But no one can tell—and we ask it in vain—
Why a rabbit should wabble his nose.
“We’ve whispered it so you could hear it for miles;
We’ve shouted it ‘under the rose’;
But alas and alack! only Echo calls back—
‘Oh—why—does—he—wabble—his—nose?
Wabble—his—nose,
His—no-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-ose?’”
By this time the Laziest Beaver, who picked up songs as quickly as gossip, had learned the words and the tune of the chorus; and when the Yellow Dog repeated it he joined in again—shouting the first line, whispering the second, and imitating Echo in the fourth. And so good was the imitation that Buddie found herself looking up and around for the voices in the air, which grew fainter and fainter and fainter, and at last died away in a long “no-o-o-o-o-o-o-se.”
