Clothing and dress -- Juvenile fiction; Fantasy literature; Humorous stories; Insects -- Juvenile fiction
"Then," said the Woggle-Bug, "you must pay me four dollars a day; for I
have four arms to their two, and can do double their work."
"If that is so, I'll pay you four dollars," agreed the man.
The Woggle-Bug was delighted.
"In two days," he told himself, as he threw off his brilliant coat and
placed his hat upon it, and rolled up his sleeves; "in two days I can
earn eight dollars--enough to purchase my greatly reduced darling and
buy her seven cents worth of caramels besides."
He seized two spades and began working so rapidly with his four arms
that the foreman said: "You must have been forewarned."
"Why?" asked the Insect.
"Because there's a saying that to be forewarned is to be four-armed,"
replied the other.
"That is nonsense," said the Woggle-Bug, digging with all his might;
"for they call you the foreman, and yet I only see one of you."
"Ha, ha!" laughed the man, and he was so proud of his new worker that
he went into the corner saloon to tell his friend the barkeeper what a
treasure he had found.
It was just after noon that the Woggle-Bug hired as a ditch-digger in
order to win his heart's desire; so at noon on the second day he quit
work, and having received eight silver dollars he put on his coat and
rushed away to the store that he might purchase his intended bride.
But, alas for the uncertainty of all our hopes! Just as the Woggle-Bug
reached the door he saw a lady coming out of the store dressed in
identical checks with which he had fallen in love!
At first he did not know what to do or say, for the young lady's
complexion was not wax--far from it. But a glance into the window
showed him the wax lady now dressed in a plain black tailor-made suit,
and at once he knew the wearer of the Wagnerian plaids was his real
love, and not the stiff creature behind the glass.
"Beg pardon!" he exclaimed, stopping the young lady; "but you're mine.
Here's the seven ninety-three, and seven cents for candy."
But she glanced at him in a haughty manner, and walked away with her
nose slightly elevated.
He followed. He could not do otherwise with those delightful checks
shining before him like beacon-lights to urge him on.
The young lady stepped into a car, which whirled away rapidly. For a
moment he was nearly paralyzed at his loss; then he started after the
car as fast as he could go, and this was very fast indeed--he being a
woggle-bug.
Somebody cried: "Stop, thief!" and a policeman ran out to arrest him.
But the Woggle-Bug used his four hands to push the officer aside, and
the astonished man went rolling into the gutter so recklessly that his
uniform bore marks of the encounter for many days.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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