“Where are we going?” asked the elephant, who had run away from the circus man to travel by himself.

“Oh, to some place where we may find our fortune,” said the old gentleman rabbit.

“I would much rather find some snails to eat,” said Grandfather Goosey Gander, the old gentleman duck, as I shall call him for short.  “For I am very hungry.”

“What’s that?” cried the rabbit.  “Hungry after the nice pie I made for you?”

“Oh, that was some time ago.  I could eat another pie right now,” spoke the old duck.  But there wasn’t any pie for him, so he had to eat a cornmeal sandwich with watercress salad on, and Uncle Wiggily ate some carrots and cabbage, and the elephant ate a lot of grass from a field—­oh! a terrible lot—­about ten bushels, I guess.

Then, all at once, as they were walking along over a bridge, a man suddenly jumped out from behind a tree, and cried: 

“Ah, ha!  Now you won’t get away from me, Mr. Elephant.  This time I am surely going to take you back to the circus.”  And with that he threw a rope around the elephant’s trunk, and led him away.  The elephant cried so many tears that there was a muddy puddle right near the bridge, and the big animal begged to be allowed to stay with Uncle Wiggily and Grandpa Goosey Gander, but the man said it could not be done.

“Well, then, you and I will have to go on together,” said the old gentleman rabbit to the duck, after a bit.  “Perhaps we may find our fortune.”

“I think I could make money calling out ‘honk-honk!’ on an automobile,” said the grandfather.  “Jimmie Wibblewobble once did that for a man.  I think I’ll look for a nice automobile gentleman to work for, and if I get money enough we’ll be rich.”

Well, he looked and looked, but no one seemed to want an old duck for an auto horn, and the rabbit and Grandfather Goosey Gander kept on traveling together, over the fields and through the woods.

Pretty soon they came to a place where a June bug was sitting on the edge of a stone wall, buzzing his wings.

“Let’s ask him where we can find our fortunes,” said Uncle Wiggily.  So they asked the June bug.

“Well,” replied the buzzing creature, “I am not sure, but a little way from here are two roads.  One or the other might bring you to your fortune.  One goes to the right, the other to the left hand.”

“We will take the left hand road,” said Uncle Wiggily.  “We will go down that for some distance, and if we do not find a pot of gold, or some ice cream cones at the end of it, we will come back, and try the other road.”

So Uncle Wiggily and Grandfather Goosey Gander went down the left road.  On and on they went, walking in the dust when there was any dust, and in the mud when there was any mud.  But they didn’t find any gold.

“Oh, let’s go back and try the other road,” said the rabbit gentleman after a bit.  “Perhaps that will be better.”