"Then this is the last of me and my fortune," thought the rabbit. "I might as well say good-by."
So the lobster pulled the rabbit right out of the wood-and-seaweed house, holding him by the two long ears, and he started down the sandy beach with him toward the rolling, tumbling ocean. Uncle Wiggily tried to get away, but he couldn't.
Well, if you'll believe me, the big lobster nearly had the rabbit in the rolling, tumbling waves of the surf, when suddenly a flashing lantern showed glimmeringly over the sand, and a voice exclaimed:
"Shiver my timbers! If the big lobster hasn't caught a rabbit. Oh, ho! And he's trying to drown him. That will never do. I will save him. Yo ho! Heave ho!"
Uncle Wiggily looked up and he saw a big, brown, life-saving man, who was out taking a walk along the beach with a lantern to see if anybody needed to be saved. And before that lobster could drag the rabbit into the water that life guard just reached over and took the lobster up by his back, where the crawly creature couldn't pinch, and the lobster was so frightened that he let go of Uncle Wiggily's ears at once.
"Now, hop away, Mr. Rabbit," said the life guard, kindly, and you may be sure that Uncle Wiggily didn't waste any time hopping. "I'll attend to this lobster," went on the big, brown man, and then the rabbit hopped back to his wood-and-seaweed house, where he slept in peace and quietness the rest of the night. And, as for the lobster, the man put him in a pot and boiled him until he was as red as your coral necklace, or your pink necktie, and that was the end of the lobster.
So that's all to this story, if you please, but in case the clothes-wringer doesn't squeeze all the rice out of the ice-cream pudding, I'll tell you next about Uncle Wiggily and the little clam.