“Oh, this beats lollypops!” cried Neddie. “It is better even than automobiles.”
Neddie reached his paw into the middle of the black mass and scooped out a lot of honey. He put it in his mouth and began to chew on it. It was so good that he just had to shut his eyes.
“Oh, yum! yum!” cried Neddie.
Now, if he had had his eyes open Neddie might have seen a lot of bees flying out of the hollow honey tree. But he did not look. He was thinking too much of the sweet stuff. Out buzzed the bees, and they were very angry that some one had come to take their sweet stuff. And, small as they were, the bees were not afraid of Neddie, who was quite a large bear boy.
“Buzz! Buzz! Buzz!” went the bees. “Get away from our honey!” Then they flew at Neddie, and with their sharp stings they stung him on the end of his soft and tender nose, and on the bottom parts of his paws, where they had no fur, and on his ears; and some of the bees even snuggled down in his fur and stung him through that.
“Oh, wow!” cried Neddie, as he felt the needle-like stings. Then he opened his eyes quickly enough.
“Get away from our honey!” buzzed the bees, and Neddie was glad to slide down that tree more quickly than he had climbed up it. Oh! how his nose smarted, and his paws! He seemed on fire all over. He licked the honey off his paws, but it did not taste good any more.
“Oh, wow! Double wow!” howled poor Neddie, and then he started to run home as fast as he could. And on the way he met Uncle Wigwag, who soon knew what the matter was.
“Some cool, wet mud on your nose will stop the pain,” said the bear gentleman, and he took Neddie to a brook and made him a nice mud-plaster. Then Neddie felt better, but he said he would never go near a bees’ honey nest again.
“And did Uncle Wiggily give you the auto?” asked Neddie of Uncle Wigwag on their way home.