“Izn’t tellin’ fibs! An’ a little boy wabbit said, ‘Papa, I wantsh a dwink.’s So his papa took a little tumbler, dzust about as big as a fimble, an’ held a big leaf up sideways so de dew would run off into de tumbler, an’ he gived it to the little boy wabbit. An’ when dey got done dinner, de mamma wabbit gave each of de little boy wabbits a strawberry to suck. An’ none of ’em had to be told to put on de napkins, ’cause dey only had one dwess, and dat was a color dat didn’t show dyte, like mamma says I ought to have.”
“Were all the little rabbits boys—no girls at all?” asked Mr. Burton.
“Yesh, dere was a little sister baby, but she wazh too little to come to de table, so de mamma wabbit held her in her lap and played ‘Little Pig Went to Market’s on her little bits of toes. Den de sister-baby got tired, an’ de mamma wabbit wocked it in a wockin’-tsair, an’ sung to it ’bout——
“Papa gone a-huntin’,
To get a little wabbit-skin
To wap a baby buntin—baby wabbit—in.”
Den de baby-wabbit got tired of its mamma, an’ got down an’ cwept around on itsh handsh an’ kneezh, an’ didn’t dyty its djess at all or make its kneezh sore a bit, ’cauzh dere wazh only nice leaves an’ pitty fynes for it to cweep on, instead of ugly old carpets. Say, do you know I was a wabbit once?”
“Why, no,” said Mr. Burton. “Do tell us about it.”
“Harry!” remonstrated Mrs. Burton.
“He believes it, my dear,” explained her husband. “He has his ’weetly fanciful’ mood on now, that you were moaning for a few moments ago. Go on, Toddie.”