Uncle Wiggily in the Woods | Page 6

"Oh, hello. Uncle Wiggily!" cried Jillie. "I don't know what to do with
my little cousin mouse. You see she wants to slide down hill on her
Christmas sled, but there isn't any snow on any of the hills now."
"No, that's true, there isn't," said the bunny uncle. "But, Squeaky, why
didn't you slide down hill in the Winter, when there was snow?"
"Because, I had the mouse-trap fever, then," answered Squeaky-Eeky,
"and I couldn't go out. But now I am all better and I can be out, and oh,

dear! I do so much want a ride down hill on my sled. Boo, hoo!"
"Don't cry, Squeaky, dear," said Jillie. "If there is no snow you can't
slide down hill, you know."
"But I want to," said the little cousin mouse, unreasonable like.
"But you can't; so please be nice," begged Jillie.
"Oh, dear!" cried Squeaky. "I do so much want to slide down hill on
my sled."
"And you shall!" suddenly exclaimed Uncle Wiggily. "Come with me,
Squeaky."
"Why, Uncle Wiggily!" cried Jillie. "How can you give Squeaky a slide
down hill when there is no snow? You need a slippery snow hill for
sleigh-riding."
"I am not so sure of that," spoke Uncle Wiggily, with a smile. "Let us
see."
Off through the woods he hopped, with Jillie and Squeaky following.
Pretty soon Uncle Wiggily came to a big tree that had fallen down, one
end being raised up higher than the other, like a hill, slanting.
With his strong paws and his sharp teeth, the rabbit gentleman began
peeling the bark off the tree, showing the white wood underneath.
"What are you doing, Uncle Wiggily?" asked Jillie.
"This is a slippery elm tree, and I am making a hill so Squeaky-Eeky
can slide down," answered the bunny uncle. "Underneath the bark the
trunk of the elm tree is very slippery. Dr. Possum told me so. See how
my paw slips!" And indeed it did, sliding down the sloping tree almost
as fast as you can eat a lollypop.
Uncle Wiggily took off a lot of bark from the elm tree, making a long,
sliding, slippery place.

"Now, try that with your sled, Squeaky-Eeky," said the bunny uncle.
And the little cousin mouse did. She put her sled on the slanting tree,
sat down and Jillie gave her a little push. Down the slippery elm tree
went Squeaky as fast as anything, coming to a stop in a pile of soft
leaves.
"Oh, what a lovely slide!" cried Squeaky. "You try it, Jillie." And the
little mouse girl did.
"Who would think," she said, "that you could slide down a slippery elm
tree? But you can."
Then she and Squeaky took turns sliding down hill, even though there
was no snow, and the slippery elm tree didn't mind it a bit, but rather
liked it.
And if the coal man doesn't take away our gas shovel to shoot some
tooth powder into the wax doll's pop gun, I'll tell you next about Uncle
Wiggily and the sassafras.

STORY IV
UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE SASSAFRAS
"Uncle Wiggily! Uncle Wiggily! Get up!" called Nurse Jane Fuzzy
Wuzzy, the muskrat lady housekeeper, as she stood at the foot of the
stairs of the hollow stump bungalow and called up to the rabbit
gentleman one morning.
"Hurry down, Mr. Longears," she went on. "This is the last day I am
going to bake buckwheat cakes, and if you want some nice hot ones,
with maple sugar sauce on, you'd better hurry."
No answer came from the bunny uncle.
"Why, this is strange," said Nurse Jane to herself. "I wonder if anything
can have happened to him? Did he have an adventure in the night? Did

the bad skillery-scalery alligator, with humps on its tail, carry him off?"
Then she called again:
"Uncle Wiggily! Uncle Wiggily! Aren't you going to get up? Come
down to breakfast. Aren't you going to get up and come down?"
"No, Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy," replied the bunny uncle, "not to give you a
short answer, I am not going to get up, or come down or eat breakfast
or do anything," and Mr. Longears spoke as though his head was
hidden under the bed clothes, which it was.
"Oh, Uncle Wiggily, whatever is the matter?" asked Nurse Jane,
surprised like and anxious.
"I don't feel at all well," was the answer. "I think I have the epizootic,
and I don't want any breakfast."
"Oh, dear!" cried Nurse Jane. "And all the nice cakes I have baked. I
know what I'll do," she said to herself. "I'll call in Dr. Possum. Perhaps
Uncle Wiggily needs some of the roots and herbs that grow in the
woods--wintergreen, slippery elm or something like that. I'll call Dr.
Possum."
And when the