STORY II
UNCLE WIGGILY AND BUNTY’S SKATES
Uncle Wiggily Longears, the bunny rabbit gentleman, was asleep in his hollow stump bungalow one morning, when he heard, as if in a dream, Nurse Jane Fuzzy ring the breakfast bell.
“Oh! Um! Ah! I don’t hardly believe I’ll get up this morning!” said Uncle Wiggily, sort of stretchy like. “You may keep breakfast for me, Nurse Jane.”
“Oh, Uncle Wiggily! You must get up! You must get up! You must get up! Oh, Uncle Wiggily, you must get up! You must get up today! Right away!” sang a jolly little voice.
Uncle Wiggily gave a sudden start. All his aches and pains seemed to go away at once, and he felt as spry as a new grasshopper.
“Hello! Who’s down there?” he called from the top of the stairs, for the voice seemed to come from the dining room, down below. “Who wants me to get up?”
“It’s Baby Bunty!” said Nurse Jane. “Have you forgotten that you brought her home from a hollow stump yesterday, and that she’s going to live here?”
“Oh, I did forget!” cried Uncle Wiggily. “Is she still here?”
“Well, you’d better come down here and look after her while I get breakfast!” said Nurse Jane. “I never saw such a lively little rabbit before! She nearly jumped over the milk bottle while I had my back turned!”
Uncle Wiggily smiled until his pink nose twinkled on both sides at once.
“So Baby Bunty is lively, is she?” said the bunny gentleman. “Well, that’s just what I need to keep me from getting old and stiff.”
“Hurry, Uncle Wiggily! Hurry!” called Baby Bunty.
“What’s the hurry?” asked Mr. Longears, as he smoothed out his fur with a pine tree cone for a brush.
“Why, this is the first of May!” went on the little rabbit girl, who was going to live with Uncle Wiggily. “It’s the first of May and we’re going out and gather flowers today, tra-la!”
“Who’s going?” asked Uncle Wiggily, as he came downstairs to breakfast.
“You and I are going to gather flowers. We’ll have fun, many joyful hours!” sang Baby Bunty, as she danced about the breakfast room like a sunbeam playing tag with a pussy cat.
“Oh, oh! We’ll see about that!” said Uncle Wiggily. “Now you run out and play while I eat, and then we’ll see what happens. Did you have your breakfast?”
“Oh, yes, Baby Bunty was up as soon as I was,” said Nurse Jane.
Uncle Wiggily ate his breakfast slowly and carefully. He didn’t like to hurry except when the Pipsisewah was chasing him. And after he had eaten some carrot pancakes, Uncle Wiggily felt sort of lazy like and comfortable.
“I’ll play a little trick on Baby Bunty,” he thought. “I don’t believe it will do my old bones good to go off in the damp woods so early in the morning to gather flowers. I’ll wait until the sun is warmer. I’ll just stay here and go to sleep. She’ll forget all about me.”
So Uncle Wiggily curled up in the easy chair, thinking how good it felt to rest his tired bones and joints. But, all of a sudden, as he was sort of dozing off to sleep, he heard Nurse Jane cry:
“Oh, Uncle Wiggily! Come here! Come quickly! There goes Baby Bunty off on her skates.”
“Baby Bunty? Going off on her skates! Why, she hasn’t any skates!” cried the rabbit gentleman, suddenly waking up! “She’s too little to have roller skates, and it isn’t the time of year for ice skates. How you talk, Nurse Jane!”
“Well, there she goes, anyhow!” said the muskrat lady. “She’s a lively little tyke, is Baby Bunty. She made herself a pair of roller skates out of some old round clothespins, and there she goes on them, skating down the woodland path. You’d better run after her, Uncle Wiggily, or a bad fox may catch her!”
“That’s so!” cried Uncle Wiggily. Then he forgot all about his stiff joints, and how he used to have rheumatism and all that. Away he hopped and ran and leaped and jumped after Baby Bunty. And away the little Bunty went on her clothespin roller skates.
“Come on, Uncle Wiggily!” she cried to him. “See if you can catch me!”
Well, Uncle Wiggily finally did, but it was hard work, and he was so out of breath when he finally ran and caught up to Baby Bunty that he could hardly twinkle his pink nose at all.
“Isn’t this jolly!” laughed the little bunny girl tyke. “Now we can get May flowers! I wanted you to be lively and come, and you did. You came right after me!”
“Yes, but you led me quite a chase!” panted Uncle Wiggily. “However, I guess I feel better after it. I’m not stiff, now!” And he wasn’t a bit, and he and Baby Bunty gathered a fine bouquet of May blossoms. And if the molasses jug doesn’t get stuck in the alley when it’s trying to run through and tag the sugar cookie, I’ll tell you next about Uncle Wiggily and Bunty’s ride.