He peeked through the bushes, and there he saw two big, bad foxes, whose tongues were hanging out over their white teeth, for the foxes had run far and they were tired.

“I see how it is,” Uncle Wiggily thought.  “The foxes chased the little puppy dogs as they were coming from school and Jackie and Peetie have run somewhere and hidden.  I must find them.”

Just then one of the foxes cried: 

“Come on.  Now we’ll chase after those puppies, and get them.  Come on!”

“Ha!  I must go, too!” thought Uncle Wiggily.  “Maybe I can scare away the foxes, and save Jackie and Peetie.”

So the foxes ran and Uncle Wiggily also ran, and pretty soon the rabbit gentleman came to a place in the woods where grew a tree with big white blossoms on it, and in the center the blossoms were colored a dark red.

“Ha!  There are the puppy boys under that tree!” cried one fox, and, surely enough, there, right under the tree, Jackie and Peetie were crouched, trembling and much frightened.

“We’ll get them!” cried the other fox.  “Come on!”

And then, all of a sudden, as the foxes leaped toward the poor little puppy dog boys, that tree began to hark and growl and it cried out loud: 

“Get away from here, you bad foxes!  Leave Jackie and Peetie alone!  Wow!  Bow-wow!  Gurr-r-r-r!” and the tree barked and roared so like a lion that the foxes were frightened and were glad enough to run away, taking their tails with them.  Then Jackie and Peetie came safely out, and thanked the tree for taking care of them.

[Illustration:  The tree barked and roared so like a lion that the foxes were frightened and were glad enough to run away.]

“Oh, you are welcome,” said the tree.  “I am the dogwood tree, you know, so why should I not bark and growl to scare foxes, and take care of you little puppy chaps?  Come to me again whenever any bad foxes chase you.”  And Peetie and Jackie said they would.

So Uncle Wiggily, after also thanking the tree, took the doggie boys home, and they told him how the foxes had chased them soon after they came from school, so they had to run.

But everything came out all right, you see, and if the black cat doesn’t dip his tail in the ink, and make chalk marks all over the piano, I’ll tell you next about Uncle Wiggily and the hazel nuts.

STORY XVIII

UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE HAZEL NUTS

“Going out again, Uncle Wiggily?” asked Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy, one morning, as she saw the rabbit gentleman taking his red, white and blue-striped rheumatism crutch down off the clock shelf.

“Well, yes, Janie, I did think of going out for a little stroll in the forest,” answered the bunny uncle, talking like a phonograph.  What he meant was that he was going for a walk in the woods, but he thought he’d be polite about it, and stylish, just for once.