One day in March, Nurse Jane bought a new rug, and Uncle Wiggily helped her take it home to the hollow stump bungalow. “If you hadn’t helped me I never could have carried it,” said the muskrat lady housekeeper. “My! how hard the wind blows!” Uncle Wiggily could feel it on his pink, twinkling nose. “The wind is getting worse!” he shouted. “Hold the rug, Nurse Jane! My hat is blowing off my head!”
Uncle Wiggily let go his end of the rug and reached up to grasp his hat as it blew off his head. But the wind was so strong that it filled the tall hat like a balloon, and lifted the bunny rabbit off his feet. “Uncle Wiggily! Help me!” cried Nurse Jane, as she felt the March wind beginning to raise the rug and her with it. But the bunny rabbit gentleman was having troubles of his own. Just look!
Uncle Wiggily heard Nurse Jane’s cries and knowing that if he wished to save his housekeeper he would have to let go his hat, he did. Away it sailed, and then up in the air went the rug, taking the muskrat lady with it. “Come along, Uncle Wiggily!” shouted Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy, “I don’t want to go adventuring alone!” The bunny hopped along until he grasped one corner of the rug. “Pull me up!” he begged.
Nurse Jane leaned over the edge of the rug, which was like a raft in the air, and caught hold of Uncle Wiggily. “Up you come!” she cried. “We’re sailing away on a regular voyage!” “That’s right!” agreed Uncle Wiggily, twinkling his pink nose very fast. “Mind your bonnet, Janie! It’ll blow away.” The muskrat lady said she had it tied by a string so it couldn’t. “How will we ever get down?” she asked.
At last Nurse Jane pulled Uncle Wiggily up on the rug, and there they were safe for a while, at least. “But what is going to become of us?” asked the muskrat lady. Uncle Wiggily did not answer. He seemed to be looking at something in the air. “What is it?” asked Nurse Jane. “It looks like Mrs. Twistytail, the lady pig,” the bunny rabbit gentleman answered. “It must be a strong wind to blow her!”
The wind blew harder and harder. All at once it blew Mrs. Twistytail along so that she was directly over the rug on which were sailing Uncle Wiggily and Nurse Jane. “Quee! Quee!” cried the lady pig. “Oh, this is terrible!” Nurse Jane whispered and said: “It will be if she falls on us!” Uncle Wiggily twinkled his nose again. “She would be a good anchor to bring us to the ground,” said the bunny.
“If you can fall in between us, Mrs. Twistytail,” called Uncle Wiggily to the lady pig, “you will bear us to the ground.” The lady pig tried, but she missed the rug and fell on some hay. “Oh dear, we’ll never get down!” sighed Nurse Jane. “Yes! Yes!” cried Uncle Wiggily. “Mrs. Twistytail struck on some hay and she’s bouncing up! She will land on us yet and weight us down so that we can land!”
“Mrs. Twistytail! Mrs. Twistytail! This way if you please!” called Nurse Jane, when the lady pig, lovely and fat, was up in the air again, above the rug. “Fall here, Mrs. Twistytail, and you’ll help bear us to the earth!” Mrs. Twistytail squealed: “Quee! Quee! I’ll do my best,” she grunted. And down she fell, landing on the sailing rug, safely between Uncle Wiggily and Nurse Jane. Down they went!
“It’s a good thing you landed here with us, Mrs. Twistytail,” said Nurse Jane, as the pig lady fell softly on the rug. “It’s a good thing I didn’t alight on a church steeple!” grunted Mrs. Twistytail. “Oh, I never felt such a wind in all my life!” Uncle Wiggily said he was glad the pig lady happened to drop in. And then down to the ground went the rug with a bump. “How jolly!” laughed the Squiggle Bugs.
