Uncle Wiggily in the Woods | Page 9

and Uncle Wiggily was thinking
that it was about time to get out his extra-thin fur coat when, all of a

sudden, he felt something very hot behind him.
"Why, that sun is really burning!" cried the bunny. Then he heard a
little ant boy, who was crawling on the ground, cry out:
"Fire! Fire! Fire! Uncle Wiggily's bundle of groceries is on fire! Fire!
Fire!"
"Oh, my!" cried the bunny uncle, as he felt hotter and hotter, "The sun
must have set fire to the box of matches. Oh, what shall I do?" He
dropped his bundle of groceries, and looking around at them he saw,
surely enough, the matches were on fire. They were all blazing.
"Call the fire department! Get out the water bugs!" cried the little ant
boy. "Fire! Water! Water! Fire!"
"That's what I want--water," cried the bunny uncle. "Oh, if I could find
a spring of water. I could put the blazing matches, save some of them,
perhaps, and surely save the bread and crackers. Oh, for some water!"
Uncle Wiggily and the ant boy ran here and there in the woods looking
for a spring of water. But they could find none, and the bread and
crackers were just beginning to burn when a voice cried:
"Here is water, Uncle Wiggily!"
"Where? Where?" asked the rabbit gentleman, all excited like.
"Where?"
"Inside my pulpit," was the answer, and Uncle Wiggily saw, not far
away, the Jack-plant he had helped from under the stone.
"When it rained a while ago, my pitcher-pulpit became filled with
water," went on Jack. "If you will just tip me over, sideways, I'll splash
the water on the blazing matches and put them out."
"I'll do it!" cried Uncle Wiggily, and he quickly did. The pulpit held
water as good as a milk pitcher could, and when the water splashed on
the fire that fire gave one hiss, like a goose, and went out.

"Oh, you certainly did me a favor, Mr. Pulpit-Jack," said Uncle
Wiggily. "Though the matches are burned, the bread and crackers are
saved, and I can get more matches." Which he did, so Nurse Jane could
make a fire in the stove.
So you see Uncle Wiggily had an adventure after all, and quite an
exciting one, too, and if the lemon drop doesn't fall on the stick of
peppermint candy and make it sneeze when it goes to the moving
pictures, I'll tell you next about Uncle Wiggily and the violets.

STORY VI
UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE VIOLETS
Down in the kitchen of the hollow stump bungalow there was a great
clattering of pots and pans. Uncle Wiggily Longears, the rabbit
gentleman who lived in the bungalow, sat up in bed, having been
awakened by the noise, and he said:
"Well, I wonder what Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy is doing now? She
certainly is busy at something, and it can't be making the breakfast
buckwheat cakes, either, for she has stopped baking them."
"I say, Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy, what's going on down in your kitchen?"
called the rabbit gentleman out loud.
"I'm washing," answered the muskrat lady.
"Washing what; the dishes?" the bunny uncle wanted to know. "If you
wash them as hard as it sounds, there won't be any of them left for
dinner, and I haven't had my breakfast yet."
"No, I'm getting ready to wash the clothes, and I wish you'd come down
and eat, so I can clear away the table things!" called the muskrat lady.
"Oh, dear! Clothes-washing!" cried Uncle Wiggily, making his pink
nose twinkle in a funny way. "I don't like to be around the bungalow

when that is being done. I guess I'll get my breakfast and go for a walk.
Clothes have to be washed, I suppose," went on the rabbit gentleman,
"and when Nurse Jane has been ill I have washed them myself, but I do
not like it. I'll go off in the woods."
And so, having had his breakfast of carrot pudding, with turnip sauce
sprinkled over the top, Uncle Wiggily took his red, white and blue
striped rheumatism crutch, and hopped along.
The woods were getting more and more beautiful every day as the
weather grew warmer. The leaves on the trees were larger, and here and
there, down in the green moss, that was like a carpet on the ground,
could be seen wild flowers growing up.
"I wonder what sort of an adventure I will have today?" thought the
bunny uncle as he went on and on. "A nice one, I hope."
And, as he said this, Uncle Wiggily heard some voices speaking.
"Oh, dear!" exclaimed a sad little voice, "no one will ever see us here!
Of what use are we in the world? We are so small that we