ANIMALS' NESTS(MARCH)

Five Times He Tried, and Five Times His Fat Body, when Half Submerged, Shot Up and Bobbed Afloat

The Shrew-Mouse drew all Four Feet together and Slithered Eel-wise off the Ledge

The Shrew-mouse rocked with laughter.

"Again, Natterjack!" she cried. "Again! again!"

Shame-faced, he paddled back to shore.

"Be charitable, Shrew-mouse, be charitable. I did my best."

The Shrew-mouse looked at him inquiringly. "Never mind, Natterjack," she said, "I'll fetch him. It's hardly the right thing to do, but still——"

She climbed a ledge, drew all four feet together, and slithered off it eel-wise. She swam a yard and dived. The water closed like oil upon her going. Ten seconds passed and then she reappeared.

"He's coming, Natterjack," she said, and landed close beside him. The French Frog shot up like a cork, and half of him splashed clear above the surface. He took two strokes to reach the shore, and came out moist and shiny. He bristled with apologies—"It was unpardonable. He was altogether desolated. That a lady should have had to dive for him. Alas! he had been dreaming, and his dream, like all his dreams——"

He Bristled with Apologies

The Shrew-mouse cut him short.

"The King Toad has heard your singing,"she said, "and has commanded your presence. The Natterjack will guide you."

Ambition strove with gallantry, and, for a time, the French Frog wavered.

"And have I your permission, Shrew-mouse?" he said, at last.

"Please go," said she, "then come and tell me all about it." So both departed. The Shrew-mouse watched them out of sight, then swam to open water. She wished the Rat to see her next.

*****

"Sire," said the Natterjack, "it is my privilege to inform you that I have been successful."

The King Toad made no answer. His eyes turned from the Natterjack to his companion, and, after an appropriate pause, he signed with one fore-foot.

The French Frog tiptoed forward.

"I have heard your singing," said the King Toad, "and your singing has annoyed me intensely."

There was a queer strained silence.

The Natterjack turned to conceal his face, and saw the Green Toad perched above him. He too was struggling to keep countenance. Beside him was the Salamander, wreathed in smiles.

The Green Toad, too, was Struggling to keep Countenance

"Your singing has annoyed me intensely," repeated the King Toad.

Words failed the French Frog, who could only gulp.

"Sire," he burst out at length, "it was a love-song."

"A love-song!" said the King Toad, "a love-song! and what nice-minded English frog would listen toyourlove-song?"

His Inside was Red-Hot

The French Frog might have scored a point, but prudence checked him.

"I am a poor exile, Sire," he said, "and, when I sing, my heart is far away."

"So will your voice be, soon," said the King affably. "Come out, fire-toads." The fire-toads squirmed from underneath him.

The French Frog eyed them greedily. There are worse eatables than little toads.

"You may have the big one," said the King.

"Sire!" screamed Bombinatrix.

But she was too late. The French Frog's mouth had closed again, and all now visible of Bombinator was one distraught hind leg.

He Lay as He had Fallen on His Back

"Excellent," murmured the King Toad, and watched the French Frog narrowly. He was worth watching. He paled a dirty ochre, his eyes rolled horribly, he scratched his sides with both hind feet, he dragged at his own throat, he gasped and foamed and spluttered.

"Most interesting," said the King.

But there was more to follow. The French Frog straddled with his toes wide spread; then came an uncontrollable explosion, which flung him four feet skywards, and, at the height of this great leap, loosed Bombinator.

Two thuds were heard, the first a sounding, floppy one, the second farther off and duller.

"I thought that would happen," said the King Toad.

The French Frog slowly pulled himself together, climbed up the slope, and sat with mouth agape. His inside was red-hot.

The Natterjack burst into song, the Green Toad joined him, the Salamander laughed outright, but Bombinatrix, with a heavy heart, hopped silently away.

She was not long in finding him. He lay, as he had fallen, on his back, his hands and feet outspread, his poor throat twitching. But he still breathed, breathed in short, wheezy, gasping sobs, which made his whole frame shudder.

She crept up close and whispered. I cannot tell you what she said, but Bombinator caughtthe sense of it. He stretched his legs as far as they would go, and clasped his hands beneath his chin. This seemed to ease his breathing, and presently, from every pore, welled a bead-drop of moisture. He lay thus for an hour, and Bombinatrix mounted guard beside him.

At last he moved, but Bombinatrix checked him instantly. "Down, Toad of mine," she whispered, "down for your dear life!"

"What is it now?" he groaned.

"Ducks," whispered Bombinatrix, "Great, Fat, White Ducks!"

"Ducks," whispered Bombinatrix, "Great, Fat, White Ducks"

Whena young friend of mine told me the other day that he was going birds'-nesting, and I told him in reply that I was going animal-nesting, I think that, if he had not been a very polite young friend, he would have laughed at me. As it was he laughedwithme—which was really very nice of him, for he must have been thinking all the time that I was laughing athim. But I was quite serious really. Iwasgoing animal-nesting. I hear you ask at once, "What animal was it?" and I might tease you by saying, "Any animal, of course. When you go birds'-nesting you look for any kind of bird's nestyoucan find, and when I go animal-nesting, I look for any kind of animal's nestIcan find." But I won't do that, because there are only a few animals' nests which can be found in the same way in which you find birds' nests. All animals makesome kind of nest for their babies, and most of them make some kind of nest to sleep in too. They make them in such queer, out-of-the-way places, though, that it would be quite impossible for any boy or girl, let alone a man or woman, to find them; for the first thing to be done would be to choose the right hole in the ground, and the next thing to be done would be to crawl down it. Some animals, however, make nests which are not in burrows, and though these are not nearly so easy to find as birds' nests, they can be found if you know the sort of place to look for them in.

There are four animals in this country whose nests can be found without having to dig, and these are the mole, the squirrel, the dormouse, and the harvest-mouse. Three of these build their nests above the ground, and the fourth, "the little gentleman in black velvet," builds the ground above his nest. I am going to tell you something about this one (the mole) first, because his nest, I think, is the easiest to see. I expect most of you know those queer little heaps of earth which are sometimes dottedabout the fields and are called mole-hills (I want you to keep these in your minds for the moment), and I expect those of you who have got a natural history book will have seen a picture of what is called a mole fortress. I want you to put that out of your mind altogether; it is quite wrong. Now, the little mole-hills never have a nest in them, and I am not quite sure why the moles make so many, but if you ever find a really big hill among the little ones, as big as six or seven of these heaped together, and grub down into it (it is quite soft, and you can do this with your hands if you don't mind getting dirty), you will find a mole's nest just about the place where you would find the grass growing if there was no hill at all. In May or June you may find the baby moles. Have a good look at them and put them back, for you won't be able to keep them alive, and the mother mole is sure to come back and look after them—when you have gone.

FOUR MOLES' NESTS TOGETHER. THE BIG HILLOCK OF EARTH ABOVE THEM HAS ALL BEEN TAKEN AWAY SO THAT THEY COULD BE PHOTOGRAPHED

Another animal's nest which is easy to find is the squirrel's, but of course it is no use looking for this anywhere but in woods andplaces of that kind where you know there are squirrels about. A squirrel's nest is in a hole, or fork of a tree, and always, always out of reach. When it is in a fork of a tree it lookslike an untidy bird's-nest, made of rather big twigs. It has a soft, warm lining, though, and, if you can get up to it, you may find the baby squirrels inside in June. If they are furry you can take them away, for then they are quite easy to bring up and tame.

The Squirrel. "Squirrel means Shadowtail"

Then there is the harvest-mouse's nest, which is the most beautifully made of all, and is usually to be found in cornfields, built some way up the stalks, and looking just like a bird's-nest except that it is quite round and has no opening that you can see. One can't very well walk about in a cornfield, but you have another chance of finding a harvest-mouse's nest in the hay-time, for they often build in the hay, and once I found one with babies in it, on a haycock, where it had been thrown without any one noticing it.

THE HARVEST MOUSE'S NESTThe most beautifully made of all

You have two chances, too, of finding a dormouse's nest, for this mouse builds one nest for the babies, and another to sleep in through the winter. Both of them are rather big compared with the harvest-mouse's nest, and they are generally made of moss and leaves, oftenhoneysuckle leaves, which the mother dormouse seems to like, though I can't tell you why.

The dormouse often makes a sleeping-nest at the side of a path through a wood, and does not seem to fasten it very carefully, for one sometimes finds it in the middle of a path, as if the dormouse had turned over in his sleep and sent the whole thing rolling. It may be, though, that some hungry animal has pulled the nest out, and thinking the dormouse dead, preferred to take the chance of finding something alive and warm, and so left it.

If you ever find a sleeping dormouse, which will feel quite cold, you should take the nest and all and keep it somewhere out of doors. For if you bring it into a warm house, it will wake up before its proper time and very likely die; but if you leave it alone until the spring comes, it will wake up as Mother Nature meant it to, and you will have a pet which you will like much better than one which you looked at in a shop window, and could not resist buying.

The Dormouse

Now there are other things for you to learnabout animals' nests besides the kind of places in which you may hope to find them. To begin with, you must remember that an animal has not got the beautiful little nest-making tool which a bird has—I mean, of course, a beak. A bird's beak is used something like a knitting-needle, to thread the little wisps of hay and feathers and moss and things like that in and out and round about, until they stick where the beak tells them. I expect that animals use their teeth a little in the same way, but they use them more, I think, in biting leaves into strips, in softening hard stalks, and cutting thick grasses into thin ones, and I feel sure that they would find knitting very awkward, because of their thick lips. Most animals, instead of building a nest in front of themselves, build itround themselves. The first thing they do is to collect a little store of nest-material, and this they manage by biting and nibbling at anything which they think will be nice and soft, and carrying it away in their mouths. I expect most of you have seen a house-mouse's nest. It is usually made of scraps of paper and wool and fluff and other little rubbishes, which they can pick up behind the walls and under the floor. Sometimes, though, Mousey is not content with a common kind of nest, and gets into a hat-box and spoils a pretty hat, or intoa drawer and spoils valuable papers. Once a mouse nibbled the date and the signature off a valuable paper of mine. That was all she took, but it gave me a great deal of trouble, for it was a legal paper, and it had to be done all over again. Sometimes Mousey chooses even queerer places. I will tell you three I have heard of; the first was a tin of gunpowder, the second was a box of cigars, and the third was a plum cake. The last sounds the nicest, doesn't it? But mousey is very fond of tobacco, and I have often seen her, when thehouse was quiet, nibbling at scraps of tobacco which I had dropped on the carpet.

A DORMOUSE'S NURSERY NEST, BUILT IN A FURZE BUSH

The first thing that animals do, then, is to collect a little store of nest material. The next thing is to dive right into the middle of it. When they are well in the middle, they begin turning over and over, with a tug here and a push there, and little curls and flicks of the tail (the Harvest Mouse has the most useful tail of any of our animals, and that, I think, is one reason why his nest is so neat), until in a very short time they have scooped out a hollow in the ball of grass, or whatever it may be, andare sitting inside it. Sometimes they have to come out and get some more grass, and then the outside of the nest, which is quite springy, closes up like a little trapdoor behind them, and they have to make a fresh way in.

The Harvest Mouse

I expectthat most of you have seen some of the wonderful foreign beetles, whose wing-covers gleam and sparkle with colour as though they were studded with jewels; and some of you, perhaps, may have envied the small Black Folks down south, who have the chance of finding such beautiful things. But if you have a microscope, or even a magnifying glass, or if you know some one who will lend you either, you need not envy the small Black Folks at all, for here, in our own dear country, there are hosts and hosts of beetles as beautiful as any in the world. But there is always a something, isn't there? and the something in this case is that they are so very, very small. There is anothersomething, and that is that nearly all of them have such very, very long names. The reason for this is that the young people were not the first to find them. If they had done so they would certainly have given them names which grownups could understand, just as the young people of long ago christened Tom-Tit and Jenny Wren, and Daddy Long-legs and Flitter Mouse. All these names have lived since they were first made, and they will live, I think, long after some much more learned names for the same things have been altogether forgotten.

Now I must tell you how to find these beautiful little beetles, and I think that you will be able to find them very soon after you have read these lines, for the spring-time will have come, and the May will have flowered, and there is nothing that the little beetles like better than May-buds. All you have to do is to find a May-tree (it doesn't matter if it is white or pink, and it needn't even be a May-tree so long as there is plenty of blossom on it) and hit one of the branches with a stick, and hold a butterfly-net, or an old umbrella, or a piece of newspaper,or even your hat (an old hat is best) underneath, and catch what falls from the branches. You will find all sorts of things, but among them there are sure to be some tiny long-snouted beetles which are called Rhynchophora. That is a dreadful name, isn't it? but I think that the English word "weevils" is just as ugly. Though they are very small indeed, you will see at once that they have very wonderful colours. Probably you will catch an emerald-green one, and a sky-blue one, and perhaps a little square-shaped scarlet one, which is not very uncommon, and there may come a red-letter day when you catch one of the most beautiful little beetles in the world, who is green and crimson and gold. I have done this twice myself.

The Stag-Beetle

There are so many different beetles in our country that no one has ever collected all of them. Most are very small indeed, like the weevils, but a few are quite big, and I am showing you pictures of some of the largest.

Perhaps I ought to tell you how to know a beetle when you see one. This sounds easy enough, but it is not quite as easy as it sounds. All beetles have six legs (beetles' bodies are divided into three parts, and the legs grow out of the middle part); nearly all of them have strong, horny covers for their wings, and all of them have their skeletons outside. This sounds a very topsy-turvy arrangement, but it is quite true. We have our bones inside, and our flesh outside, but beetles have their bones outside and their flesh inside. Sometimes you may see beetles crushed flat in the road, but often they are trodden on or run over without being killed; and the reason for this is that their hard, outside skeletons prevent their soft insides from being altogether squashed up. Once I ran over a Stag-beetle on my bicycle—it was nearly darkat the time, and I was over him before I could get out of his way. Now a big Stag-beetle weighs about an eighth of an ounce, and I am rather a heavy person—indeed, with my bicycle thrown in I should think that I must weigh over two hundredweight, which is about thirty thousand times as much as the Stag-beetle. You can imagine how surprised I was to find that the Stag-beetle was not hurt. I ought to tell you, though, that the road was soft, andthat my bicycle-tyres were not blown up hard, so perhaps the Stag-beetle did not get all my weight on his back—but, anyhow, it was a wonderful escape for him, wasn't it?

The Stag-BeetleThis is the one that I ran over on my bicycle

The two largest beetles in this country are the Stag-beetle and the Great Black Water Beetle. I am not sure which should really be called the larger of the two, for it seems hardly fair to count the Stag-beetle's antlers, and if we leave these out, I fancy that the Great Black Water Beetle has the bigger body. It is curious that these two large beetles should be such quiet, easy-going things, and that they should never dream of eating beetles smaller than themselves.

The Female Stag-Beetle, whose antlers are quite short, and two Stag-Beetle Grubs

The Great Water BeetleWho looks as if he was silver-plated underneath

But so it is, for both of them, the Stag-beetle on land and the Great Water Beetle in the ditch, eat scarcely anything at all, and, when they do eat, are quite content to suck the juices out of plants. One reason for these big beetles eating so little is, I think, the very long time which they have for feeding while they are caterpillars—beetle caterpillars, by the way, are always called "grubs" or "larvæ," and beetle chrysalises are called "pupæ." The grubs of theStag-beetle live on decaying wood (you may sometimes find them at the bottom of an old gate post which has decayed under the ground), and take three or four years to become "full-fed." The grub of the Great Water Beetle spends all his time (three or four years, too, I expect) inthe water, and I think he feeds on decaying plants, but I am not sure of this. Some people say that the Stag-beetle uses his great antlers to crush twigs and leaves so as to get the juice. This may be so, but I have never seen him do it.

The Musk BeetleWho has a very nice smell

Another big and beautiful insect is the Musk Beetle. As you see in the picture, he has very long horns and a narrow body. He is a beautiful bronze green all over, and must be a wonderful sight when he is flying in the sunshine. I have never seen him fly myself, but people who have say that his legs and horns stream out behind him, so thathe must look like a little green Heron. Perhaps the most wonderful thing about him, however, is his scent. I expect most of you know those little round pink sweets which are called "cachous." He smells just like the taste of those, and that is why he is called Musk Beetle.

Another big beetle I have to show you is the Cockchafer. You must look at his picture carefully, because it shows you how a beetle lifts up his hard wing-covers when he is going to fly. Some beetles, the Burying Beetle for one, turn these wing-covers almost upside down when they are flying, so that the hollowedside is uppermost. I expect that this helps to keep them up when they are flying, and perhaps it helps them to start as well.

The Cockchafer Raising its Wing-covers just before taking Flight

Of course you have all heard of the wonderful flying machines which are now being made. To fly at all, you must be able to do three things: lift yourself up, keep yourself up, and move about. If you can do these three things just as quickly and just as slowly as you want to, you will be able to fly perfectly. The hardest puzzle of all is how to make a machine which will keep itself up (and the right way up too) without movingabout very quickly. This is what many birds can do so beautifully, and I expect that in time (all great inventions take a long time to make perfect, and they are never the work of one man alone, but rather of one man helped by the work of many men who lived before him) machines will be made in which men will be able to fly as perfectly as birds. At present they only fly as perfectly as beetles, but that they should be able to do this is a very wonderful thing. The great difference, in flying, between a beetle and a bird like a gull, is that the beetle has to keepgoing full speed all the time, or else he will tumble down to the ground, while a bird like a gull can poise balanced in the air, with just a flap or turn of his wings now and then to keep himself the right way up.

The Churchyard BeetleWhen this Beetle is cross, he puts his head down, and rears up backwards as if he were going to kick

AUTHOR'S NOTE

Thereare "go-to-bury" rabbits and "stub" rabbits. The "go-to-bury" rabbits have the longest ears, but the "stub" rabbits, as any stoat will tell you, are the best for dinner.Moreover, there are rabbits and bunny rabbits—but all were bunny rabbits once.

Thereare "go-to-bury" rabbits and "stub" rabbits. The "go-to-bury" rabbits have the longest ears, but the "stub" rabbits, as any stoat will tell you, are the best for dinner.

Moreover, there are rabbits and bunny rabbits—but all were bunny rabbits once.

BunnyRabbit missed the bluebells, though these rang in his birth.

Up rose the kingly foxgloves, tier upon tier of them pink-purple, but Bunny Rabbit missed these too.

A golden world—the ragwort blazing on the slope, below the mellowing corn-field, and, mantling primrose hills, the dawn.

Now Bunny Rabbit was ready.

The burrow winds in four sharp turns, and, at each one, he stubbed his nose. This through a mad desire to keep near Mother; for Mother's tail bobbed in quick jerks, shaving each corner to a hair, and he and all his brothers raced to catch it. They reached the entrance packed as one, but Bunny Rabbit, squirming clear, shot past the uplifted paw, butted his waiting Father, flung off him like a smoke-puff, and landed on his back six feet below.

That is why he has a separate history.

It was indeed sharp change of circumstance. The nursery had been pitch-black, though one short gleam of light had reached it daily. That was when Mother Rabbit snatched her food, and sealed the entrance up for fear of Father. At other times she screened her babies' eyes. So now the sunshine blinded Bunny Rabbit, and pointed grass-stems pricked a skin which nothing harder than breast-fur had touched.

AND LANDED ON HIS BACK SIX FEET BELOW

He took some minutes to collect his wits, then twisted upright, and, with frightened eyes, sought guidance.

But for the woolscrap all would have been well.

Mother Rabbit was close at hand, feeding his brothers with small sprigs of green. Father Rabbit was close too. The sight of his lost wife had softened him. He purred approval. He licked the children's noses.

Assuredly the lost would have been found, but for the woolscrap. The woolscrap fluttered, wind-borne, down the slope, and Bunny Rabbit nature-taught, went after it.

It led him far.

It caught on brambles and then flicked away. It plunged in little valleys. It mounted little hills. It bobbed and jerked and twisted, and Bunny Rabbit, panting hard, pursued.

At last he caught it, checked upon a grass-stem, and—it wasn't Mother after all!

It wasn't Mother after all!

Bunny Rabbit sat down bewildered. He was hot with running; his ears were prickly, his coat was rumpled. He combed his ears out, one by one,brushed down his face, and nibbled all the fur that he could reach. Then he felt better.

He combed his ears out, one by one

The morning breeze gained appetite and sent the woolscrap once more on its travels. Bunny Rabbit took no heed of it—he watched and heard the awakening of the wood. Bird notes, that in the burrow had been restful, now screamed and whistled in his ear. Out from the shelter-side of leaves, out from the heart offlowers, out from the grass-stems and from earth itself, came whirring, humming, buzzing insects. In this new myriad-peopled world there seemed small room for loneliness. A red mouse bobbed up from his hole, stared at him curiously, then whisked about and vanished. Bright eyes bejewelled the grass-tufts. Here a flick-footed lizard, here a slow-trailing blindworm, here a squat toad. The day-moths woke and flitted leaf to leaf. The bee-fly clambered up the thyme, poised hovering, vanished slantwise, and vanishing, reappeared.

This was full entertainment, and Bunny Rabbit stared round-eyed. He stared till hunger gripped him. His brothers, a barehundred yards away, already had acquired the art of nibbling. He had no teacher, and no wits by which to teach himself. So, though food lay on every side, he starved. He felt a craving he had never known; a tightening of his fluffy body; an ache for Mother. Mother would set things straight for him, but where to find her was beyond his reasoning.

He wandered aimlessly this way and that; he nosed the bushes aimlessly; he stepped on Berus the Adder, because to him an adder, neatly coiled, was merely speckled ground.

Berus the Adder, though infuriate, forebore to strike. Venom is far too precious to be squandered, and baby rabbits are too large to swallow. He swayed his ugly head, and slowly, very slowly, he stretched forward. This was enough for Bunny Rabbit, who spun about and left the wind behind.

HE WATCHED AND HEARD THE AWAKENING OF THE WOOD

Before he had been lured by Hope, now Terror thrust hergoad at him. He leapt two thorn-stumps blindly, and, stumbling, plunged head-deep into the ant-hill.

The ant-hill covers two square yards of ground, and every inch of it is peopled. Though soft, it is no place to fall on. Its citizens resent intrusion—nay, more, resent it actively.

When Bunny Rabbit reached the grass he felt the pricking of a thousand needles. The pain and smart of them half maddened him. He rolled upon his back; he scraped his neck on stones; he writhed; he bit himself.

The pain eased as his torturers dropped off him. Once more he tried to run, but in ten yards his strength was gone. His fore-paws flopped and stumbled, his hind paws dragged, his nose was bruised, his coat was hot and steamy. So he flung down bewildered, scraped an imaginarybed (a poor half-hearted scraping), slid out his feet, and lay full length, eyes closed.

Berus the Adder

Nothing now seemed to matter much. The hornet moth came whirring past his ears, he never heard it; the drone fly danced upon his nose, he never felt it; the Man lay almost at his side, he never saw him. Poor tired-out baby! Nature had ordered sleep and so he slept.

*****

The Man woke slowly. Nature had been his comfort, too, though sleep had not refreshed him. He rose half-dreaming, with a smile. "All right, little girl," he said; then his face tightened. "It's the same place," he muttered, "just where we lost the locket. First bluebell, then foxglove, then ragwort; blue, purple, and gold. It was the gold she loved."

The woodland rang with voices, but BunnyRabbit slept until man spoke. Then he leapt up and found himself a prisoner.

"You sha'n't be hurt, Bunny," said the Man.

Bunny Rabbit ceased his wriggling, and lay quite limp, his eyes upturned, his nose a-quiver.

"Why lying in the open?" said the Man "foolish, foolish Bunny. What's to be done with you? Stoats and foxes and hawks, Bunny. You can't be left, that's certain. You can't be taken to your Mother, for I don't know your Mother. You can't be taken to your hole, for I don't know your hole. Hungry, Bunny? You look as though you'd travelled. Try some grass."

Bunny Rabbit knew nothing of grass and kept his teeth tight-clenched.

"You must eat something," said the Man.

He loosed one hand to reach a groundsel-top, and Bunny Rabbit, squirming clear, slipped deep into his pocket.

"Well, it's your own choice, Bunny. Now you come home with me."

It was dark and warm and soft inside the pocket. The Man took swinging downhill strides, and, at each stride, the folds changed shape. Now they were loose and twisty, and Bunny Rabbit stretched full length to fill them. Now they were tightened to a ball, and Bunny Rabbit tightened as the centre.

The Man paused as he reached the corn, and stepped two paces up again. He stooped, and Bunny Rabbit was inverted. He rose, and Bunny Rabbit found his feet. But now he was more cramped than ever. He lay deep in the farthest corner. Over, and on all sides of him, was packed a stifling mass of green.

Then Bunny Rabbit used his teeth, axe-fashion at first, but soon to better purpose. The lesson that he should have long since learnt was now enforced by circumstance.

He bit and tasted.

*****

"Bunny Rabbit," said the Man, "your ears are abnormal."

Bunny Rabbit lay crouched upon the hearthrug,blinking. At first he had found covert in the curtains, but these had been looped up. Then he had squeezed behind the bookcase and been, with difficulty, extracted. Then he had set himself to dig. The carpet had repaid him with some fluff. The doormat and the wicker chair seemed promising, but he made little headway, and so had lain down tired.

Lay full Length, Eyes closed

"Very abnormal ears, Bunny," the Man went on. "This smacks of the domestic. Then why so frightened?"

But Bunny Rabbit was more tired than frightened.

"More food, Bunny?" A bunch of green had lain upon the floor but every scrap had vanished.

"You've had enough for one day, Bunny. It's bedtime, up you come."

So Bunny Rabbit slept that night on blankets, he and the moonshine. The Man tossed restlessly and Bunny Rabbit watched his moving lips. Twilight crept in soft-footed, and Bunny Rabbit took three little jumps and wormed inside the bed-clothes.

*****

"Slept well, Bunny?" said the Man; "it's more than I have. I've made my mind up, Bunny. I'm going. I can't bear the house. I can't bear the rooms. They're empty, empty, empty."

The Man stepped slowly down the stairs and Bunny Rabbit stumbled after him. He reached the hall and paused, then caught up Bunny Rabbit, and once more ascended. He enteredevery upstairs room and gazed as though to clinch them on his memory. He entered every downstairs room, and in one room, the loneliest of all, he sat and cried his heart out.

*****

"We're homeless, Bunny Rabbit," said the Man. "But you're the better off, for your home's somewhere here."

They had got half-way up the slope. The Man stood tall among the ragwort, and Bunny Rabbit, with wide, frightened eyes, clung to his shoulder.

The Man stooped down, and Bunny Rabbit slid to earth.

"Now you must find your home or make one," said the Man, and Bunny Rabbit straightway tried to make one. He plunged his forepaws in the ground and scratched. The dust flew out behind and, in the midst, shot something hard and glittering.

It was a small gold locket.

The Man bent down and picked it up. He opened it and with dimmed eyes he kissed it.

"You've done me a good turn," he said—"of course it's pure coincidence," and Bunny Rabbit watched him out of sight.

Bunny Rabbit watched Him out of Sight

I wonderhow many of my young readers know why these dainty flying creatures are called "Butterflies"?

We all know what butter is, and we know, too, that there are quite a number of English words which begin with "butter." It is not a pretty beginning, is it? But there it is. Let us think of a few—butter-fly,butter-cup,butter-wort,butter-fingers,butter-scotch—why, one can think of half a dozen straight away.

Now this shows us clearly that "butter" is a very old word, and that the people of long ago (who were much less clever than we are, perhaps) must have used it quite naturally when they wanted to describe anything which was squashy, or pasty, or greasy, or slippery, or yellow.

Back to Index Next