"For my lunch?" asked Uncle Wiggily.
"No. For MINE!" and once more the bear smacked his lips hungry like. "I am just in time, I see."
"Oh, I thought you meant you were just in time to take a drink of this water," said the bunny, pointing at the pool. "If you did, you aren't."
"If I did I aren't? What kind of talk is that?" asked the bear, curious like.
"I mean we can't have a drink until Alice comes—the sign says so," spoke Uncle Wiggily, politely.
"Pooh! I don't believe in signs," snapped the bear. "I'm thirsty and I'm going to have a drink," and with that he took a long one from the woodland pool. And then a funny thing happened.
The bear began to grow smaller and smaller. First he was the size of a dog, then of a cat, then of a kitten, then he shrank to the littleness of a mouse, and next he was like a June bug. Then he became a July bug, next he was no larger than a little black ant, and finally he became a microbe, and Uncle Wiggily couldn't see him at all.
"Well, thank goodness he's gone!" said the bunny. "But what made him so shrinking like I wonder?"
"It was the pool of tears," said a voice behind the bunny, and there stood Alice from Wonderland. "This pool is sour alum water, Uncle Wiggily," she said, "and if you drink it you shrink and shrivel up and blow away. That's why I put up the sign so nothing would happen to you. I knew about the pool, as it's in my story book. And now we can go have some funny adventures."
And away they went over the hills and far away and that bear was never seen again. But if your cat doesn't catch the ice cream cone in the mosquito net and feed it to the gold fish, I'll tell you more of Uncle Wiggily's adventures in a little while. For the old gentleman rabbit had many surprising things happen to him. You may read about them in another book to be called "Uncle Wiggily In Fairyland," which tells of some of the Genii and Gnomes of the Arabian Nights.