Part 6

"I--I'll be good--I won't fall!" promised Bumps. So Mother bundled her up, and out she went to the coasting hill with Brother and Sister, each of whom had a sled.

"I'm not going to give her rides on my sled all the while!" said Brother, half grumbling.

"We'll take turns," more kindly suggested Sister. "Take hold of my hand, Bumps, and don't fall any more times than you can help, dear!"

"No; I won't," answered Bumps. The littlest girl was smiling and happy because she was going coasting with Sister and Brother. And she made up her mind she would try very, very hard not to fall.

On the other side of the forest, near which was the coasting hill of the children, lived Uncle Wiggily in his hollow stump bungalow. From afar he had often watched the boys and girls sliding down on their sleds, but the bunny gentleman had never gone very close.

"For," he said to himself, "they might, by accident, run over me. And, though I haven't much of a tail to be cut off, I would look queer if anything should happen to my long ears. I'll keep away from the coasting hill of the boys and girls."

But not far from the bunny's bungalow was another and smaller hill, down which the animal boys and girls coasted. Of course, very few of them had such sleds as you children have, with shiny steel runners, and with the tops painted red, blue, green and gold. In fact, some of the animal boys didn't bother with a sled at all.

Take Toodle and Noodle Flat-Tail, the beaver chaps, for instance. They just slid down hill on their broad, flat tails. And as for Johnnie and Billie Bushytail, the squirrels, they sat on their fuzzy tails and scooted down the hill of snow. Others of the animal children sometimes used pieces of wood, an old board or some sticks bound together with strands from a wild grape vine.

And about the time that Sister, Brother and Bumps went coasting, Sammie and Susie Littletail, the rabbits, passed the hollow stump bungalow of Uncle Wiggily Longears. The little bunnies were each pulling a sled made from pieces of birch bark they had gnawed from trees.

"Let's ask Uncle Wiggily to go coasting with us," spoke Susie.

"Oh, yes! Let's!" echoed Sammie. "It'll be lots of fun!"

And Uncle Wiggily was very glad to go coasting. Out of his bungalow he hopped, his pink nose twinkling twice as fast as the shiny star on top of the Christmas tree.

"Dear me, Wiggy!" cried Nurse Jane. "You don't mean to say you're going coasting with your rheumatism!"

"No, I'm going coasting with Sammie and Susie," the laughing bunny answered. "I haven't any rheumatism to go coasting with to-day, I'm glad to tell you." And, surely enough, he didn't need to take his red, white and blue striped crutch.

When Sammie, Susie and Uncle Wiggily reached the coasting hill, they found there many of the animal children.

"Oh, Uncle Wiggily! Ride on my sled!" invited one after another. "Ride on mine! Coast with me!"

"I'll take turns with each one!" promised the bunny gentleman, and so he did, riding with Sammie and Susie first, then with the Bushytail squirrel brothers, next with Lulu, Alice and Jimmie Wibblewobble, the ducks, and so on down to Dottie and Willie Flufftail, the lamb children.

Oh, such fun as Uncle Wiggily had on the animal children's coasting hill. And on the other side of the forest, Sister, Brother and Bumps had their fun, with the real boys and girls.

At last it began to grow dusk, and when Uncle Wiggily was thinking of telling the animal children it was time for them to leave for home, up came rushing Jackie and Peetie Bow Wow, the puppy dog boys.

"Oh, Uncle Wiggily!" barked Jackie. "We were just over to the big hill, where the real boys coast, and we saw----"

"We saw a little baby girl--that is, almost a baby--in a pile of snow!" finished Peetie, for his brother Jackie was out of breath and couldn't bark any more.

"What's that?" cried Uncle Wiggily. "A real, live little girl in the snow?"

"Right in a snow drift!" barked Jackie. "All alone!"

"Why," said the bunny gentleman, as he thought it over, "she must have been coasting with her brother or sister, and maybe she fell off a sled and went down deep in the snow. And they played so hard they never missed her! But she mustn't be allowed to stay asleep in the snow. She'll freeze!"

"If she's only a little one--almost a baby--couldn't we put her on one of our sleds?" asked Sammie.

"And ride her home," went on Susie.

"If we all pull together we'd be strong enough to pull a real, live girl, if she wasn't too large," quacked Jimmie Wibblewobble, the duck.

"We'll try!" said Uncle Wiggily. "All of you take the grape-vine ropes from your sleds and follow me."

Quickly the animal children did this, taking with them only the large double sled of Neddie Stubtail, the boy bear, which was the largest sled of all. It was low and flat, and Uncle Wiggily thought it would be easy to roll a little girl up on it and pull her along.

Soon Uncle Wiggily and the animal children reached the hill where the real boys and girls had coasted. None of them was there now, all having gone home to their suppers.

"Here she is!" softly barked Jackie, leading the way to a snowbank, at the foot of the hill.

And there, sound asleep in the soft, warm snow was--Bumps!

Yes, as true as I'm telling you--Bumps!

The little girl had been sliding down with her sister, and had rolled off the sled at the bottom of the hill after about the forty-'leventh coast. And Bumps was so tired, and sleepy, from having been outdoors so long, that, as soon as she rolled from the sled into the snow, she fell asleep! Think of that!

And as Sister wanted to have a race with Brother and some of the other children, she never noticed what happened to Bumps. But there she was--in the snow asleep. Poor little Bumps!

"It will never do to leave her here!" whispered Uncle Wiggily to the animal boys and girls. "Don't awaken her, but roll her over on Neddie's sled, and we'll pull her to her home. I know where she lives. We'll leave her in front of the door, I'll throw a snowball to make a sound like a knock, and then we can run away. Her father and mother will come out and take her in."

So all working together, pushing, pulling, tugging and rolling most gently, the bunny gentleman and the animal boys and girls slid Bumps upon the low sled of the bear boy. Then they fastened the grape-vine ropes to it, and, all taking hold, off they started over the snow toward the village.

It was almost dark, so no one saw the strange procession of Uncle Wiggily and his friends; and the bunny gentleman was glad of this. Right up to the home of Bumps they pulled her, and just as they got the sled in her yard Bumps opened her eyes.

"Oh! Oh! Oh!" she cried when she saw all the animal children, and Uncle Wiggily, too, standing around her. "I'm in fairyland! Oh, how I love it!"

"Quick, Sammie--Susie--Jackie--Peetie--scoot away!" called Uncle Wiggily in animal talk, and the rabbits, squirrels, guinea pigs, ducks, bears, beavers and others, all hopped away through the soft snow, out of sight. Uncle Wiggily tossed a snowball at the door, making a sound like a knock, and then the bunny gentleman also hopped away, laughing to himself.

He turned back in time to see the door open and Sister, Brother, Daddy and Mother rush out.

"Oh, here's Bumps, now!" cried Brother. "We must have forgotten and left her at the hill."

"Oh, that's what we did!" exclaimed Sister.

"Yes, but how did she get home?" asked Mother. "She never walked, I'm sure!"

"And look at the queer wooden sled!" said Sister.

"Who brought you home, Bumps?" asked Daddy.

"A--a nice bunny man, and some little bunnies, and squirrels, and a little bear boy and some ducks and chickens and little lambs and--and----" But Bumps was out of breath now.

"Oh, she's been asleep and _dreamed_ this!" laughed Brother. "Some man must have found her and put her on this board for a sled, to bring her home."

"Nope!" declared Bumps, "it was a bunny! It was a funny bunny!"

"Bring her in the house!" laughed Mother. "She must have been dreaming!"

But we know it wasn't a dream; don't we? And if the strawberry shortcake doesn't go swimming with the gold fish in the lemonade and catch cold, I'll tell you next about Uncle Wiggily and the picnic.

STORY XV

UNCLE WIGGILY'S PICNIC

"Come on, Uncle Wiggily! Wake up! Wake up!" called Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy in the hollow stump bungalow one morning. "Come on!"

"What's that? What's the matter? Is the chimney on fire again?" asked the bunny gentleman, and he was so excited that he slid down the banister, instead of hopping along from step to step as he should have done.

"Of course the chimney isn't on fire!" laughed Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy. "But this is the day for the picnic of the animal children, and you promised to go with them to the woods."

"Oh, so I did!" exclaimed Uncle Wiggily, and he put one paw on his pink nose to stop the twinkling, which started as soon as he grew excited over thinking the chimney was on fire. "Well, I'm glad you called me, Nurse Jane. I'll get ready for the picnic at once. What are you going to put up for lunch?"

"Oh, some carrot bread, turnip cookies, lettuce sandwiches and nut cake," answered the muskrat lady.

"That sounds fine!" laughed Uncle Wiggily. "I'm very glad I'm going to the picnic!"

"Well, you had better hurry and get ready," remarked Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy. "Here come Jackie and Peetie Bow Wow to see if you aren't soon going to start."

Uncle Wiggily looked from the window of his hollow stump bungalow, and saw the two little puppy dog boys coming along.

Jackie was so excited that he stubbed his paw and fell down twice, while Peetie was so anxious to show Uncle Wiggily what was in the package of lunch the puppies were going to take to the woods, that Peetie fell down three times, and turned a back somersault.

"Uncle Wiggily! Uncle Wiggily! Aren't you coming?" barked Jackie.

"Hurry or it may rain and spoil the picnic," added Peetie.

"Oh, I hope not!" answered the bunny gentleman. "For if there is one thing, more than another, that spoils a picnic, it is rain! Snow isn't so bad, for we don't have picnics when it snows."

"Maybe it won't rain," hopefully spoke Nurse Jane, who was busy putting up lunch for Uncle Wiggily. "There isn't a cloud in the sky!"

And, surely enough, when Uncle Wiggily, Nurse Jane and dozens of animal children started off to the woods for their picnic, the sun shone bravely down from the blue sky and a more lovely day could not have been wished for.

The forest where the bunny gentleman, Nurse Jane and the animal children went for their picnic was a large one, with many trees and bushes. There were dozens of places for the squirrels, rabbits, goats, ducks, dogs, pussy cats and others to play; and when they reached the grove they put their lunches under bushes, on the soft cool, green moss and began to have fun.

"Oh, Uncle Wiggily! Please turn skipping rope for us?" begged Brighteyes, the little guinea pig girl.

"And please come play ball with us!" grunted Curly and Floppy Twistytail, the piggie boys.

"Have a game of marbles with us," teased Billie Wagtail, the goat, and Jacko Kinkytail, the monkey chap.

"I'll play with you all in turn," laughed the bunny gentleman. He was in the midst of having fun, and was just gnawing off a piece of wild grape vine to make a swing for Lulu and Alice Wibblewobble, the ducks, when up came hopping Bully No-Tail, the frog boy. Bully was quite excited.

"What's the matter, Bully?" asked Uncle Wiggily.

"Oh, gur-ump!" croaked Bully. "There is a big crowd of boys and girls over on the other side of the pond. They're having a picnic, too! Ger-ump! Ger-ump!"

"Real boys and girls!" added Bawly, who was Bully's brother. "Hump-bump!"

"Well, that will do no harm!" laughed Uncle Wiggily. "Let the real boys and girls have their picnic. They will not see us, for very few boys and girls know how to use their eyes when they go to the woods. I have often hidden beside a bush close to where a boy passed, and he never saw me. Let the boys and girls have their picnic, and we'll have ours!"

So that's the way it was. Uncle Wiggily and the animal children played tag, and they slid down hill. Perhaps you think they could not do this in summer when there was no snow. But the hills in the forest were covered with long, smooth, brown pine needles, and these layers of needles were so slippery that it was easy to slide on them.

And then, all of a sudden, just about when it was time to eat lunch, it began to rain! Oh, how hard the drops pelted down! Rain! Rain! Rain!

"Scurry for shelter--all of you!" cried Nurse Jane. "Get out of the rain!"

The animal boys and girls knew how to take care of themselves in a rain storm, even if they had no umbrellas. Most of them had on fur or feathers which water does not harm. And they snuggled down under trees and bushes, finding shelter and dry spots so that, no matter how hard it poured, they did not get very wet.

They hid their lunches under rocks and overhanging trees so nothing was spoiled. And when the rain was over and the sun came out, as it did, the animal picnic went on as before, and when the food was set out on flat stumps for tables, there was enough for everyone, and plenty left over.

Nurse Jane was looking at what remained of the good things to eat when Jackie Bow Wow, who, with Peetie, had been splashing in a mud puddle, came running up wagging his tail.

"Oh, Uncle Wiggily!" barked Jackie. "What you think? Those real children, on the other side of the wood, they had their things to eat out on some stumps for tables, just as we had, and when the rain came, oh! it spoiled everything!"

"They didn't know how to keep their lunches dry," added Peetie. "Now they haven't anything to eat for their picnic, and they are starting home, and some of the little girls are crying."

"That's too bad!" murmured Uncle Wiggily, kindly. "Too bad that the rain had to spoil their picnic! Now we have plenty of things left that children could eat--nuts, apples, some popcorn and pears," for the animal folk had brought all these, and many more, to the woods with them. "We have lots left over."

"We could give them something to eat," spoke Nurse Jane, "but how are we going to get it to them? We can't call them here; and it would never do to let them see us carrying the things to them."

"No," agreed Uncle Wiggily. "But I think I have a plan. We can make some baskets of birch bark. Some of the animal children--such as Jacko and Jumpo Kinkytail, the monkeys, Joie and Tommie Kat, Johnnie and Billie Bushytail, the squirrels--are good tree climbers. Let them climb trees near where the real children are having their picnic, and lower to them, on grape-vine ropes, the food we have left."

"Oh, yes!" mewed Tommie, the kitten boy. "What jolly fun!"

Quickly Nurse Jane began to gather up the food. Uncle Wiggily put it in birch bark baskets the animal children made and then, with the baskets, fastened to vines, in their paws or claws, the animal boys went through the wood to the place of the other picnic. Uncle Wiggily and the remaining animal children followed.

There the poor, disappointed real children were, looking at their rain-soaked and spoiled lunches. Some of the little girls were crying.

"We might as well go home," grumbled a boy. "Our picnic is no good!"

"Mean old rain!" sighed a girl.

But just then the animal chaps with lunch from Uncle Wiggily's picnic--lunch which had not been rained on--climbed up into trees over the heads of the boys and girls. Not a sound did the animal chaps make. And when the real boys and girls had their backs turned, there were lowered to the stump tables enough good things for a jolly feast--apples, pears, popcorn, nuts and many other dainties.

A little girl happened to turn around and see the birch bark baskets of good things just as the animal boys scurried off through the trees.

"Oh, look!" cried the girl. "The fairies have been here! They have left us some lunch in place of ours that the rain spoiled. Oh, see the fairy lunch!"

And I suppose that is as good a name for it as any, since the boys and girls didn't see Uncle Wiggily's friends lower the baskets from the trees. And the real boys and girls ate the lunch and had a most jolly time, and so did the bunny gentleman and his picnic crowd.

Now if the rubber plant doesn't stretch over and tickle the teapot so that it pours coffee instead of milk into the sugar bowl, you may next hear about Uncle Wiggily in the rain storm.

STORY XVI

UNCLE WIGGILY'S RAIN STORM

Down pelted the rain in Animal Land.

It also poured in Boy and Girl Land, which was on the other side of the forest from where Uncle Wiggily Longears lived in his hollow stump bungalow.

The bunny rabbit gentleman looked out of a window, and saw the drops fall drip, drip, dripping from trees and bushes, making little puddles amid the leaves where birds could come, later, and take a bath.

"You aren't thinking of going out in this storm; are you?" asked Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy, the muskrat lady bungalow-keeper, as she saw Mr. Longears putting on his coat.

"Why, I was, yes," slowly answered the bunny gentleman. "I am neither sugar nor salt, that I will melt in the rain. And, as it isn't freezing, I think I'll take a hop through the woods, and see Grandfather Goosey Gander."

"Well, as long as you are going out, I wish you'd go to the store for me," requested Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy.

"What do you want?" asked the bunny gentleman.

"Oh, bring a muskmelon for dinner," said Nurse Jane.

"A watermelon would be much easier to carry through the rain," Uncle Wiggily answered. "I think I'll bring a watermelon. If it gets wet no harm is done."

"All right," agreed Nurse Jane, laughing, so away hopped the bunny rabbit uncle, over the fields and through the woods. It seemed to rain harder and harder, but Uncle Wiggily did not mind. He had an umbrella, though he did not always carry one. It was made from a toadstool, and it kept off most of the rain. Though, as Mr. Longears said, he was neither a lollypop nor an ice-cream cone that would melt in a shower.

But not everyone was as happy as Uncle Wiggily in this storm. On the other side of the forest, as I told you, was Boy and Girl Land, and in one of the houses lived a brother and a sister. They, too, stood at the window, pressing their noses against the glass as the rain beat down, and they were not happy.

"Rain, rain, go away! Come again some other day! Brother and I want to go and play!"

That is the verse the little girl recited over and over again as she watched the rain pelting down. But the storm did not stop for all that she said the verse backward and frontward.

"Will it ever stop?" crossly cried the boy. "Why doesn't it stop?" and he drummed on the window sill, banged his feet on the floor and whistled. And his sister loudly recited over and over again:

"Rain, rain, go away!"

"Children! Children!" gently called Mother from where she was lying down in the next room. "Can't you please be a little quiet? My head aches and I am trying to rest. The noise makes my pain worse."

"We're sorry, Mother," said the girl.

"But being quiet isn't any fun!" grumbled the boy. "Why can't we go out and play?"

"Because you would get all wet," answered his mother. "I've told you that two or three times, dear. Now please be quiet. It will stop raining sometime, and then you may go out."

"What can we play with?" asked the boy, not very politely I'm sorry to say.

"Why, some of your toys," replied his mother. "Surely you have enough."

"I'm tired of 'em!" grunted the boy.

"So'm I," echoed his sister.

Then she began once more to say the verse about the rain, as if that would do any good, and the boy rubbed his nose up and down the window, making queer marks.

Uncle Wiggily, on his way to see Grandpa Goosey Gander, and get a watermelon for Nurse Jane, took a short cut through a field, and passed the house where the children were kept in on account of the rain. And, as it happened, the window near which the boy and girl stood was open a little way at the top.

So, as the bunny gentleman hopped past, he not only saw the children, but he heard what they said, being able, as I have before related to you, to understand real talk.

But the children were looking up at the sky so intently, trying to see if it would stop raining, that they never noticed Uncle Wiggily. Though if they had seen him, all dressed as he was like a gentleman from the moving pictures, they would have been very much surprised.

"Too bad those children have to stay in on account of the rain," thought Uncle Wiggily. "I wonder if I couldn't find some way of amusing them? If they are tired of their own playthings I might toss in, through the open window, some of the things the animal boys and girls play with. I'll do it!"

Off through the woods in the rain hopped Uncle Wiggily. He found a number of smooth, brown acorns, some of which had the cups, or caps still on. He filled one pocket with the acorns.

Next the bunny picked up some cones from the pine tree. There were large and small cones, and Nurse Jane always used one as a nutmeg grater, it was so rough, while Uncle Wiggily kept one near his bed to scratch his back at night.

"Let me see, what else would the animal children take?" said the bunny to himself. "I think they would take some green moss, and the girls would make beds with it for their dolls. The animal boys would take hollow reeds and blow little pebbles through them as real boys blow beans in their tin shooters. I'll take some moss and reeds."

This the bunny uncle did, also picking up some empty snail and periwinkle shells he found on the bank of a brook.

"The little girl can string these shells for beads," thought the bunny. "And I'll strip off some pieces of white birch bark so the boy can make a little canoe, as the Indians used to do."

Having gathered all these things--playthings which the animal children found in the woods every day--the bunny hopped back to the house of the boy and girl. The window was open, but the boy and girl had left it. The girl was giving her mother a drink of water, and the boy was bringing up some coal for the fire.

"This is my chance!" thought Uncle Wiggily.

Standing outside, he tossed in through the open window the acorns, the pine cones, the shells, the moss and other things. Then he hopped quickly away and hid behind a bush. He could hear the children come back into the room, and soon he heard the girl cry:

"Oh, look what the wind blew in! Some acorns! I can make little cups of them, and use the tops for saucers! And I'll set a play-party table for my doll, and decorate it with green moss. Oh, how perfectly lovely!"

"I'm going to make a boat out of this birch bark!" cried the boy. "And look! A hollow reed, like a bean blower! Now I can have some fun!"

"Look at the lovely shells I can string and make a necklace of!" went on the girl.

"And I can make wooden legs, and a wooden head and stick em on these pine cones and make believe they're Noah's ark animals!" laughed the boy. "Hurray!" he cried most happily.

"What is going on out there?" called Mother from where she was lying down. "Have you found something to play with?"

"Yes'm," answered the boy. "We'll be quiet now."

"And we don't care if it does rain," said the girl. "The wind blew a lot of lovely things in the window!"

But of course we know that Uncle Wiggily tossed them in.

"I guess they'll be all right now, no matter how much it rains," said the bunny, as he hopped along to see Grandpa Goosey, and buy the snowmelon--excuse me, I mean the watermelon--for Nurse Jane.