CHAPTER XV
UNCLE WIGGILY AND TOM-TOM
Uncle Wiggily Longears, the nice rabbit gentleman, was going along through the woods one day, wondering what sort of an adventure he would have, when he met Mother Goose, who, as I have told you before, had come, with her large family of funny folk, to live in the forest near the hollow-stump bungalow of the bunny uncle.
“How do you do, Mother Goose?” asked Mr. Longears, as he made a polite bow, taking off his tall silk hat.
“I am very well, thank you,” she said. “You look well yourself. I wonder if you have seen him anywhere, as you have been walking along?”
“Seen whom?” asked Uncle Wiggily. “If you mean the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker, I have. I met them the other day——”
“No, thank you, I don’t mean them,” said Mother Goose. “They have come safely home again with their rub-a-dub-dub-tubs, and they are happily living together once more. No, it’s another of my friends who is lost. You may have seen him. He is——”
But just then Old Mother Hubbard came to the door of her house, after having given her dog a bone, and she called across the woodland path:
“Oh, Mother Goose! Little Tommie Tucker is crying for his supper. What shall I give him, white bread and butter?”
“Wait a minute. I’ll be right there,” answered Mother Goose. “I want to put a little molasses on Tommie’s bread. You walk on,” she said to Uncle Wiggily. “I’ll come back to you in a minute and tell you who is lost.”