uncle wiggily longears, the old gentleman rabbit, was out taking a sail among the clouds in his airship, made from a clothes basket, some toy circus balloons, a japanese umbrella and an electric fan, that went whizzie-izzie.
“well, i wonder what will happen to me to-day?” uncle wiggily said to himself, as he steered out of the way of a thunderstorm that was having a race with a black cloud. “i suppose i shall have some sort of an adventure.”
and, surely enough he did, and i am going to have the pleasure of telling you all about it; that is, if you care to listen, as the telephone girl says.
uncle wiggily was sailing along, flying over the tops of the houses and the trees in animal land, when, all at once, as he fluttered in his airship above the burrow, or underground house where sammie littletail, the rabbit boy lived, mr. longears heard a voice crying:
[pg 54]
“oh, mamma! but i don’t want to go! i can’t go! i know it will hurt too much!”
“silly boy!” said mrs. longtail, the rabbit lady. “would you rather have the toothache than go to the dentist’s and have him take it away?”
“do you mean take the toothache away or the tooth, mamma?” asked sammie, curious like.
“both,” answered mrs. littletail, with a smile.
“oh, i’m not going!” yelled sammie.
“ha! there is trouble down there,” said uncle wiggily, as he listened to this talk. “i guess perhaps i had better go down and see what i can do.”
so down he went in his airship to the home of the littletail rabbit family, and there, indeed, he found trouble. sammie had the toothache, from eating too many carrot ice cream cones, and as the tooth was an old one, with a big hole in it, that tooth needed to be pulled.
“but i won’t go to the dentist’s!” howled sammie. sometimes boy animals, and real boys, too, are that way. it takes girls to go to the dentist. they don’t mind a bit. all they’re afraid of is that their hair ribbons may get bent, or twisted, but they are easily fixed.
[pg 55]
“i’ll not go,” said sammie, and he cried real hard.
“oh, dear!” exclaimed mrs. littletail. “whatever shall i do with you?”
“ha! perhaps i can help you!” exclaimed uncle wiggily, as he came sailing gently down in his airship. “sammie, you come for a ride with me, and perhaps everything will be all right. come in my airship.”
“are we going to the dentist’s?” asked the rabbit boy.
“well, we’ll just stop in and see how he is,” said uncle wiggily. “perhaps he may have a new way of pulling teeth that won’t hurt you the least mite.”
well, at first sammie did not want to go, but finally he said he would, and into the airship he got with uncle wiggily.
up near the clouds they went, sailing along until they came to the hollow stump office of the dentist, who was a bear gentleman, with long claws, just made on purpose for pulling out the aching teeth of the animal people.
“here is my nephew, sammie littletail, the rabbit boy,” said uncle wiggily to the dentist bear. “he has an aching tooth!”
“and i want it pulled, but i am afraid it will hurt too much,” cried sammie.
[pg 56]
“oh, nonsensicalness!” exclaimed the dentist bear. “i can pull teeth without anyone knowing it. now did you ever tie a string around your tooth, and then fasten a flatiron to the other end of the string, and let the iron drop out of the window?”
“yes,” said sammie, “i have done that, and every time the flatiron dropped the tooth came out, also. but it hurt!”
“well, maybe a little bit,” said the dentist bear. “but did you ever tie a string to the tooth you wanted pulled, and then tie the other end of the string to the door-knob, and have some one open the door suddenly, when you didn’t know it; ever do that?”
“yes,” said sammie, “i did. and the tooth came out that time, too.”
“then we shall have to try a new way,” said the dentist bear. “just let me tie a string to your tooth, and we shall see what happens.”
“you won’t pull it; will you?” asked the rabbit boy.
“no, i won’t pull it,” answered the dentist bear, as he blinked both his eyes at uncle wiggily sort of funny like.
so sammie tied the string to his aching tooth; a good long strong string it was. the dentist[pg 57] took the other end of the cord and dropped it out of the window.
“what are you doing?” asked sammie.
“you’ll see, in a minute,” answered the dentist. “here, you just look at this picture book for awhile,” and he gave sammie one with many prettily colored pictures in.
well, when sammie was looking at the picture book, the dentist took the loose end of the string, that was on the rabbit boy’s tooth, and tied it to uncle wiggily’s airship; tied the string i mean, not the tooth.
“now,” whispered the nice bear to the rabbit gentleman, “if you start your airship all of a sudden you will pull on sammie’s aching tooth, and you’ll have it out in a jiffy, which is very quick indeed.”
“i’ll do it!” said uncle wiggily. so, while sammie was sitting there, with the string around his tooth, looking at the pictures and wondering what was going to happen, all of a sudden uncle wiggily started the airship. up it went toward the clouds, pulling on the string, and the next minute sammie felt a tug, and a pull and a yank and a jerk and, all of a sudden—out came his aching tooth.
“oh!” he cried, jumping up. “what happened?”
[pg 58]
“your toothache is gone,” said the dentist bear gentleman. “uncle wiggily pulled it away with his airship.”
“oh, i am so glad!” cried sammie, when it was all over. “i didn’t know uncle wiggily was a dentist, too.”
then his toothache stopped and he rode back home with the rabbit gentleman in the airship, and everybody was happy. mrs. littletail, especially, for sammie had been very troublesome, though he did not mean to be. so this teaches us that an airship is good for pulling teeth, as well as for sailing up in the clouds.
and on the next page, if the pussy cat doesn’t fall out of the cherry tree and scratch the covers off the pansy bed, where the puppy dog sleeps, i’ll tell you about uncle wiggily and the grocery cat.
