UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE DUCHESS
Uncle Wiggily Longears, the rabbit gentleman, was hopping along through
the woods one day, looking for an adventure, when, all of a sudden, he
came to a door standing up between two trees. It was a regular door,
with a knob, hinges and all, but the funny part of it was there didn't
seem to be a room on either side of it.
"This is remarkable!" exclaimed Wiggily, "remarkable" meaning the same
thing as queer. "It is very odd! Here is a door and the jamb--"
"Where's the jamb?" asked a little katydid, who was sitting on a leaf in
the sun. "I'm very fond of jam."
"I didn't say j-a-m--the kind you eat on bread," spoke Uncle Wiggily. "I
was talking about the j-a-m-b--with a b--"
"Bees make honey," said the katydid, "and honey's almost as good as jam.
I'm not so fussy as all that. Jam or honey--honey or jam, it's all the
same to me."
"No, there isn't any honey, either," said the bunny. "The jamb of the
door is the wooden frame that goes around it, to hold it in place."
"Then I don't want any door jamb--I want bread and jam," said the
katydid, hopping off to find her sister, Katydidn't, leaving Uncle
Wiggily to stare at the lone door.
"Well," said the rabbit gentleman to himself, "I may as well see what's
on the other side. Though a door standing all by itself in the woods is
the strangest thing I've ever seen."
However, he turned the knob, opened the door and stepped through, and,
to his surprise, he found himself in a big kitchen which seemed
magically to have appeared the moment he entered the very surprising
place. At one end was a big stove, with a hot fire in it, and on the
stove was a boiling kettle of soup, which was being stirred by a big fat
cook lady, who was shaped like a ham, without the string in the end, of
course. For the cook could stand up and didn't need to be hung on a
nail as a ham is hung before it's cooked.
In front of the fire was another large lady with a bonnet on almost as
big as the Hatter's hat. Over the bonnet was a fluffy, flowing veil.
"Now please be quiet--do!" exclaimed the sitting down lady to something
in her lap, and Uncle Wiggily saw that it was a baby. "Come, cook!" she
cried. "Is that hot soup ready yet for the baby?"
"Not yet, mum. But it soon will be," answered the cook, and Uncle
Wiggily was just going to say something about not giving a little baby
hot soup, when the door opened again, and in came Alice from Wonderland.
"Oh, I'm so glad you're here, Uncle Wiggily!" cried Alice. "Now it will
be all right."
"What will?" asked the bunny. "What will be right?"
"My left shoe," said Alice. "You see I just came from the Pool of Tears,
and everything got all mixed up. When I came out I had two left shoes
instead of one being a right, but now you are here it's all right--I
mean one is right and the other is left, as it should be," and with that
Alice put on one shoe she had been carrying in her hand, and smiled.
"But who is this?" asked Uncle Wiggily, pointing with his red, white and
blue striped rheumatism crutch at the big lady holding the baby, which
was now squirming like an angle worm.
"It's the Duchess--a friend of the Queen of Hearts," answered Alice.
"I'll introduce you to her in a minute. Are you fond of sneezing?"
"Only when I have a cold," answered Uncle Wiggily. "Why do you ask?" and
he began to think he was having a very funny adventure indeed. "Why
should I be fond of sneezing?"
"Because you'll have to whether you like it or not," answered Alice.
"The Duchess is going to talcum powder the baby now--it's just had a
bath."
With that the duchess, who is the wife of a duke, you know, called:
"Here, cook! Never mind the soup. Give me the pepper!"
"Goodness me sakes alive and some horseradish lollypops!" cried Uncle
Wiggily. "She isn't going to talcum powder the baby with pepper, is
she?"
"Of course," answered Alice. "It's that way in the book from which I
came to have an adventure with you, so, of course, pepper it has to be.
Look out--here come the sneezes!" and Alice got out her handkerchief.
Uncle Wiggily saw the duchess, with a funny smile on her big face, take
the pepper-box the cook gave her and start to sprinkle the black stuff
over the baby in her lap. The baby was cooing and gurgling--as all
babies do after their bath--and didn't seem at all to mind her being
peppered.
"They season chickens and turkeys with salt and pepper, so why not
babies?" asked Alice of Uncle Wiggily. The bunny gentleman was just
going to say he did not know the answer to that riddle, when the door
suddenly opened again and in came a great big dodo bird, which is
something like a skillery-scalery alligator, only worse, with a beak
like that of a mosquito.
[Illustration]
"Ah, ha!" chirped the dodo. "At last I have found him!" and he made a
dart with his big beak for Uncle Wiggily. The dodo was just going to
grab the bunny gentleman in his claws, and Mr. Longears was so shivery
he didn't know what to do, when the duchess, suddenly tossing the baby
to the cook, cried:
"Ha! No you don't! I guess it's you I want to pepper instead!" and with
that she shook the box of pepper at the dodo, who began sneezing as hard
as he could sneeze.
"Aker-choo! Aker-choo! Aker-choo!" sneezed the dodo.
"Keer-zoo! Keer-zoo! Keer-zoo!" sneezed the duchess.
"Goo-snitzio! Goo-snitzio! Goo-snitzio!" sneezed Alice.
"Fizz-buzzy-wuzz! Fizz-buzzy-wuzz! Fizz-buzzy-wuzz!" sneezed Uncle
Wiggily, and then the dodo himself gave another very large special five
and ten cent store sale sneeze and blew himself backward out of the
door. So he didn't get Uncle Wiggily after all.
"And now we are all right," said Alice, when they had all finished
sneezing, including the baby. "Have some soup, Uncle Wiggily."
So the bunny did, finding it very good, and made from cabbage and
pretzels and then he went home to his stump bungalow.
And if the lollypop stick doesn't have to go out and help the wash lady
hold up the clothesline when it goes fishing for apple pie I'll tell you
next about Uncle Wiggily and the cook.