Yes, sir! Just as that dear little bunny stepped on Lettuce avenue something big and soft hit him between his left ear and his left hind foot and knocked the breath right out of him. And so of course he couldn’t say “Oh, dear; oh, dear!” so I’m going to make the typewriter say it for him.
And that will give him time to get his breath so that he can say it if he wants to. Well, after that he looked around to find out what had hit him, and what do you suppose it was that had knocked the “Oh, dear me!” out of him! I’ll tell you right away—a great big head of lettuce. There it lay on the ground. So the little rabbit picked it up and was just going to put it in his knapsack for his Uncle Lucky, when a cross voice called out:
“Don’t you touch that lettuce,
For it belongs to me,
And I am going to take it
Home with me for tea.”
“Who are you?” asked the little rabbit, dropping the lettuce and looking all around. But he couldn’t see anybody, and neither can I, so I’m going to let Billy Bunny look again. And this time he saw a Scarecrow in the field close by.
And if the old clothes man doesn’t throw another head of lettuce and hit my typewriter so it won’t talk to the paper I’ll tell you another story to-morrow.
STORY VIII—BILLY BUNNY AND THE SCARECROW
As soon as Billy Bunny saw the Scarecrow—who had thrown the head of lettuce at the little rabbit in the last story, but he shan’t do it again in this story! I’ll promise you that right now—the little rabbit said:
“Did you hit me just now between my left ear and my left hind leg with this lettuce?”
“I did,” replied the Scarecrow, in a sort of scarecrowey voice.
As soon as the little rabbit heard that he picked up that head of lettuce and threw it right at the head of that Scarecrow and knocked off his stovepipe hat. And when Billy Bunny looked at the hat he saw two gold letters pasted inside the crown, and what do you think they were? I don’t know why I asked you, for I’ve got to tell you, anyway. Well, they were the letters U. L.