Flop Ear found a place near a spring, where there was some soft, black mud. He put some of this on the outside of his nose, and the pain was soon lessened.
Then Flop Ear hopped on again, looking, as he went, for the place where he lived. But he could not find it. Try as he did, he could not see the underground house. He met other rabbits, but none whom he knew. Some of them invited him to stay with them, but Flop Ear said he would rather find his own house, though he thanked the kind rabbits.
Then one day, as Flop Ear was hopping along through the woods, he heard a voice calling to him from up in a tree.
“I say, white rabbit,” called the voice, “who are you, and where are you going?”
“I am Flop Ear, and I am looking for my home,” the bunny answered. “Who are you?”
“I am Mappo, the merry monkey,” was the answer. “Wait a minute and I will come down and talk to you.”
And then the queer animal, who had four hands and a long tail, came scrambling down the tree.
“What are you doing in these woods?” asked Mappo of Flop Ear, as soon as the merry monkey had seated himself on a soft cushion of green moss at the foot of the tree.
“I am hopping through them, trying to find my lost home,” answered Flop Ear. “I live in woods like these, but not in this part. I am lost. What are you doing here?”
“Well, I’m staying here for a while,” answered Mappo. “Years ago, when I was a little fellow, I used to live in the woods, but not here. In my country it was very warm. It was what is called a jungle.”
“Tum Tum, the jolly elephant, lived in a jungle,” said Flop Ear.
“What! do you know about Tum Tum?” asked Mappo in surprise.
“Oh, I have met him,” the rabbit replied. “I was near the circus, where he was, and Dido, the dancing bear; and Tum Tum saved my life.”
Then Flop Ear told how the elephant lifted him up in his trunk, and pulled him out from under the circus wagon wheel.
“But you spoke of Tum Tum as though _you_ knew him,” said Flop Ear to the merry monkey. “How did that happen?”
“It was this way,” explained Mappo. “I had not lived in the jungle very long before I was caught by some men who want monkeys to go around with the hand-organ players. I was put on a ship and brought to this country. There Tum Tum and I became good friends. He was also caught in the jungle and brought over on the ship. Then he went with a circus. I was there, too, for a while. But I ran away and met Squinty, the comical pig.”