“That may very well be,” went on the garden maid, “but the truth of the matter is that I cannot smell, because a blackbird has nipped off my nose.”
Uncle Wiggily, in great surprise, looked, and, surely enough, a blackbird had nipped off the nose of the garden maid.
“Bless my whiskers!” cried the bunny uncle. “What a thing for a blackbird to do—nip off your nose! Why did he do such an impolite thing as that?”
“Why, he had to do it, because it’s that way in the Mother Goose book,” said the maid. “Don’t you remember? It goes this way:
“‘The King was in the parlor,
Counting out his money,
The Queen was in the kitchen,
Eating bread and honey.
The maid was in the garden,
Hanging out the clothes,