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy. He was going to get his muskrat lady housekeeper a jug of molasses so Nurse Jane might make a cake.

Uncle Wiggily hopped on and on, wondering if he would have an adventure that day, and he was thinking how good the molasses cake would taste when, all of a sudden, down in a field he saw a red cow. Not exactly red like a rose, you understand, or red like a barn, but still somewhat between those colors--a brownish-red, I suppose it would be called.

"Moo! Moo! Moo!" called the cow, in such mournful tones that Uncle Wiggily right away said:

"Something must be the matter! I'm going down and see if I can help that poor cow!"

Down into the meadow hopped the bunny rabbit gentleman, and when he reached the cow he looked at her and she looked at him, and the bunny asked:

"What is the matter, Mrs. Cow?"

"Oh," was the sad answer, "I've lost the cud that I always chew, and now I don't know what to do! I'm so upset I'm sure I'll give sour milk to-night, instead of sweet!"

"That would be too bad," Uncle Wiggily remarked. "This cud of yours--may I ask what it is?"

"Well, it isn't gum, as many boys and girls suppose, when they see me chewing," spoke the cow lady. "My cud is a bunch of grass, which I crop and pull up by winding my tongue about it, for I haven't two sets of teeth as have many animals. I only have teeth on my upper jaw. On my lower jaw I have no teeth, but the gums are very hard so I can chew grass, and that is what makes my cud. I only chew the grass a little bit, when I first pull it from the meadow. I swallow it down into my first stomach, and, when I have more time, I bring the cud of grass up into my mouth and chew it as long as I please, so it will be good for me to put into my last stomach."

"Well, well!" exclaimed Uncle Wiggily in surprise. "So you have two stomachs and only one set of teeth."

"Yes," went on the cow, "but what is worrying me now is to know whether I lost my cud of grass in the meadow, after I had chewed on it a while, or whether it slipped down into my last stomach before it was time."

"What will happen if it did?" asked Uncle Wiggily.

"I'm afraid I'll have indigestion," the cow lady answered. "And that will make my milk bad and sour. Oh, dear! I wish I knew where my cud was!"

"How did you come to lose it--or miss it?" asked the bunny.

"Why, I was watching Bully and Bawly No-Tail, the two frog boys, hopping down by the brook," the cow lady said. "They were playing leap-toad, you know--or, perhaps, it was leap-frog; and Bully made such a funny jump over Bawly's back that I laughed right out loud. I was chewing my cud at the time, and when I stopped laughing I missed it. Now whether I swallowed it, or whether it dropped in the brook, I don't know. Isn't that dreadful?"

"Can't you tell by the way you feel--inside, you know," asked the bunny, "what became of your cud?"

"Not for some little time," answered the cow lady, "and then it will be too late. Oh, if only I could find my cud somewhere in this meadow I'd know I hadn't swallowed it, and I'd be all right."

"I know just how you feel," said Uncle Wiggily. "Once, when Susie Littletail, the rabbit, was a tiny baby, her mother gave her a big cake spoon to play with. She went out of the room, leaving Susie to play with the spoon, and when she came back it was gone."

"What was gone?" asked the cow lady, "Susie or the spoon?"

"The spoon," answered the bunny gentleman. "And as Susie was too little to talk, and tell where it was, her mother didn't know whether she had hidden, or dropped the spoon somewhere, or whether she had swallowed it."

"Just fancy!" mooed the cow. "How exciting! But what happened?"

"Why, finally," said Uncle Wiggily, "after I had hopped over to help, we found the spoon behind the piano where Susie had thrown it. Then we knew she hadn't swallowed it."

"And if I could find my cud I'd know I hadn't swallowed _that_," sadly said the cow lady.

"I'll help you look," offered Uncle Wiggily. "I'm a pretty good hopper, and I'll hop around the meadow and look for your cud of half-chewed grass."

The bunny set down his molasses jug and began looking all over the meadow for the cud. And the cow helped, but she could not move very fast. Besides, she was worried and nervous.

"Here it is! I've found it!" suddenly called Uncle Wiggily, and there on the grass, near the brook where the frog boys had been leaping, was the cow lady's cud.

"Oh, how glad I am to get it back!" she mooed as she began to chew it again. "Now my milk will be nice and sweet. You have done me a great favor, Uncle Wiggily. I hope I may do you the same some day."

"Pray do not mention it," said the bunny politely, as he hopped on with his molasses jug. "It was just a little adventure for me."

Uncle Wiggily hopped on to the store, had the jug filled with molasses and then went to his hollow stump bungalow.

"Well, you were gone a long time," said Nurse Jane. "I have been waiting to make the ginger cake."

"I had to help a cow lady find her lost cud," said the bunny.

"Oh, Wiggy! What next!" laughed Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy. "Helping cow ladies! Oh! Oh!"

"That's all right," the bunny said. "Perhaps some day a cow lady may help us."

"I don't see how she can," spoke Nurse Jane, as she started to make the cake. But pretty soon she called to the bunny who had gone to sit outside on a bench and warm his rheumatism in the sun.

"Oh, Wiggy!" exclaimed Nurse Jane. "I can't get the cork out of the molasses jug. It's in so tight! I can't pull it out, and if I break it, and push it inside, then the molasses won't run out. Oh, what a lot of trouble!"

"Let me try!" offered the bunny. But he could not get the cork out of the molasses jug either, not even with his red, white and blue striped rheumatism crutch.

"I guess I'll have to break the jug!" said the bunny at last.

"Oh, don't do that!" spoke a voice behind him, and, turning, Uncle Wiggily saw the cow lady. "I am on my way home to be milked," she mooed, "and I saw you in trouble, so I came over. What's wrong?"

"We can't get the cork out of the molasses jug," answered Uncle Wiggily.

"Perhaps I can," said Mrs. Cow. "Please let me try."

"We have a corkscrew somewhere," remarked Nurse Jane, "but I can't find it."

"I shall not need it," went on the cow.

Then with one of her long, sharp horns she easily pried the cork out of the molasses jug, breaking nothing and making it very easy for Nurse Jane to pour out the sweet stuff for the ginger cake.

"Thank you, Mrs. Cow," said Uncle Wiggily, as the milk lady animal went on her way.

"Pray don't mention it!" mooed the cow. "Now we are even, as far as favors go!"

Uncle Wiggily looked at Nurse Jane, and the muskrat lady smiled at the bunny gentleman.

"You were right, Wiggly," spoke Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy. "I never thought a cow could help anyone, but this shows how little I know."

"That's all right!" laughed the bunny. "Mistakes will happen!"

So once again everything came out all right for the bunny gentleman, you see, and if the pussy cat doesn't make a popcorn ball out of snow, for the puppy dog to play bean bag with, you shall next hear about Uncle Wiggily and the camping boys.

STORY XXV

UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE CAMPING BOYS

"Oh, Uncle Wiggily! What you think?" cried Baby Bunty one day, as she hopped up to the rabbit gentleman, who was pulling the weeds out of his carrot garden.

"What I think, Baby Bunty?" repeated Mr. Longears, smiling down one side of his pink, twinkling nose. "Well, I think lots of things, my little rabbit girl. But if you think I'm going to play _tag_ with you this morning you are wrong. I haven't time!"

"Oh, I don't want you to play tag!" exclaimed Baby Bunty, though she was such a lively little tyke that she nearly always wanted Uncle Wiggily to play a game of some sort. "But there's something over in the woods," she went on. "What you think it is?" and she was quite excited.

"Something over in the woods, Baby Bunty?" asked Uncle Wiggily, as he looked at one of his carrots to see if the point needed sharpening; but it didn't, I'm glad to say. "Well, what's in the woods, Baby Bunty; the Fox, the Skeezicks or the Pipsisewah?"

"Neither one, Uncle Wiggily," answered the little rabbit girl. "But there's a lot of those funny animals you call 'boys,' and they're making a snow house, and maybe they'll try to catch you, or me or Nurse Jane," and Baby Bunty looked quite worried.

"A _snow_ house this time of year! Tut! Tut! Nonsense!" laughed Uncle Wiggily. "This is summer and there isn't any snow with which to make houses."

"Well, these boys, in the woods, are making a _white_ house, anyhow, Uncle Wiggily," spoke the little rabbit girl, who once had lived in a hollow stump, before she came to visit the bunny gentleman. "It's a white house, and there's a lot of boys, and they're cutting down wood, and making a fire and boiling a kettle of water and oh, they're doing lots of things! I thought I'd better come and tell you."

"Hum!" said Uncle Wiggily, straightening up to rest his back, which ached from pulling the weeds out of his garden. "Yes, perhaps it is a good thing you told me, Baby Bunty. I'll go have a look at the white house the boys are putting up."

Uncle Wiggily and Baby Bunty hopped through the woods, and soon they were near that side of the forest nearest the village where real boys and girls lived. Through the green trees gleamed something white, on which the sun shone as brightly as it does at the seashore.

"There's the house," said Baby Bunty, pointing with her paw off among the trees.

"Ho! That isn't exactly a _house_!" Uncle Wiggily told the little rabbit girl. "That's a white tent, and those boys must be camping there. Boys like to come to the woods to camp in the summer. We'll hop a little closer and listen. Then we can tell what they are doing."

"We mustn't let 'em see us!" whispered Baby Bunty. "Oh, no!"

"Well, no, maybe not first along," Uncle Wiggily agreed. "But nearly all boys, especially the kind that go camping, are fond of animals, and will not hurt them. We will see what sort of boys these are, Baby Bunty."

So the bunny gentleman and the little rabbit girl hid behind the bushes and watched the camping boys, for that is what they were. They had come to spend a few weeks in the woods, living in a white tent which, at first, Baby Bunty thought was a snow house.

The boys had just come to camp, and the tent had been up only a little while. But already the lads had started a campfire; and they had hung a Gypsy kettle over the blaze, and were cooking soup.

"Get some more water, somebody!" called one boy.

"And I'm not going to cut any more wood!" exclaimed another. "I've been cutting wood ever since we got here!"

"We'll take turns!" spoke a third boy.

"Look out! That soup's boiling over!" shouted a fourth.

"They're regular boys all right!" chuckled Uncle Wiggily, as he crouched under a bush with Baby Bunty. "They're so excited at coming to camp they hardly know what they're doing."

Uncle Wiggily and Baby Bunty could hear and understand what the boys said, though they themselves could not speak to the camping chaps. For a time the two rabbits watched the little lads, who were trying to get a meal. They made many mistakes, of course, such as getting the salt mixed up with the sugar, and they left the bread out of its tin box so it dried, for they had never been camping before.

"But they'll soon learn," said Uncle Wiggily.

"I hope they won't chase us, and throw stones at us," Baby Bunty remarked, as she and Mr. Longears hopped away.

"I think they are good boys," spoke the bunny gentleman.

And the camping boys were. When they had finished eating they scattered crumbs so the birds could pick them up. Larger pieces of left-over food were placed on a flat stump where the squirrels and chipmunks could get them.

Johnnie and Billie Bushytail, the two boy squirrels, saw some of this food as they were coming through the woods. The camping boys were away just then, so the squirrel chaps had no fear of going close to the white tent-house. Johnnie found a piece of bread and butter, and Billie picked up half a ginger snap.

"That shows the camping boys are kind to animals," said Uncle Wiggily, when Johnnie and Billie told him what they had found. "I hope I may get a chance to do these lads a favor."

And Uncle Wiggily had this chance sooner than he expected.

For about a week the weather was most lovely for camping. The sun shone every day, the wind blew just enough to send the sailboat spinning about the lake and there wasn't a drop of rain.

It is rain which soaks most of the fun out of camping, just as rain takes away your fun at home. And these boys, never having camped in a tent before, gave no thought to storms.

One afternoon it began to rain. Uncle Wiggily, in his hollow stump bungalow, where he was reading the cabbage-leaf paper, heard the pitter-patter of the drops on the window, and looked up.

"Where is Baby Bunty, Nurse Jane?" asked the bunny gentleman.

"Why, she hasn't come back from the store yet," answered the muskrat lady housekeeper.

"Did she take an umbrella?" asked Uncle Wiggily.

"No," replied Nurse Jane, "she did not."

"Then she'll get soaking wet!" exclaimed Mr. Longears. "I'll go after her with a toadstool."

You know in Woodland, near the Orange Ice Mountain, where Uncle Wiggily lived, toadstools were often used for umbrellas. Of course, some of the animal folk had regular umbrellas, but when they were in a hurry they could break off a big toadstool, or mushroom, and use that.

So Uncle Wiggily hopped out of his hollow stump bungalow, and, growing near his front gate, he found a big toadstool. Picking this, he held it over his head and hurried along through the rain to meet Baby Bunty, who had gone to the three and five cent store for Nurse Jane.

Uncle Wiggily had to hop almost to the place where the tent of the camping boys stood before he met the little rabbit girl, half drenched.

"Oh, Uncle Wiggily! You ought to see!" cried Baby Bunty. "There is so much water around the tent that those nice boys will be washed away, I guess!"

"Water around their tent?" repeated the bunny gentleman. "You don't say so!"

"Yes," said Baby Bunty. "The rain is coming down so hard that it is running like a little brook around the tent. The boys are inside, and I heard them saying that the water would soon come up over the cots and they wouldn't have any dry place to sleep to-night!"

"Silly boys!" exclaimed Uncle Wiggily, holding the toadstool umbrella over Baby Bunty. "They didn't know enough to dig a ditch around the outside of their tent to let the rain water run off. All campers do that, but as this is the first time these boys came to the woods I suppose they didn't know about it. Always dig a ditch, or trench, in the earth around your tent when you go camping, Baby Bunty."

"I will," promised the little rabbit girl, real serious like.

"But that isn't going to help the boys now," went on Uncle Wiggily. "I think I shall have to take a paw in this. They are good boys, and are kind to animals. I must do them a favor."

"But how can you?" asked Baby Bunty.

"Why, I, being a rabbit, am one of the best diggers in the world," went on Mr. Longears. "Still, I will need help to dig a ditch around the tent, as it is rather large. Hop home, Baby Bunty, and tell Sammie Littletail, Toodle and Noodle Flat-Tail, the beaver boys, and Grandpa Whackum, the old beaver gentleman, to please come here. With their help I can dig the ditch."

So Baby Bunty, taking the toadstool umbrella, hopped away, and Uncle Wiggily, to await her return, hid under a thick-branched pine tree which kept off most of the rain. The drops pelted down, and around the tent of the camping boys was almost a flood. Night was coming on, too, and before morning the water would rise up so high that it would wet the feet of the boys in their beds.

Pretty soon, just about dusk, when it was still raining hard, along came Sammie Littletail, the rabbit boy, Toodle and Noodle the beavers, with their broad, flat tails, and Grandpa Whackum, the oldest beaver of them all. Beavers just love to work in the water and they can dig dirt canals better than most boys.

"Lively now, my friends!" called Uncle Wiggily, coming out from under the pine tree. "We'll dig a ditch around the tent for the kind boys. They won't see us, as they are inside, and probably will not come out in the train."

So Uncle Wiggily, Sammie and the beavers began work. Quickly and silently they dug and dug and dug in the soft earth, piling the dirt to one side, and making a trench so that the rain water could run off into the brook. And soon the little pond that had formed around the tent of the camping boys had drained away.

"Now they will have no more trouble," said Uncle Wiggily as he and his friends, all wet and muddy, finished the trench. "We can go home."

Home they went, through the rain, to get something to eat and dry out. And in the morning, though it still rained, no water rose inside the boys' tent. And none came through the roof, for that was like an umbrella, the canvas cloth being stretched over the ridge-pole.

"Oh, look!" cried one boy, coming to the flap of the tent, as the front of the canvas house is called. "Someone has dug a ditch around our camp, and now we'll keep dry!"

"Why, it's a regular little canal!" exclaimed a second boy. "It wasn't there yesterday!"

"Who did it?" asked the other lads.

But none of them knew, and I hope you will not tell them, for I want to keep it a secret.

And when the rain stopped, the ground around the tent dried out very quickly because the proper ditch had been dug around it. And the camping boys put out on the flat stump many good things for the animal folk to eat. And the next time those boys went camping they knew enough to make a trench around their tent.

Now let me see; what shall we have next? Well, I think I shall tell you the story of Uncle Wiggily and the birthday cake--that is, I will if the snow-shovel doesn't make the coal-scuttle sneeze when they are playing tag down under the cellar steps.

STORY XXVI

UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE BIRTHDAY CAKE

"To-morrow is my birthday! To-morrow is my birthday! And I'm going to have a cake with ten candles on!"

A little girl sang this over and over as she danced around the house one morning.

"Ten candles! And they'll be lighted, and I can blow them out and cut the cake and pass it around; can't I, Mother?" asked the little girl.

"Yes, my dear," Mother answered. "But if you are going to have a birthday cake you must go to the store and get me some flour, sugar and eggs. I did not know I needed them, but I do, if you are to have a cake."

"Oh, of course I want a cake!" said the little girl. "It wouldn't be at all like a birthday without a cake! And ten candles on top, all lighted! Last year I only had nine candles. But now I can have ten! Ten candles! Ten candles on my birthday cake!" sang the happy little girl again and again. "Ten candles! Ten candles!"

"You had better go to the store, instead of singing so much!" laughed her mother. "Sing on your way, if you like. But don't forget the flour, sugar and eggs."

"I'll get them," said the little girl, and off she started, taking a short cut through the woods to reach the store more quickly.

These woods were the same ones in which Uncle Wiggily had built his hollow stump bungalow, and about the same time the little girl started off to get the things for her birthday cake the bunny rabbit gentleman stood on his front porch.

"Where are you going?" asked Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy, his muskrat lady housekeeper.

"Oh, just to hop through the forest, to look for an adventure," answered Mr. Longears. "I haven't had one since I helped dig the rain-trench about the tent of the camping boys."

"I should think that would be enough to last a long time," spoke Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy.

"Oh, no. I need a new adventure every day!" laughed the bunny, and over the fields and through the woods he hopped.

Now Uncle Wiggily had not gone very far before, all of a sudden, he stepped into a trap. It was a spring trap, set in the woods by some hunter who had covered it with dried leaves so it could not easily be seen. That's the way hunters fool the wild animals.

And, not seeing the trap, Uncle Wiggily hopped right into it.

"Snap!" went the jaws of the trap together, catching the poor bunny gentleman fast by one hind leg.

"Oh, my!" cried Mr. Longears. "I'm caught! But it is fortunate that it is a smooth-jawed trap, and not the kind with sharp teeth. If I could only get my leg loose I'd be all right; except that my paw might be lame and stiff for a few days. I must try to get out!"

Uncle Wiggily tried to pull his paw from the trap, but it was of no use. The spring held the jaws too tightly together. The bunny gentleman twinkled his pink nose as hard as he could, and he even tried to pry apart the trap jaws with his red, white and blue striped rheumatism crutch. But he couldn't.

"Oh, dear!" though Uncle Wiggily. "I must call for help. Perhaps Neddie Stubtail, the strong boy bear, will hear me. He could easily spring open this trap and set me free."

So the bunny gentleman called as loudly as he could:

"Help! Help!"

Of course he talked animal talk, and for this reason the little girl, who was going to have a birthday cake, with ten candles on it, did not know what Uncle Wiggily was saying. She heard him making a noise, though, for she passed the place where the bunny was caught in the trap, soon after the accident happened.

"I wonder what that funny noise is?" said the little girl, as Uncle Wiggily again called for help. "It sounds like some animal. I wish I understood animal talk!"

Uncle Wiggily wished, with all his heart, that the little girl could hear what he was saying, for he was calling for help. The bunny understood girl-talk, and he knew what this girl was saying, for she spoke her thoughts out loud.

"But she doesn't know what I want!" said poor Uncle Wiggily to himself. "She is sure to be good and kind, as all girls are, and if I could only get her to come over this way she might take me out of the trap."

The little girl, on her way home from the store, had come to a stop not far from Uncle Wiggily, but she could not see him because he was behind a bush.

"I must make some kind of a noise that she will hear," thought the bunny. Then he thrashed around in the bushes with his crutch, rattling the dried leaves and the green bushes, and the little girl heard this noise.

"Oh, maybe a bird is caught in a big cobweb!" said the little girl. "I'll get it loose--I love the birds!"

Putting down her bundle of flour, sugar and eggs on a flat stump, she made her way through the bushes until she saw where Uncle Wiggily was caught in the trap.

"Oh, what a funny rabbit!" cried the little girl as she looked at the bunny gentleman all dressed, as he always was when he went to look for an adventure. "He looks just like a picture on an Easter card!" laughed the little girl. "I wish I had him at my party!"

"Well, I wish she'd take this trap off my paw!" thought Uncle Wiggily, though of course he could say nothing, however much he could hear.

Then the little girl looked down among the leaves and saw where the trap pinched Uncle Wiggily.

"Oh, you poor bunny rabbit!" she cried. "I'll set you loose."

Very gently she pressed her foot on the spring of the trap, to open it. And when the jaws were opened Uncle Wiggily could lift out his paw, which he did. He hopped a little way over the dried leaves, limping a bit, for the pinching trap had pained him. Then, coming to a stop on a smooth, grassy place, the bunny leaned on his red, white and blue striped rheumatism crutch and, taking off his tall silk hat, he made a low and polite bow to the little girl.

"Thank you for having done me a great favor!" said Uncle Wiggily in animal talk. "I wish I could do one for you!"

But of course the little girl could not understand this bunny language, so she only laughed and said:

"Oh, what a dear, funny bunny! With a tall hat and everything! I wish you would come to my birthday party! I'm going to have a cake with ten lighted candles on!"

"Thank you, I'd like to come, but it is out of the question," answered Uncle Wiggily in his own talk. Then, with another low and polite bow, he hopped away.

The little girl picked up the things she had bought at the store and went home.

"You'll never guess what I saw in the woods," she told her mother. "A bunny rabbit, all dressed in a black coat and red trousers, was caught in a trap, and I set him free!"

"Nonsense!" laughed Mother. "Whoever heard of a rabbit like that? You are so excited about your birthday cake that you were dreaming, I think!"

"Oh, no, Mother! I didn't dream!" said the little girl. "Really I didn't!"

"Well, never mind. Now we'll make your birthday cake," answered Mother.

The birthday cake was mixed and baked in the oven, and on top was spread pink frosting.

"We'll put the candles on to-morrow, when you have your party," Mother told the little girl.

To-morrow came, after a night in which Cora Janet, which was the little girl's name, had dreamed about riding in an airship, with a bunny gentleman dressed up like a soldier. In the afternoon many boys and girls came to Cora Janet's birthday party.

"Oh, how lovely everything is!" exclaimed a little boy, when he was given his second dish of ice cream.

"Wait until you see my birthday cake with ten candles on!" whispered Cora Janet.

When it was almost time to bring on the lighted cake, Mother called Cora Janet out into the kitchen.

"Did you get the candles, Cora?" Mother asked.

"Why, no!" the little girl answered. "I--I thought we had candles!"

"And I thought I told you to get them," Mother went on. "There isn't one in the house! I've looked everywhere. Never mind, perhaps I can borrow some next door. Go back to your friends."

"Oh, I do hope you can get candles!" sighed Cora Janet. "A birthday cake without candles will hardly be right!"

Mother asked the lady who lived next door, on one side, if she had any candles.

"Not a one, I'm sorry to say," was the answer.

Then Mother asked the lady on the other side.

"Oh, I never use candles," this lady replied, coming out on her back stoop to talk over the fence to Cora Janet's mother. "I'm so sorry!"

"Well, I guess they'll have to eat the cake without any birthday candles on," said Mother. "Cora Janet will be so disappointed, too, as she is such an imaginative child! Just fancy, Mrs. Blake, she came home yesterday, and told about helping out of a trap an old rabbit gentleman, with a tall silk hat!"

"The idea! She must have dreamed it!" said Mrs. Blake.

"No, she didn't dream it! That really happened!" said Uncle Wiggily to himself, who was just then hopping through the fields back of the house where Cora Janet lived. "So this is her home, is it?" went on the bunny gentleman to himself. "And she hasn't any candles for her birthday cake! Too bad!"

Uncle Wiggily had hopped along just in time to hear Cora Janet's mother asking for candles of the neighbors.

"It's so late that all the stores are closed," went on Mrs. Blake, "or I'd go get some candles for Cora."

"Never mind," spoke Mother. "She will have to bear her disappointment as best she can."

"No! That must not be!" said Uncle Wiggily to himself. "I cannot give her real candles, but I can leave on her steps some slivers of the pine tree. They have in them pitch, tar and resin and will burn almost like candles. When I was a rabbit boy I often lighted these pine-tree candles."

Not far away were the woods, and, hopping across the field in the dusk of the evening, Uncle Wiggily, with his sharp teeth, soon gnawed off some pine-knot splinters from one of the trees. In olden times, when there were no electric or kerosene lamps, children used to study their lessons in front of the fireplaces, by these pine knots.

"These will do for birthday-cake candles," whispered Uncle Wiggily, as he hopped back to Cora Janet's house with a paw full of the pine knots. He put them on the stoop, and then, with his hind paws, he kicked some gravel from the front walk up against the dining-room windows.

"What's that?" asked Cora Janet, as she heard the noise.

"Some bad boys playing tick-tack," said one of the girls at the party. "They're playing tricks because they weren't asked."

"I'll see who it is," spoke Mother.

She went out on the porch. There she saw the pile of pine-knot slivers. Having lived in the country when she was a girl, Mother knew that these bits of wood could be used for candles.

"Oh, now I can make the birthday cake blaze most brightly!" exclaimed Mother. Into the house she hurried. She stuck ten pine-knot slivers on the cake, for Uncle Wiggily had left a full dozen, not knowing exactly how old Cora Janet was. Then, when the pine knots were lighted, Mother carried the cake into the room where the boys and girls were wishing Cora Janet many happy returns for her birthday.

"Oh, where did you get the candles?" asked Cora.

"I guess the rabbit you dreamed you saw must have left them," answered Mother, in fun, of course, for she never thought that really could happen.

"Dream-candles or not, they are lovely!" murmured the little girl.

And everyone at the party said the same thing.

They watched Cora Janet as, one by one, she blew out the pine candles on her birthday cake. And when the last one flickered away, the cake was cut amid the joyous laughter of the boys and girls.

"Well, I'm glad I could do her a favor," said the bunny rabbit to himself, as hidden under the lilac bush, he heard and saw all that went on. "I shall always love Cora Janet!"

And he did.

So if the needle doesn't wink its eye when it sits on the sewing-machine to read the paper of pins, I'll tell you next about Uncle Wiggily and the New Year's horn.

STORY XXVII

UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE NEW YEAR'S HORN

Christmas had come and gone, and the next holiday for the boys and girls who lived in the village outside of Uncle Wiggily's forest was to be New Year's Day. I call it Uncle Wiggily's forest for on one edge of it the bunny rabbit gentleman had built himself a hollow stump bungalow. There he lived with Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy, his muskrat lady housekeeper.

On the farther side of the wood was the village where many real boys and girls had their homes. To them, as I say, Christmas had come and gone, bringing to most of them presents which they liked very much.

"I'm going to have a lot of fun on New Year's," said one boy to another as they were coasting on the hill the last day of the old year.

"What are you going to do?" asked the other boy.

"I'm going to blow the Old Year out and the New Year in," was the answer.

"Gracious me sakes alive!" thought Uncle Wiggily Longears, the bunny rabbit gentleman, who happened to be resting under a bush near where the boys were coasting down hill. "I hope he doesn't blow the Old Year so far away that the New Year will be afraid to come in," said Mr. Longears to himself. Then he listened again, for the boys were talking further.

"How you going to blow?" one lad wanted to know.

"With my Christmas horn," was the answer. "I got a dandy horn for Christmas. To-night is New Year's eve. My father said I could stay up late. At twelve o'clock the Old Year goes away and the New Year comes, and we're going to have a party at our house, and I'm going to blow my horn like anything!"

"So'm I," said several other boys.

"Where does the Old Year go when you blow it away?" asked a lad who had red hair and freckles.

"Oh, I don't know," answered the boy who had first talked of his Christmas horn. "It just goes--that's all! It disappears same as the hole in a doughnut when you eat it."

"You don't eat the _hole_!" declared another boy.

"Well, you eat all around it," was the answer, "and then there isn't any hole any more. It's the same with the Old Year. After twelve o'clock on December 31 there isn't any Old Year any more. It's January the first, and it's the New Year. I'm going to blow my horn loud! All the fellows are!"

"We will, too!" cried the rest of the boys.

But one lad, who had a clumsy, home-made sled on the hill, did not say he was going to blow the New Year in. He turned away as the other lads talked of their coming fun. Someone asked him:

"Are you going to watch the Old Year out, Jimmy?"

"No, I guess not," was the answer. "I'm going to sleep."

"The noise will wake you up," someone suggested.

"Well, then I'll go to sleep again," was the answer.

"I guess the reason Jimmy won't blow the Old Year out and the New Year in is because he hasn't any horn," said a boy with a fine new blue sled. "He didn't get hardly anything for Christmas."

"That's too bad!" softly spoke the lad who had first mentioned about blowing in the New Year. "Maybe I can find an old horn at my house, and I'll take it to him. If I could find two I'd take another to his sister. But I don't believe I can."

"Oh, won't we have fun, blowing the New Year in?" cried the boys, as they walked to the top of the hill so they might coast down. But Jimmy did not join in the joyous shout. He was a poor boy, and, as the others had said, he had not found much in his stocking at Christmas. Certainly there was no bright tooting horn!

"This is too bad!" thought Uncle Wiggily, as he hopped back to his hollow stump bungalow, after the coasting boys were out of the way so they would not see him. "I wonder how I could get a New Year's horn for that poor boy?"

The bunny gentleman was wondering about this, but he could not seem to think of any plan, when, as he was about to hop up his bungalow steps, he saw Billie Wagtail, the goat boy.

"Oh, Uncle Wiggily!" bleated Billie. "See my new horns!"

"Your new horns!" exclaimed Mr. Longears, turning toward the goat chap. "Are you going to blow the New Year in, also?"

"Yes, but not with these horns," went on Billie. "I mean, see the new horns on my head. I was ill, you know, and my old horns dropped off, and now I have these new ones," and he shook his head, on which were two long, curving sharp horns. "I'm going to blow the New Year in," bleated the boy goat, "but not on my head horns; on my Christmas tin horn."

"That's more than one boy whom I know about is going to do," said Uncle Wiggily a little sadly. Then the bunny gentleman had a sudden thought. "Do you s'pose, Billie," he asked the goat boy, "that your old horns could be made into blowing ones for New Year's?"

"Why, yes, I guess so," Billie answered. "But you'd have to saw off one end to make a place to blow in. My horns are partly hollow and if you blew in the little end, after making a hole there, the noise would come out the other end."

"Then I know what I can do!" exclaimed Uncle Wiggily. "Get me your old horns, Billie boy, and I'll fix them up for New Year's blowing. I know how to do it!"

The Wagtail goat chap gave the bunny gentleman the old horns. Uncle Wiggily took them into his bungalow, and he and Nurse Jane washed them clean and polished them. Then, with her sharp teeth, the muskrat lady gnawed a little off the small end of each horn, so they could be blown through.

Uncle Wiggily made two wooden whistles and fastened one in the small end of each horn.

"Now I'll try it, Janie," he said to Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy.