“where is my bunny boy?” and the worried lady rabbit hopped out of
the kitchen of the tiny white bungalow down to the edge of the Sunny
Meadow. Shading her eyes with her paw, she looked up the old Cow Path
to the Big Red Barn, but no little bunny boy could she see there or
anywhere.
“Dear me!” she sighed again, “what has become of him. I hope Danny
Fox isn’t chasing him in the Shady Forest.”
For some time she stood at the edge of the Old Bramble Patch, looking
across the meadow, but at last she turned and hopped up the little
path through the brambles to the tiny garden in the rear of her
pretty white bungalow.
“I’ll pick some carrots and lettuce,” she said to herself. Filling
her apron, she had hardly turned to hop into her neat little kitchen
when, all of a sudden, just like that, quick as the wind that blows
off your hat, over the Old Rail Fence jumped Danny Fox.
“Oh, dear, oh, dear!” she cried.
“My dear, my dear!” laughed Danny Fox, creeping toward her, “how
sweet and tender you look!”
Poor little Lady Love dropped the carrots and lettuce and hopped
toward the barn, but Wicked Danny Fox was too quick for her. Then she
tried to hop over to the woodpile, but the nimble old beast again
jumped in front of her.
“You’d better let me put you in my bag,” snarled the cruel beast. “If
you don’t, I’ll bite off your left ear.”
“Please, oh, please, don’t touch me,” cried the frightened little
bunny lady. “Oh, oh, oh.”
Just then a friendly bark sounded near, and the next minute over the
fence came the Yellow Dog Tramp.
“Get out!” he shouted, and, picking up a stick of wood, he hit the
old fox over the head.
“Ouch! ouch!” yelled that old robber, and away he sneaked, leaving
Lady Love and the kind dog to pick up the carrots and lettuce leaves.
“Dear me,” thought the old fox, as he ran into the Shady Forest, “it
grows worse every day. Some one always comes at the wrong time.”
Yes, indeed, this old robber hardly knew what to do. Every time he
started out from his den in the rocky hillside, somebody would call
over the wireless:
“Danny Fox is going hunting!”
After that warning, of course, everybody locked his front door and
bolted his back door and pulled down the window shades.
“My dear,” he said, one dark gloomy night to Mrs. Fox, “maybe I can
bring home a chicken—it’s dark enough to hide me.”
So off he started with a big empty bag over his shoulder. As he
softly crept through the Shady Forest he saw a little twinkling star.
“Now, who’s that, I wonder?” he asked himself in a whisper. But, of
course, as he didn’t know, he got no answer.
“I must be careful,” he thought, “it might be the Policeman Dog’s
lantern.”
So the old robber fox hid behind a tree and waited. By and by, after
a while, who should come along but a firefly. My, how her little
lantern flickered and flared in the wind.
“Oh, ho!” said Danny Fox, “who’s afraid? I’m glad it’s not the
Policeman Dog!”
The little firefly kept on her way, for, of course, she hadn’t heard
Danny Fox thinking. As her little light had disappeared in the
darkness the old robber came out of his hiding place.
Then off he started again for the henhouse.
By and by he reached the Old Barnyard. But just as he crept around
the Big Red Barn, Old Sic’em, the farmer’s dog, looked out of his
wooden house.
“Bow, wow!” he went, tugging at the chain which kept him home nights
in his little bungalow, “wow.”
“Keep quiet, can’t you,” whined Danny Fox.
“Get out!” snarled Old Sic’em. “I’ll call the farmer.”
Just then who should hop by in the moonlight but Little Jack Rabbit
on his way home.
“I guess I’ll catch that little bunny,” thought the old fox, sneaking
around to the Big Red Barn.
“Now where is the old robber going?” the Weathercock asked himself,
as he swung to and fro on his gilded toe.
He needn’t have asked that question, though, for just then he spied
Little Jack Rabbit and a second later, Danny Fox.
“Dear, dear me!” thought the kind Weathercock, “I don’t want that
wicked fox to catch that nice little bunny. What shall I do?”
All of a sudden he remembered the radio. On top of the Big Red Barn
the Farmer’s Boy had fastened a set of wires which led down to his
little room in the loft.
“Hello! hello!” shouted the Weathercock. “Danny Fox is after Little
Jack Rabbit!”
The Farmer’s Boy must have heard him, for out of bed he jumped to
call through the transmitter:
“Danny Fox is after Little Jack Rabbit! Danny Fox is out hunting!”
“Ha, ha!” exclaimed the Policeman Dog, as the message rang out in the
Station House and, picking up his club, off he started for the Shady
Forest.
Just then a soft voice whispered from the treetop:
“Danny Fox is close to the heels of Little Jack Rabbit.”
The dear little bunny was hopping down the forest trail happy as
could be. He didn’t know that close behind was crafty Danny Fox. No,
siree! He thought he was safe enough. Why, he never had a thought of
danger.
“I’ll soon be home with Mother,” he said to himself when, all of a
sudden—dear, dear! Will something dreadful happen?
“Now I’ll get you!” snarled Danny Fox.
“No, not yet!” barked the Policeman Dog, swinging his club. Whack!
Down it came on the old fox’s head.
“Now, run!” shouted the Policeman Dog. And maybe Little Jack Rabbit
didn’t go! Why, he went so fast that he left his shadow a mile behind
him!
Then back to the Station House trotted the Policeman Dog, leaving the
sly fox to get home as best he could.
In a few minutes the little bunny was safe in the dear Old Bramble
Patch.
“Mother dear,” he said the next morning, “can’t I have a radio outfit
for my very own?”
“Call up the Three-in-One-Cent Store and find out what it will cost,”
she answered.
It took the little rabbit bunny boy just a minute or three to call up
“Rabbitville, 1, 2, 3.
Hurry up! It’s little me.”
[Illustration: “Now I’ll get you” snarled Danny Fox.]
“Who’s Little Me?” asked a voice. Then, of course the little rabbit
had to explain who he was, whether it looked like rain, and why the
clover tops were not so red as last year. You see, the person in
the Three-in-One-Cent Store was a very curious person, always trying
to find out what was going on in the Shady Forest and the Sunny
Meadow. Maybe he had once been a country boy rabbit before going into
business at Rabbitville, U. S. A.
By and by he figured out what the cost of a radio outfit would be.
“When do you want it installed?” he asked, which means, set up.
“Wait till I ask mother,” answered the little bunny, hopping into
the kitchen where the pretty lady bunny was making carrot cake and
lollypop stew for supper.
“Dear, dear me!” she exclaimed, on learning that it would cost 230
carrot cents. “You’d better call up your Uncle Lucky. He’s rich
enough to put in a dozen. Maybe he’ll order one for you. I wish I had
the money,” and sweet Lady Love picked up her little boy rabbit and
kissed him three times, once on the left cheek, twice on the right
cheek and, last and best, on the mouth. “There now, run along.”
So away he hopped back to the receiver to tell the rabbit clerk at
the Three-in-One-Cent Store that unless Uncle Lucky supplied the
money there’d be no radio at the little white bungalow in the Old
Bramble Patch.
“Too bad, and yet not so worse. Your Uncle Lucky is so fond of you
that he might buy you a little Luckymobile some day, pretty soon,”
answered the clerk.
After saying good-by, Little Jack Rabbit asked Central to give him:
“One, Two, Three,
Ring Happy Bell,
Uncle Lucky in Clover Dell.”
In a moment Uncle Lucky shouted: “Hello, hello! Who’s calling me?”
“Little Jack Rabbit,” answered the bunny boy, quick as a wink. “I
want a radio set, but I haven’t enough money. All the other little
boys are going to get one.”
“I don’t care if the radio set costs a million carrot cents,” shouted
dear Uncle Lucky over the telephone when the bunny salesman at the
Three-in-One-Cent Store suggested that a radio outfit was rather
expensive. “Nothing is too good for my little nephew. Put it in right
away so that he can listen to David Cory’s stories.”
“All right, Mr. Lucky Lefthindfoot,” respectfully answered the
Three-in-One-Cent Store salesman, hanging up the receiver.
“This afternoon I’ll motor over to the Old Bramble Patch,” said the
old gentleman rabbit to himself, sitting down in his comfortable
armchair to read the _Bunnybridge Bugle_. After luncheon he hopped
out to the garage and, telling the Old Red Rooster to weed the
lettuce patch, set out for Little Jack Rabbit’s bungalow.
“Dear me! He had gone only a little way, not so very far, when
something went wrong with the Luckymobile. Dear me! again. By the
time it was mended, Mr. Happy Sun was nearly ready for bed. At last,
however, dear Uncle Lucky arrived at the Old Bramble Patch, with
his old wedding stovepipe hat and blue silk polkadot handkerchief.
Honking the horn maybe a million times, less or more, he hopped out
and into the little kitchen where Lady Love and her bunny boy were
eating supper.
“Have you got any clover top pie?” asked the old gentleman rabbit,
hanging up his old wedding stovepipe hat.
Of course Lady Love had. She had everything that was good to eat, you
may be sure.
As soon as the supper dishes were cleared away, the three little
rabbits hopped into the sitting room to hear the victrola sing:
“Oh, early in the morning
Before the sun is high,
I love to hunt for cherries
In mother’s apple pie.
And if Old Mother Hubbard
Can’t find her dog a bone,
I’ll take him to the candy store
To get an ice cream cone.”
“Ha, ha!” laughed Uncle Lucky, and he told a funny story of a crab
who, by walking backwards into an orchard, made all the trees bear
crab apples, which so provoked the farmer that he boiled the crab and
ate him for supper.
By and by the little cuckoo began to sing from her little clock
house: “Time for bed, time for bed!” At once the three little rabbits
hopped upstairs, first blowing out all the electric lights so that
Hungry Hawk, who is always looking for little mice and rabbits,
wouldn’t be able to see the little white bungalow.
And when everything was quiet a tiny fly asked Little Miss Cricket:
“Is there any cheese in Lady Love’s cupboard?”
But the little cricket wouldn’t tell where Lady Love kept all her
good things and neither would I and neither would the canary bird who
was sound asleep with her head under her wing.
The next morning, bright and early, Uncle Lucky shouted over the
’phone: “Is this the Three-in-One Cent Store? Don’t forget to put in
Little Jack Rabbit’s radio apparatus?”
“We’ll have it installed to-day—don’t worry.”
“Let’s invite all our friends over to-night,” said Uncle Lucky,
turning to Little Jack Rabbit.
In less than five hundred short seconds the two little bunnies were
speeding away. Pretty soon they saw Squirrel Nutcracker on the
doorstep of his Chestnut Tree House.
“Come over to-night and listen in over our new radio,” shouted the
bunny boy.
“I’ll be there, thank you!” replied the old squirrel.
Next, Busy Beaver said he’d come; also Sammy Skunk and the Big Brown
Bear. Then Uncle Lucky stopped at the Old Duck Pond to invite
Granddaddy Bullfrog and Taddy Tadpole.
“What’s all the noise about?” asked pretty Mrs. Oriole from her
stocking-like nest on the Old Willow Tree.
“Come over to my radio party to-night,” answered Little Jack Rabbit,
as he drove over to the Barnyard.
“I’ll come,” crowed Cocky Doodle.
“I’ll be there,” said Goosey Lucy.
“I won’t be a second late,” promised Turkey Tim.
“Yes, we’ll come,
Make no mistake,
And don’t forget
The Angel Cake!”
shouted all the Barnyard Folk.
“Ha! ha!” laughed Little Jack Rabbit, “won’t we have a dandy radio
party?”
BUNNY TALE 6
MR. WICKED WOLF
“Hop out of bed and wash your face
And neatly part your hair
Right down the middle of your back,
Then hurry down the stair,”
sounded the wake-up song of the musical alarm clock.
Out of bed hopped Little Jack Rabbit and in a few minutes he was
ready for breakfast—nice carrot porridge with lettuce cream, turnip
toast and a stewed lollypop. After he had polished the front door
knob, fed the canary and filled with kindling the woodbox behind the
kitchen stove, he kissed Lady Love good-by.
“Do be careful!” cautioned his pretty bunny mother, smoothing the
blue bow at his little white throat. “Do be careful. Danny Fox is
everywhere.”
“Don’t worry,” answered the little rabbit bunny boy, and away he
hopped down the winding path through the brambles. Pretty soon he
came to the Sunny Meadow, through which the Bubbling Brook gurgled
and laughed until it splashed into the Old Duck Pond.
The Sunny Meadow was brown and barren. No lovely flowers smiled at
the little rabbit as he hopped along. A few dry leaves scurried by
as Billy Breeze whistled merrily.
“Where are you going, bunny boy?
Here is a penny to buy a toy,”
all of a sudden shouted Professor Crow from a treetop.
[Illustration: Nice carrot porridge.]
“Oh, thank you!” answered the happy little rabbit, politely. “I’ll go
right down to the Three-in-One Cent Store for a lollypop ice-cream
cone.”
On the way he heard Squirrel Nutcracker scolding Chatterbox, his red
squirrel cousin.
“What’s the matter?” inquired the little rabbit.
“Nothing but trouble,” replied the old gray squirrel. “Chatterbox
tried to steal into my store house.”
“I did not!” answered the little Red Squirrel. “I only peeked in
through a knot hole.”
“Let’s play a game of tag! You’re it!” shouted the bunny boy,
clapping his paw on Chatterbox’s shoulder.
My, what a scamper after that! Over the fallen logs, across the
Bubbling Brook and under the Old Rail Fence raced these three little
people until, all of a sudden, they almost bumped into the Billy Goat
Stage Coach.
“Stop! stop! I want to take a ride,
Pull in your Billy Goat Team,
I’m on my way to Turnip Town
For a lollypop ice cream,”
shouted Little Jack Rabbit.
“Whoa!” cried the Old Dog Driver, pulling in the billy goats right in
front of the little bunny. “Stand still, Butter! Quiet now, Bouncer!”
“All right, I’m in,” called out the little rabbit, looking up through
the open window at the good bow-wow driver.
“Gid-ap!” shouted the Old Dog, clicking his tongue on his long white
teeth, and cracking his whip over the heads of his prancing billy
goats.
Away went the Billy Goat Stage Coach, rattlety bang, over the bumps
and over the stones till it almost crackled the bunny boy’s bones.
Pretty soon the Old Dog Driver shouted:
“Carrot City—Next stop, Turnip Town!”
“Wait, wait!” squeaked an old lady Pig, waving a green umbrella.
“Hurry up!” growled the Old Dog, “I’m five minutes behind time.”
“Where are you going?” asked the breathless lady Pig, as the polite
little rabbit latched the coach door.
“Turnip Town, m’am,” he answered, opening his knapsack to slip in his
little red-striped candy cane.
“Going for a visit?” enquired the inquisitive lady Pig.
“No, m’am,” replied the little rabbit. “Just going for a candy
chocolate mouse.”
“Be careful, the peppermint cat might catch it,” said the lady Pig
with a squeaky chuckle.
“Dear me!” sighed the little bunny, “is she as fierce as the farmer’s
black cat?”
“Not quite,” answered the talkative lady Pig.
Just then the coach stopped and in hopped Daddy Longlegs. He wore a
long linen duster and carried a cotton umbrella on his arm.
“Well, I declare!” he exclaimed, “if my dear little friend isn’t on
board.” And, sitting down by the little bunny, he enquired all about
the folks at home.
“Mother’s well,” answered the little rabbit. “She always wears two
pink roses, one on each cheek.”
“How’s Uncle Lucky?”
“Oh, he’s all right,” laughed the bunny boy.
“He’s always well
And hops up with
The rising bell.”
“Turnip Town!” all of a sudden shouted the Old Dog Driver, and out
jumped the little rabbit boy to buy his chocolate mouse.
“Dear me!” he sighed, as he hopped out of the candy shop, “I must
hurry home,” and away he went, clipperty clip, lipperty lip to the
Shady Forest.
By and by, not so very far, a dreadful howl sounded close at hand.
Dear me! before poor little Jack Rabbit could hop away somebody
grabbed him by the throat.
“Ha, ha, ha! Now I’ve got you!” chuckled a deep, growly voice, and
Mr. Wicked Wolf dropped the little frightened bunny boy into a big
empty gunny sack. Then, throwing it over his shoulder, he started off
for his den in the Shady Forest.
“Ha, ha, ha!” again chuckled Mr. Wicked Wolf, “what a nice dinner
Mrs. Wolf and I will have to-night!”
“Oh, dear me!” thought the little rabbit, “mother will never again
see her little bunny boy come hopping up the path in the Old Bramble
Patch.”
“Ha, ha!” chuckled Mr. Wolf, as he hurried along with the poor little
rabbit.
“Oh, oh, oh!” cried the poor little bunny boy, all alone in the sack
on the back of the big wicked wolf, “what shall I do, what shall I
do? I’m a goner. Yes, I’m a goner, just as sure as
Monday follows Sunday
And sunshine follows rain,
And the little brook flows to the ocean,
And green apples give you a pain!”
Poor Little Jack Rabbit! all alone—in the sack—on the back—of Mr.
Wicked Wolf.
Just then a little voice from the treetop whispered: “Haven’t you a
knife in your pocket, little rabbit?”
It was Bobbie Redvest’s voice, so low and sweet that Mr. Wicked Wolf,
who was old and deaf, never heard a word.
“Oh, oh, oh!” thought the little rabbit, all a-tremble, his little
knees going clitter, clatter and his little heart pitter, patter, “I
wonder if I have?” And he looked through his pockets one by one, his
little pink nose trembling with fright just like a star on a frosty
night. At last, oh joy! and a catch of his breath; he found his knife
in the little handkerchief pocket of his coat.
Then he waited all alone—in the sack—on the back—of Mr. Wicked Wolf.
There! It came again, the little voice from the treetop:
“Cut a hole—in the sack—
Oh, so care-ful-ly!”
All a-tremble, the little rabbit opened his knife and made a slit in
the bag, oh, so qui-et-ly.
Then, thrusting out his head, he was just going to hop away, when the
little voice from the treetop whispered:
“Wait—a—minute.”
“Oh, dear me!” thought the little rabbit, “I don’t want to wait. I
want to get away.” But he minded the little voice, and it was mighty
well he did, for just then Mr. Wicked Wolf stopped short and said,
“Gee whiskers, I’m getting tired. I guess I’ll sit down on this old
log.” And down he sat, letting the sack slip to the ground. Taking
out his old corncob, he filled it with tobacco and, scratching a
match on his furry trouser leg, commenced to smoke.
“Now’s your chance!” whispered the little voice from the treetop.
Out jumped the little rabbit, but as he was about to hop away, oh,
dear me! again the little voice from the treetop whispered:
“Wait—a—minute.”
“Oh, oh, oh!” sighed the little bunny, “I don’t want to wait. I want
to get away!” But he minded the little voice from the treetop.
“Pick up—that stone—and slip—it in—the sack—oh,—so—care-ful-ly.”
And the little rabbit, all a-tremble, his little heart
a-pitter-patter and his little knees a-clitter-clatter, picked up the
stone and slipped it in the sack, oh, so care-ful-ly.
“Wait—a—minute!” whispered the little voice for the third time, as he
was about to hop away.
“Oh, oh, oh, oh!” sighed the little bunny, looking over his shoulder
at Mr. Wicked Wolf’s hairy back, “if I wait another minute I’ll never
get away.” But he minded the little voice from the treetop.
“Pin up the slit—in the sack—with three—pine needle—pins,” whispered
the little voice. All a-tremble, the poor, distracted little rabbit
hunted on the ground under the big pine tree until he found the three
little pins. Then, oh, so, care-ful-ly, he pinned up the slit in the
sack.
“Now’s your chance!” whispered the little voice. “Hide!”
The next minute the little rabbit had hopped behind a tree. Buttoning
up his pretty white fur overcoat so that it wouldn’t show around the
trunk and drawing together the tips of his little ears, he waited,
oh, so anxiously, for maybe just a minute or three.
“Guess I’m rested now!” said Mr. Wicked Wolf, knocking the ashes from
his pipe and slipping it in his pocket. Then, drawing the sack up on
his shoulder, he started off for home.
“My, what a heavy little bunny you are!” he growled, as he trotted
through the woods.
Pretty soon he jumped over the Bubbling Brook. But when he landed on
the other side,
The great big stone
In the sack
Hit him a dreadful
Whack on the back.
“Oh, my! What a tough little rabbit you are! But wait till I get you
home! Mrs. Wolf will stew you until you’re nice and soft and tender!
Ha, ha!”
“Hey, mother,” he shouted, on reaching his little stone house on the
wooded hillside, “I have a nice little rabbit for supper.”
Letting the sack slip to the ground, Mr. Wicked Wolf untied it, oh,
so care-ful-ly! But, goodness gracious me! When he peeked in and saw
a big stone instead of a tender little rabbit, wasn’t he angry?
Shoving in his paw, he pulled out the stone and hurled it across the
Sunny Meadow. Whack! it came up against the old apple tree, knocking
off twenty big red apples, which almost hit Little Jack Rabbit as he
hopped safely back to the dear Old Bramble Patch, where Lady Love,
his pretty bunny mother, stood waiting for her little boy at the gate
in the old picket fence.
“Cousin Cottontail has invited us over this evening to hear the Jack
Rabbit Man tell stories,” she said, kissing her little bunny boy.
“Ha, ha! That will be fine!” cried the little bunny, forgetting all
about Mr. Wicked Wolf. Dear me, I wish that wicked wolf had forgotten
all about the little rabbit. Then, with a skip and jump, he hopped on
the porch.
“Hello, little rabbit boy,” twittered the canary from her gold cage.
“What makes you so happy?”
“Didn’t you hear what mother just said?” he asked, with a twinkle of
his pretty pink nose.
“No,” answered the pretty yellow bird. “What did she say?”
“That we are invited over to Cousin Cottontail’s to listen on the
radio.”
Just then something happened. Isn’t it a shame that unpleasant things
so often happen?
“No, you’re not going to hear bunny stories to-night,” growled a deep
ugly voice, and there, just outside the Old Bramble Patch, stood Mr.
Wicked Wolf. Dear me! How cruel he looked, his big red tongue hanging
out of his mouth and his long sharp teeth gleaming like bowie knives
in the sunlight.
“What—what are you here for?” asked the little rabbit, all a-tremble.
“Never you mind!” snarled the ugly beast. “I’ll wait here for you.”
“No, no, please don’t wait!” cried the frightened little rabbit.
“Gr-r-r!” growled the big ferocious animal; “I’d like to eat you. I
would, if I could only break through into the Old Bramble Patch.”
Little Jack Rabbit didn’t wait to hear more. Quickly taking down the
canary cage, he hopped one, two, three, go! into his little bungalow.
“Mother! Mother!” he shouted, skip-toeing into the kitchen,
“something dreadful is going to happen to-night. Mr. Wicked Wolf is
waiting outside.”
“You don’t say so!” cried the anxious lady bunny. “Oh, dear! oh,
dear! what shall we do? I declare, I wish your father wouldn’t go
away on business so often.”
“How will we hear the bunny stories to-night?” asked the little
rabbit.
[Illustration: “I gave him a shock of electricity.”]
“Goodness knows!” replied his mother. “Maybe I’d better telephone.”
But, dear, dear me! the wire was out of order and all you could hear
was a dreadful buzzing like a million bees.
“Well, if I’m not mad clear through and through,” said Lady Love.
“The idea of Mr. Wicked Wolf spoiling our evening. I believe he’s
done something to the telephone wire,” and the ex-as-per-ated lady
bunny again took down the receiver. Then, all of a sudden, she
hopped over to the electric drop-light and, unscrewing the silk cord
connection, placed it against the telephone.
Goodness me! What a howl of pain came from the outskirts of the Old
Bramble Patch. With a laugh, Lady Love hopped over to the back porch
and pointed to Mr. Wicked Wolf limping across the Sunny Meadow.
“He had pulled down my telephone wire,” cried the lady bunny, “but
he let go when I gave him a shock of electricity. Ha, ha! I guess he
won’t trouble us any more this evening.” Then putting on her little
sunny bonnet with the pinky roses on it, she and Little Jack Rabbit
hopped over to Cousin Cottontail’s house.
BUNNY TALE 7
TIMMIE MEADOWMOUSE