So Rover made it go as fast as he could, and then all of a sudden that boy went down under the water, out of sight.

“Oh, he’s drowned!” cried Uncle Wiggily sorrowfully.

But he wasn’t, I’m glad to say.  Just then along came Nurse Jane Fuzzy-Wuzzy, the muskrat, swimming.  And she dived away down under and helped bring that boy up to the top of the water, and then Uncle Wiggily and Cover grabbed him as the muskrat lifted him up, and they pulled him into the motor boat, and so saved his life.  And oh! how thankful he was when he was safe on shore, and he was careful never to fall in the water again.

Now, in case the clothes wringer doesn’t squeeze all the juice out of my breakfast orange, I’ll tell you in the next story about Uncle Wiggily making a cherry pie.

STORY XV

UNCLE WIGGILY MAKES A PIE

Do you remember the little boy whom Uncle Wiggily helped save after he fell out of the boat?  Well, that boy’s papa was so glad because Uncle Wiggily had helped save the little chap from drowning that he couldn’t do enough for the old gentleman rabbit.

“You can stay here forever, and have carrot ice cream every day if you like,” the man said.

“Oh, thank you very much, but I think I’ll travel on,” replied Uncle Wiggily.  “I have still to seek my fortune.”

“Why, I will give you a fortune!” said the boy’s papa.  “I will give you a thousand million dollars, and a penny besides.”

“That would be a fine fortune,” spoke the rabbit, “but I would much rather find my own.  It is no fun when you get a thing given to you.  It is better to earn it yourself, and then you think more of it.”

“Yes, that is so,” said the man.  “Well, we will be sorry to see you go.”

Uncle Wiggily started off the next day, once more to seek his fortune, and the little boy felt so sad at seeing him go that he cried, and put his arms around the old gentleman rabbit, and kissed him between the ears.  And Uncle Wiggily felt badly, too.

Well, the old gentleman rabbit traveled on and on for several days after that, sleeping under hay stacks part of the time, or in empty hollow stumps, and sometimes he dug a burrow for himself in the soft ground.

And one afternoon, just as the sun was getting ready to go to bed for the night, Uncle Wiggily came to an open place in the woods where there was a cave, made of a lot of little stones piled up together.

“My!  I wonder who lives there?” thought the rabbit.  “It is too small for a giant to live in, but there may be a bad bear or a savage fox in there.  I guess I’d better get away from here.”

Well, Uncle Wiggily was just going, when, all at once, a voice cried out: 

“Here, hold on there!”

The rabbit looked back, and he saw a great big porcupine, or hedgehog—­you know, those animals like a big gray rabbit, only their fur is the stickery-prickery kind, like needles, and the quills come out and stick in anybody who bites a hedgehog.  So I hope none of you ever bite one.  And they won’t bite you if you don’t bother them.