One day, as Uncle Wiggily was hopping through the forest, he looked at a pond and saw Bully and Bawly No-Tail, the young frogs, jumping from the end of the diving board. “Ah, that reminds me of when I was young!” thought the rabbit gentleman. “Since sister Jane isn’t here, I’ll jump in and go for a swim too.” In the pond, Bully and Bawly splashed around to their heart’s content, while the rabbit took off his coat.
“Oh, hooray! Here comes Uncle Wiggily!” quacked Bully. “Come on in, the water’s lovely!” mumbled Bawly. “Thank you, I’ll give it a try, although I’m not a very good swimmer or diver,” Mr. Longears replied. He stood swaying at the end of the diving board. “One, two, three!” counted Bully. “Jump in!” Uncle Wiggily sniffed with his pink nose in the air one more time and, hoping he wouldn’t get too much water, he jumped in!
Uncle Wiggily didn’t think he would jump so high and dive so deep, but he did, and then his head got stuck in the mud at the bottom of the pond. “Ow, ow, blub-blub!” cried the poor rabbit gentleman. “Quick! We have to get him out! Grab his other leg!” quacked Bully. The two young frog boys, at the end of the diving board, pulled as hard as they could. “If we can get him out, we’ll put him on a raft,” quacked Bully.
“I think you’d better not try to swim or dive anymore,” the frog boys said to Uncle Wiggily after they pulled him out of the mud where he had gotten stuck upside down. “I think you’re right,” agreed the rabbit gentleman. So Bully and Bawly made a raft and Uncle Wiggily rested comfortably on it while the frog boys pulled it around the pond. But then Fuzzy Fox quietly crept to the edge of the pond…
“Well, boys, I think you’ve let me float around long enough,” Uncle Wiggily said after a while. “Push the raft to the shore, and I’ll get dressed again.” So the raft was pushed to the shore. The frog boys made jumps again from the diving board, and Fuzzy Fox went to the water’s edge to wait for the rabbit to come ashore. “Mmm, how delicious it will be to nibble on his ears!” thought the Fox, smacking his lips.
“Oh my dear heavens, help! What is this?” cried Uncle Wiggily when the Fox suddenly pulled him off the raft as soon as he reached the shore. “Ears are the answer, Uncle Wiggily!” growled the Fox. “I’m going to take you to my den in the woods and nibble on your ears.” Not waiting for the rabbit to dress himself, the Fox led the way. But Bully and Bawly came up with a trick. “We’ll sling this big rock at the Fox,” they said.
On the shore, the Fox tied a grapevine around poor Uncle Wiggily’s neck and dragged the little rabbit through the woods. “Now it will be easy to hit the Fox with the rock and not hit Uncle Wiggily,” quacked Bully as he and his brother pulled down the diving board, which would sling the rock through the air like a cannon. “Oh, how delicious some ears will taste later!” sighed the Fox.
“Is everything ready?” asked Bully as he and his brother pulled down the diving board as far as possible. “Everything is ready!” quacked Bawly. “Let it go!” shouted Bully, and they let go of the diving board. The big rock sailed up and down, straight towards the bad Fox who was almost at his den with Uncle Wiggily. “Please let me go?” begged the poor little rabbit. “No way!” snarled the Fox, and then…
Suddenly, a big rock hit the Fox’s rib cage. “Uh!” growled the Fox. “What’s happening now?” But that was all he could ask, because he fell down and the rock fell on top of him, and he couldn’t get up to nibble on Uncle Wiggily’s ears. “You were very clever, frog boys, to come up with that trick!” laughed the little rabbit as the three friends jumped away. And the Fox cried: “Wow!”
