“Oh, yes, to be sure. Why it’s that way in the book of Mother Goose, you know, and they had to do just as the book says.”
“I suppose so,” agreed Uncle Wiggily, sadly like.
“Well, after they took the third bag of wool off my back the weather grew colder, and I began to shiver. Oh! how cold I was; and how I shivered and shook. Of course if the master and the man, and the little boy who lives in the lane, had known I was going to shiver so, they would not have taken the last bag of wool. Especially the little boy, as he is very kind to me.
“But now it is done, and it will be a long while before my wool grows out again. And as long as it is cold weather I will shiver, I suppose,” said Baa-baa, the black sheep.
“No, you shall not shiver!” cried Uncle Wiggily.
“How can you stop me?” asked the black sheep.
“By wrapping my old fur coat around you,” said the rabbit gentleman. “I have two fur overcoats, a new one and an old one. I am wearing the new one. The old one is at my hollow-stump bungalow. You go there and tell Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy to give it to you. Tell her I said so. Or you can go there and wait for me, as I am going to get Dr. Possum to fix the thumb of Little Jack Horner, who sat in a corner, eating a Christmas pie.”
“You are very kind,” said Baa-baa. “I’ll go to your bungalow and wait there for you.”
So he did, shaking and shivering all the way, but he soon became warm when he sat by Nurse Jane’s fire. And when Uncle Wiggily came back from having sent Dr. Possum to Little Jack Horner, the rabbit gentleman wrapped his old fur coat around Baa-baa, the black sheep, who was soon as warm as toast.
And Baa-baa wore Uncle Wiggily’s old fur coat until warm weather came, when the sheep’s wool grew out long again. So everything was all right, you see.