Uncle Wiggilys Travels | Page 2

do not know," said the rabbit gentleman. "Perhaps I had better do some traveling at night. I couldn't find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, but perhaps there may be a gold, or silver fortune, at the end of a moon-beam. I think I'll try."
"Oh, but don't you get sleepy at night?" asked the little boy's mother as she fried an ice cream cone for Uncle Wiggily's breakfast.
"Well, I could sleep in the day time, and then I would stay awake at night," answered the traveling uncle, blinking his ears.
"Oh, but aren't you afraid of the bogeyman at night?" inquired the boy with the red hair--I mean trousers.
"There are no such things as bogeymen," said Uncle Wiggily, "and if there were any, they would not harm you. I am not a bit afraid in the dark, except that I don't like mosquitoes to bite me. I think I'll travel to-morrow night, and look for gold at the end of the moon-beam."
So he started off that day, and he went only a short distance, for he wanted to find a place to sleep in order that he would be wide awake when it got dark.
Well, he found a nice, soft place under a pile of hay, and there he stretched out to slumber as nicely as if he were in his bed at home. He even snored a little bit, I believe, or else it was Bully Frog croaking one of his songs.
The day passed, and the sun went down, and it got all ready to be night, and still Uncle Wiggily slept on soundly. But all of a sudden he heard voices whispering:
"Now you go that way and I'll go this way, and we'll catch that rabbit and put him in a cage and sell him!"
Well, you can just believe that Uncle Wiggily was frightened when he awakened suddenly and saw two bad boys softly creeping up and making ready to catch him.
"Oh, this is no place for me!" the rabbit cried, and he grabbed up his crutch and his valise and hopped away so fast that the boys couldn't catch him, no matter how fast they could run, even bare-footed.
"Let's throw stones at him!" they cried. And they did, but I'm glad to say that none of them hit Uncle Wiggily. Isn't it queer how mean some boys can be? But perhaps they were never told any better, so we'll forgive them this time.
"Well, it is now night," said the rabbit gentleman as he hopped on through the woods, "so I think I will sit under this tree and wait for the moon to come up. And while I'm waiting I'll eat my supper."
So Uncle Wiggily ate his supper, which the kind farmer lady had put up for him, and then he sat and waited for the moon to rise, and pretty soon he heard a funny noise, calling like this:
"Who? Who? Who-tu-tu-tu."
"Oh, you know who I am all right, Mr. Owl," said the rabbit. "You can see very well at night. You can see me."
"My goodness, if it isn't Uncle Wiggily!" cried the owl in surprise. "What are you doing out so late, I'd like to know?"
"Waiting for a moon-beam, so I can see if there is any gold for my fortune at the end of it," was the answer. "Is the moon coming up over the trees, Mr. Owl?"
"Yes, here it comes," said the owl, "and now I must fly off to the dark woods, for I don't like the light," and he fluttered away.
Then the moon came up, all silver and glorious; shining over the tree tops like a shimmering ball, and soon the moon-beams fell to the ground in slanting rays, but they fell so softly, like feathers, that they did not get hurt at all.
"Well, I guess I'll follow that big one," said the old gentleman rabbit, as he picked out a nice, broad, large, shiny moon-beam. "That must have gold at the end, and, if I find it, my fortune is made." So off he started to follow the moon-beam to where it came to an end.
It seemed to go quite a distance through the dark woods, and Uncle Wiggily traveled on for several hours, and he didn't seem to be any nearer the end by that time than he was at first.
"My land, this is a very long beam," he exclaimed. "It is almost big enough to make a church steeple from. But I'll keep on a little longer, for I'm not a bit sleepy yet."
Well, all of a sudden, just as he was turning the corner around a big stone, the rabbit gentleman heard a funny noise.
It wasn't like any one crying, yet it sounded as if some one was in trouble, for the voice said:
"Oh, dear!