Excerpt
UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE THIRD KITTEN
Uncle Wiggily Longears, the nice old gentleman rabbit, came walking slowly up the front path that led to his hollow-stump bungalow. He was limping a little on his red, white and blue striped barber-pole rheumatism crutch that Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy, the muskrat lady housekeeper, had gnawed for him out of a corn-stalk.
“Well, I’m glad to be home again,” said the rabbit uncle, sitting down on the front porch to rest a minute. And just then the door in the hollow stump opened, and Nurse Jane, looking out, said:
“Oh, here he is now, Mrs. Purr.”
With that a cat lady came to the door and she said:
“Oh, Uncle Wiggily! I thought you never would come back. Did you find her?”
“Find who?” asked the rabbit gentleman. “I was not looking for any one. I have just been down to Lincoln Park to see some squirrels who live in a hollow tree. They are second cousins to Johnnie and Billie Bushytail, the squirrels who live in our woods. I had a nice visit with them.”
“Then you didn’t find Wuzzo, my third little lost kitten, did you?” asked Mrs. Purr, the cat mother.
“What! Is Wuzzo still lost?” asked the bunny uncle, in great surprise. “I thought she had come home.”
“No, she hasn’t,” said Mrs. Purr. “You know you found my other kittens, Fuzzo and Muzzo, for me, but Wuzzo, the third little kitten, is still lost. She has been away all night, and I came over here the first thing this morning to see if you would not kindly go look for her. But you had already left and I have been waiting here ever since for you to come back.”
“Yes, I stayed longer with the park squirrels than I meant to,” said Uncle Wiggily. “But now I am back I will start off and try to find Wuzzo. It’s too bad your three little kittens ran away.”
They had, you know, as I told you in the two stories before this one. The three little kittens ate cherry pie with their new mittens on. And they soiled their mittens. Then they were so afraid their mother, Mrs. Purr, would scold them that they all ran away.
But Mrs. Purr was a kind cat, and would not have scolded at all. And when she found her little kittens were gone she asked Uncle Wiggily to find them.
“And you did find the first two, Fuzzo and Muzzo,” said the cat lady. “So I am sure you can find the third one, Wuzzo.”
“I hope I can,” Uncle Wiggily said. “I remember now I started off to find her, but my rheumatism hurt me so I had to come back to my bungalow. Then I forgot all about Wuzzo. But I’m all right now, and I’ll start off.”
So away over the fields and through the woods went Uncle Wiggily, looking for the third little lost kitten. When he had found the two others he had helped them wash the pie-juice off their mittens, so they were nice and clean. And then the kittens were not afraid to go home.
Uncle Wiggily looked all over for the third little kitten, under bushes, up in trees (for cats climb trees, you know), and even behind big rocks Uncle Wiggily looked....