And, surely enough, looking out of the window, the piggie boy andUncle Wiggily saw a bad wolf running over the snow toward them. Thewolf knocked on the door of the straw house and cried:
"Little pig! Little pig! Let me come in."
"No! No! By the hair of my chinny-chin-chin. I will not let you in!"answered Grunter, just like in the book.
"Then I'll puff and I'll blow, and I'll blow your house in!" howledthe wolf. Then he puffed and he blew, and, all of a sudden, overwent the straw house. But, just as it was falling down, UncleWiggily cried:
"Quick, Grunter, come with me! I'll dig a hole for us in the pileof snow that I made back of your house and in there we'll hide wherethe wolf can't find us!" Then the rabbit gentleman, with his strongpaws, just made for digging, burrowed a hole in the snow-bank, andas the straw house toppled down, into this hole he crawled withGrunter.
"Now I've got you!" cried the wolf, as he blew down the firstlittle pig's straw house. But when the wolf looked he couldn't seeGrunter or Uncle Wiggily at all, because they were hiding in thesnow-bank.
"Well, well!" howled the wolf. "This isn't like the book at all!Where is that little pig?"
But the wolf could not find Grunter, and soon the bad creature wentaway, fearing to catch cold in his eyes. Then Uncle Wiggily andGrunter came out of the snow-bank and were safe, and Uncle Wiggilytook Grunter home to the rabbit house to stay until Mother Goosecame, some time afterward, to get the first little pig boy.
"Thank you very much, Uncle Wiggily," said Mother Goose, "for beingkind to one of my friends."
"Pray don't mention it. I had a fine adventure, besides saving alittle pig," said the rabbit gentleman. "I wonder what will happento me to-morrow?"
And we shall soon see for, if the snowball doesn't wrap itself up inthe parlor rug to hide away from the jam tart, when it comes homefrom the moving pictures, I'll tell you next about Uncle Wiggily andthe second little pig.
CHAPTER III
UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE SECOND PIG
"There! It's all done!" exclaimed Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy, the nicemuskrat lady housekeeper, who, with Uncle Wiggily Longears, therabbit gentleman, was staying in the Littletail rabbit house, sincethe hollow-stump bungalow had burned down.
"What's all done?" asked Uncle Wiggily, looking over the tops of hisspectacles.
"These jam tarts I baked for Billie and Nannie Wagtail, the goatchildren," said Nurse Jane. "Will you take them with you when you goout for a walk, Uncle Wiggily, and leave them at the goat house?"
"I most certainly will," said the rabbit gentleman, very politely."Is there anything else I can do for you, Nurse Jane?"
But the muskrat lady wanted nothing more, and, wrapping up the jamtarts in a napkin so they would not catch cold, she gave them to Mr.Longears to take to the two goat children.
Uncle Wiggily was walking along, wondering what sort of an adventurehe would have that day, or whether he would meet Mother Goose again,when all at once he heard a voice speaking from behind some bushes.
"Yes, I think I will build my house here," the voice said. "The wolfis sure to find me anyhow, and I might as well have it over with.I'll make my house here."
Uncle Wiggily looked over the bushes, and there he saw a funnylittle animal boy, with some pieces of wood on his shoulder.
"Hello!" cried Uncle Wiggily, making his nose twinkle in a mostjilly-jolly way. "Who are you, and what are you going to do?"
"Why, I am Squeaker, the second little pig, and I am going to make ahouse of wood," was the answer. "Don't you remember how it reads inthe Mother Goose book? 'Once upon a time there were three littlepigs, named Grunter, Squeaker and----'"
"Oh, yes, I remember!" Uncle Wiggily said. "I met your brotherGrunter yesterday, and helped him build his straw house."
"That was kind of you," spoke Squeaker. "I suppose the bad old wolfgot him, though. Too bad! Well, it can't be helped, as it is thatway in the book."
"Little pig! Little pig! Let me come in!"]
Uncle Wiggily didn't say anything about having saved Grunter, for hewanted to surprise Squeaker, so the rabbit gentleman just twinkledhis nose again and asked:
"May I have the pleasure of helping you build your house of wood?"
"Indeed you may, thank you," said Squeaker. "I suppose the old wolfwill be along soon, so we had better hurry to get the housefinished."
Then the second little pig and Uncle Wiggily built the wooden house.When it was almost finished Uncle Wiggily went out near the backdoor, and began piling up some cakes of ice to make a sort of box.
"What are you doing?" asked Squeaker.
"Oh, I'm just making a place where I can put these jam tarts I havefor Nannie and Billie Wagtail," the rabbit gentleman answered. "Idon't want the wolf to get them when he blows down your house."
"Oh, dear!" sighed Squeaker. "I rather wish, now, he didn't have toblow over my nice wooden house, and get me. But he has to, I s'pose,'cause it's in the book."
Still, Uncle Wiggily didn't say anything, but he just sort ofblinked his eyes and twinkled his pink nose, until, all of a sudden,Squeaker looked across the snowy fields, and he cried:
"Here comes the bad old wolf now!"
And, surely enough, along came the growling, howling creature. Heran up to the second little pig's wooden house, and, rapping on thedoor with his paw, cried:
"Little pig! Little pig! Let me come in!"
"No, no! By the hair on my chinny-chin-chin I will not let you in,"said the second little pig, bravely.
"Then I'll puff and I'll blow, and I'll puff and I'll blow, and blowyour house in!" howled the wolf.
Then he puffed out his cheeks, and he took a long breath and he blewwith all his might and main and suddenly:
"Cracko!"
Down went the wooden house of the second little piggie, and onlythat Uncle Wiggily and Squeaker jumped to one side they would havebeen squashed as flat as a pancake, or even two pancakes.
"Quick!" cried the rabbit gentleman in the piggie boy's ear. "Thisway! Come with me!"
"Where are we going?" asked Squeaker, as he followed the rabbitgentleman over the cracked and broken boards, which were all thatwas left of the house.
"We are going to the little cabin that I made out of cakes of ice,behind your wooden house," said Uncle Wiggily. "I put the jam tartsin it, but there is also room for us, and we can hide there untilthe bad wolf goes off."
"Well, that isn't the way it is in the book," said the second littlepig. "But----"
"No matter!" cried Uncle Wiggily. "Hurry!" So he and Squeaker hid inthe ice cabin back of the blown-down house, and when the bad wolfcame poking along among the broken boards, to get the little pig, hecouldn't find him. For Uncle Wiggily had closed the door of the iceplace, and as it was partly covered with snow the wolf could not seethrough.
"Oh, dear!" howled the wolf. "That's twice I've been fooled by thosepigs! It isn't like the book at all. I wonder where he can havegone?"
But he could not find Squeaker or Uncle Wiggily either, and finallythe wolf's nose became so cold from sniffing the ice that he had togo home to warm it, and so Uncle Wiggily and Squeaker were safe.
"Oh, I don't know how to thank you," said the second little piggieboy as the rabbit gentleman took him home to Mother Goose, afterhaving left the jam tarts at the home of the Wagtail goats.
"Pray do not mention it," spoke Uncle Wiggily, modest like, and shy."It was just an adventure for me."
He had another adventure the following day, Uncle Wiggily did. Andif the dusting brush doesn't go swimming in the soap dish, and getall lather so that it looks like a marshmallow cocoanut cake, I'lltell you next about Uncle Wiggily and the third little pig.
CHAPTER IV
UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE THIRD PIG
Uncle Wiggily Longears sat in the burrow, or house under the ground,where he and Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy, the muskrat lady, lived withthe Littletail family of rabbits since the hollow-stump bungalow hadburned.
"Oh, dea
r!" sounded a grunting, woofing sort of voice over near onewindow.
"Oh, dear!" squealed another voice from under the table.
"Well, well! What is the matter with you two piggie boys?" askedUncle Wiggily, as he took down from the sideboard his red, white andblue barber-pole striped rheumatism crutch that Nurse Jane hadgnawed for him out of a cornstalk.
"What's the trouble, Grunter and Squeaker?" asked the rabbitgentleman.
"We are lonesome for our brother," said the two little piggie boysNo. 1 and No. 2. "We want to see Twisty-Tail."
For the first and second little pigs, after having been saved byUncle Wiggily, and taken home to Mother Goose, had come back to paya visit to the bunny gentleman.
"Well, perhaps I may meet Twisty-Tail when I go walking to-day,"spoke Uncle Wiggily. "If I do I'll bring him home with me."
"Oh, goodie!" cried Grunter and Squeaker. For they were the firstand second little pigs, you see. Uncle Wiggily had saved Grunterfrom the bad wolf when the growling creature blew down Grunter'sstraw house. And, in almost the same way, the bunny uncle had savedSqueaker, when his wooden house was blown over by the wolf. ButTwisty-Tail, the third little pig, Uncle Wiggily had not yet helped.
"I'll look for Twisty-Tail to-day," said the rabbit gentleman as hestarted off for his adventure walk, which he took every afternoonand morning.
On and on went Uncle Wiggily Longears over the snow-covered fields andthrough the wood, until just as he was turning around the corner nearan old red stump, the rabbit gentleman heard a clinkity-clankitysort of a noise, and the sound of whistling.
"Ha! Some one is happy!" thought the bunny uncle. "That's a goodsign--whistling. I wonder who it is?"
He looked around the stump corner and he saw a little animal chap,with blue rompers on, and a fur cap stuck back of his left ear, andthis little animal chap was whistling away as merrily as a butterflyeating butterscotch candy.
"Why, that must be the third little pig!" exclaimed Uncle Wiggily."Hello!" called the rabbit gentleman. "Are you Twisty-Tail?"
"That's my name," answered the little pig, "and, as you see, I ambuilding my house of bricks, just as it tells about in the MotherGoose book."
And, surely enough, Twisty-Tail was building a little house of redbricks, and it was the tap-tap-tapping of his trowel, ormortar-shovel, that made the clinkity-clankity noise.
"Do you know me, Uncle Wiggily?" asked the piggie boy. "You see I amin a book. 'Once upon a time there were three little pigs, and----'"
"I know all about you," interrupted Uncle Wiggily. "I have metMother Goose, and also your two brothers."
"They didn't know how to build the right kind of houses, and so thewolf got them," said Twisty-Tail. "I am sorry, but it had to happenthat way, just as it is in the book."
Uncle Wiggily smiled, but said nothing.
"I met a man with a load of bricks, and I begged some of them tobuild my house," said Twisty-Tail. "No wolf can get me. No, sir-ee!I'll build my house very strong, not weak like my brothers'. No,indeed!"
"I'll help you build your house," offered Uncle Wiggily, kindly, andjust as he and Twisty-Tail finished the brick house and put on theroof it began to rain and freeze.
"We are through just in time," said Twisty-Tail, as he and therabbit gentleman hurried inside. "I don't believe the wolf will comeout in such weather."
But just as he said that and looked from the window, the littlepiggie boy gave a cry, and said:
"Oh, here comes the bad animal now! But he can't get in my house, orblow it over, 'cause the book says he didn't."
The wolf came up through the freezing rain and knocking on the thirdpiggie boy's brick house, said:
"Little pig! Little pig! Let me come in!"
"No! No! By the hair of my chinny-chin-chin, I will not let you in!"grunted Twisty-Tail.
"Then I'll puff and I'll blow, and I'll blow your house in!" howledthe wolf.
"You can't! The book says so!" laughed the little pig. "My house isa strong, brick one. You can't get me!"
"Just you wait!" growled the wolf. So he puffed out his cheeks, andhe blew and he blew, but he could not blow down the brick house,because it was so strong.
"Well, I'm in no hurry," the wolf said. "I'll sit down and wait foryou to come out."
So the wolf sat down on his tail to wait outside the brick house.After a while Twisty-Tail began to get hungry.
"Did you bring anything to eat, Uncle Wiggily?" he asked.
"No, I didn't," answered the rabbit gentleman. "But if the old wolfwould go away I'd take you where your two brothers are visiting withme in the Littletail family rabbit house and you could have all youwant to eat."
Rut the wolf would not go away, even when Uncle Wiggily asked himto, most politely, making a bow and twinkling his nose.
"I'm going to stay here all night," the wolf growled. "I am notgoing away. I am going to get that third little pig!"
"Are you? Well, we'll see about that!" cried the rabbit gentleman.Then he took a rib out of his umbrella, and with a piece of his shoelace (that he didn't need) for a string he made a bow like theIndians used to have.
"If I only had an arrow now I could shoot it from my umbrella-bow,hit the wolf on the nose and make him go away," said Uncle Wiggily.Then he looked out of the window and saw where the rain, drippingfrom the roof, had frozen into long, sharp icicles.
"Ha!" cried Uncle Wiggily. "An icicle will make the best kind of anarrow! Now I'll shoot the wolf, not hard enough to hurt him, butjust hard enough to make him run away."
Reaching out the window Uncle Wiggily broke off a sharp icicle. Heput this ice arrow in his bow and, pulling back the shoe string,"twang!" he shot the wolf on the nose.
"Oh, wow! Oh, double-wow! Oh, custard cake!" howled the wolf. "Thisisn't in the Mother Goose book at all. Not a single pig did I get!Oh, my nose! Ouch!"
Then he ran away, and Uncle Wiggily and Twisty-Tail could comesafely out of the brick house, which they did, hurrying home to thebunny house where Grunter and Squeaker were, to get something toeat. So everything came out right, you see, and Uncle Wiggily savedthe three little pigs, one after the other.
And if the canary bird doesn't go swimming in the rice pudding, andeat out all the raisin seeds, so none is left for the parrot, I'lltell you next of Uncle Wiggily and Little Boy Blue.
CHAPTER V
UNCLE WIGGILY AND LITTLE BOY BLUE
"Uncle Wiggily, are you very busy to-day?" asked Nurse Jane FuzzyWuzzy, the muskrat lady housekeeper, who, with the old rabbitgentleman, was on a visit to the Bushytail family of squirrels intheir hollow-tree home.
After staying a while with the Littletail rabbits, when hishollow-stump bungalow had burned down, the bunny uncle went to visitJohnnie and Billie Bushytail.
"Are you very busy, Uncle Wiggily?" asked the muskrat lady.
"Why, no, Nurse Jane, not so very," answered the bunny uncle. "Isthere something you would like me to do for you?" he asked, with apolite bow.
"Well, Mrs. Bushytail and I have just baked some pies," said themuskrat lady, "and we thought perhaps you might like to take one toyour friend, Grandfather Goosey Gander."
"Fine!" cried Uncle Wiggily, making his nose twinkle like a star ona Christmas tree in the dark. "Grandpa Goosey will be glad to get apie. I'll take him one."
"We have it all ready for you," said Mrs. Bushytail, the squirrelmother of Johnnie and Billie, as she came in the sitting-room. "It'sa nice hot pie, and it will keep your paws warm, Uncle Wiggily, asyou go over the ice and snow through the woods and across thefields."
"Fine!" cried the bunny uncle again. "I'll get ready and go atonce."
Uncle Wiggily put on his warm fur coat, fastened his tall silk haton his head, with his ears sticking up through holes cut in thebrim, so it would not blow off, and then, taking his red, white andblue striped rheumatism crutch, that Nurse Jane had gnawed for himout of a cornstalk, away he started. He carried the hot apple pie ina basket over his paw.
"Grandpa Goosey will surely
like this pie," said Uncle Wiggily tohimself, as he lifted the napkin that was over it to take a littlesniff. "It makes me hungry myself. And how nice and warm it is," hewent on, as he put one cold paw in the basket to warm it; warm hispaw I mean, not the basket.
Over the fields and through the woods hopped the bunny uncle. Itbegan to snow a little, but Uncle Wiggily did not mind that, for hewas well wrapped up.
When he was about halfway to Grandpa Goosey's house Uncle Wiggilyheard, from behind a pile of snow, a sad sort of crying voice.
"Hello!" exclaimed the bunny uncle, "that sounds like some one introuble. I must see if I can help them."
Uncle Wiggily looked over the top of the pile of snow, and, sittingon the ground, in front of a big icicle, was a boy all dressed inblue. Even his eyes were blue, but you could not very well see them,as they were filled with tears.
"Oh, dear! Oh, dear!" said Uncle Wiggily, kindly. "This is quite toobad! What is the matter, little fellow; and who are you?"
"I am Little Boy Blue, from the home of Mother Goose," was theanswer, "and the matter is that it's lost!"
"What is lost?" asked Uncle. "If it's a penny I will help you findit."
"It isn't a penny," answered Boy Blue. "It's the hay stack which Ihave to sleep under. I can't find it, and I must see where it is orelse things won't be as they are in the Mother Goose book. Don't youknow what it says?" And he sang:
"Little Boy Blue, come blow your horn, There are sheep in the meadow and cows in the corn. Where's Little Boy Blue, who looks after the sheep? Why he's under the hay stack, fast asleep.