“Who is crying?  Does any one need help?”

“Yes,” replied Alice, “I do.  I’ve cut my foot, and I’ve dented the butter in several places, but that doesn’t matter much, and I’ve spilled the cornmeal.”

“Oh, what a lot of troubles for one poor little duck girl!” cried the voice again.  “Perhaps, I can help you,” and who should come along but Uncle Wiggily Longears, the nice old gentleman rabbit.  “Let us see what’s the trouble,” he went on, and he put his strongest spectacles over his nose and he looked at the cut in Alice’s foot.  Then he cried: 

“Oh, I should say that was a cut!  Oh, my, yes!  No doubt about it whatever!  But there, don’t cry,” he added, for he saw some tears running down Alice’s yellow bill.  “I’ll fix it for you.”

So he got some nice, soft leaves, and he tied them on her sore foot with some stout grass.  Then she felt better, but she couldn’t walk, and she didn’t know how she was ever going to get home.  So she asked Uncle Wiggily.

“Why, the easiest thing in the world!” cried Uncle Wiggily.  “All I have to do is to say a little verse, and I’ll think of a way.”  So he said this little verse: 

    “Wiggily, waggily, woggily wome,
     How shall I get Alice home? 
     She has hurt herself quite much
     And she’ll have to use my crutch.”

Of course, Uncle Wiggily knew that wasn’t a very good verse, but it was the best he could do.

“You shall use my cornstalk crutch, that Nurse Jane Fuzzy-Wuzzy made for me,” he went on.  “It will be just the thing.”

“Won’t you need it?” asked Alice, very politely.

“No,” said Uncle Wiggily.  “My rheumatism is much better to-day.  You may have it,” and he fitted it under Alice’s wing, and she could walk pretty well, not having to use her sore foot.

Then that kind old rabbit scraped up all the cornmeal, and he put some in his big left ear and some in his big right ear, because the bag was broken, and he carried the dented butter, which wasn’t hurt the least mite.

Then they started for the duck pen and they reached it safely, Alice limping along as well as she could.  And Uncle Wiggily told Mamma Wibblewobble about the accident, after he had emptied his left ear and his right ear of the cornmeal and had handed over the dented butter.  Dr. Possum was called in to put some salve on Alice’s foot, and she was soon better.

Now that’s all to-night, but, if the moving man doesn’t take my typewriter away, I shall tell you to-morrow night about Jimmie in a tall tree.

STORY XXIII

JIMMIE IN A TALL TREE

It had rained in the morning, and of course the grounds were too slippery and wet to play ball.  That is, they were for Sammie Littletail and Billie and Johnnie Bushytail, but naturally Jimmie Wibblewobble, the boy duck, and Bully, the boy frog, would not have minded the wet the least bit.  But there wasn’t any ball game, and so Jimmie was playing all alone in the woods back of his house, and wishing it hadn’t rained.