"In cooking you can never fail,
Thank you, dear Susan Cotton-Tail."

Then Bunny went upstairs and said to the Seventeen Little Bears, "You
may get up and put on your little red wrappers and sit by the fire
downstairs."

So the Seventeen Little Bears got up and put on their little red
wrappers and crept downstairs. They crept down so softly that Grandpa
Grumbles never heard a sound.

By and by when Grandpa Grumbles went back into the sitting-room there
sat the Seventeen Little Bears on their seventeen little stools by the
fire. Snubby Nose and Tippy Toes sat on the arm of Grandpa Grumbles'
chair. He was surprised you may be sure.

He began to tell his story quite as if nothing had happened. He said,
"Last Christmas I went about and picked up all the broken toys I could
find and I said I would open a Toy Shop and mend them so you could not
tell them from new toys!"

"Hear, hear!" cried the Seventeen Little Bears softly.

"Hush, hush!" said Snubby Nose and Tippy Toes, "Grandpa Grumbles is
talking."

Grandpa Grumbles went on, "On long winter evenings I sat and mended and
glued and pasted the toys and soon they looked as good as new."