“Taken!” exclaimed Nannie. “I was out in front of our house a while ago playing dolls with Beckie Stubtail, the little girl bear. Beckie had her doll, Esmeralda Pancake Eggturner, with her, and we were having a lovely time.
“But I laid my doll down to go in the house to get some cookies, and when I came out my doll was gone, and Beckie was crying.”
“Why, what happened?” asked Uncle Wiggily, surprised like.
“Beckie said a man came running along, grabbed up my doll, and before she could stop him he hurried off into the woods with my dear Priscilla Spicecake Orangejuice!”
“Oh, that’s too bad!” said the bunny uncle. “Now don’t you cry any more. You just tell me what sort of a man he was who took your doll and I’ll go after him and make him give it back, even if I have to get the circus elephant to squirt water on him from the lemonade barrel. Tell me what sort of a man he was.”
“He was a man who wore glasses,” said Nannie.
“Say no more!” cried Uncle Wiggily. “I think I know exactly who he is! I’ll go after him at once.”
So the bunny uncle, telling Nurse Jane not to wait lunch for him, started off over the fields and through the woods to look for Nannie’s doll. On the way he met Mother Goose, and he asked that old lady:
“Are any of your friends the kind of a man who wears glasses, and would take a little goat girl’s doll?”
“Well, yes,” said Mother Goose, slowly, “the Wise Man might. You see he spoiled his eyes, reading so much to make him wise, that he has to wear glasses. But he is really very kind. I think he only took Nannie’s doll for a joke, or perhaps he wants to get her another just like it and took that along for a sample.”