nyhow I couldn't go, for I promised to
come over this afternoon and play checkers with Grandfather Goosey
Gander."

"Oh, but won't you walk with me to the party?" asked Susie, sort of
teasing like. "I'm afraid to go through the woods alone, because
Johnnie Bushytail, the squirrel boy, said you and he met a bear there
yesterday."

"We did!" laughed Uncle Wiggily. "But the hazel bush drove him away by
showering nuts on his nose."

"Well, I might not be so lucky as to have a hazelnut bush to help me,"
spoke Susie. "So I'd be very glad if you would walk through the woods
with me. You can scare away the bear if we meet him."

"How?" asked Uncle Wiggily. "With my red, white and blue crutch or my
umbrella?"

"With this popgun, which shoots toothpowder," said Susie. "It belongs
to Sammie, my brother, but he let me take it. We'll bring the popgun
with us, Uncle Wiggily, and scare the bear."

"All right," said the bunny uncle. "That's what we'll do. I'll go as
far as the Wibblewobble duck house with you and leave you there at the
party."

This made Susie very glad and happy, and soon she and Uncle Wiggily
were going through the woods together. Susie's new dress was very fine
and she kept looking at it as she hopped along.

All of a sudden, as the little rabbit girl and the bunny uncle were
going along through the woods, they came to a mud puddle.

"Look out, now!" said Uncle Wiggily. "Don't fall in that, Susie."

"I won't," said the little rabbit girl. "I can easily jump across it."

But when she tried to, alas! Likewise unhappiness. Her hind paws
slipped and into the mud puddle she fell with her new dress. "Splash!"
she went.

"Oh, dear!" cried Susie.

"Oh, my!" exclaimed Uncle Wiggily.

"Look at my nice, new dress," went on Susie. "It isn't at all nice and
new now. It's all mud and water and all splashed up, and--oh, dear!
Isn't it too bad!"

"Yes, besides two it is even six, seven and eight bad," said Uncle
Wiggily sadly. "Oh, dear!"

"I can't go to the Wibblewobble party this way," cried Susie. "I'll
have to go back home to get another dress, and it won't be my new
one--and oh, dear!"

"Perhaps I can wipe off the mud with some leaves and moss," Uncle
Wiggily spoke. "I'll try."

But the more he rubbed at the mud spots on Susie's dress the worse they
looked.

"Oh, you can't do it, Uncle Wiggily!" sighed the little rabbit girl.

"No, I don't believe I can," Uncle Wiggily admitted,