Fifteen Rabbits
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If you would keep men from becoming as animals, strive ever to see animals as men.
Fifteen Rabbits
WHERE ARE MY BROTHERS and sisters?” The little rabbit, who was sitting beside his mother under the fern fronds, suddenly asked the question.
He was no bigger than a lump of earth from the forest loam. He looked like a ball of wool, but he seemed almost as soft as the softest down, almost as light as air. He was quite covered with a misty-gray color of that fine mixture which we call pepper and salt. He was as insubstantial, and at the same time as wonderful, as the first pale shimmer of the early morning that was just breaking. On his brow was a white star, the emblem of his childhood.
“Where are my brothers and sisters?” he asked again. He had just remembered them, he did not know why; and he did not bother his head about it. He was accustomed to asking questions, therefore he asked.
His mother was silent.
A large and stately hare, she sat cowering low on her haunches. She had a black stripe at the bend of her spoonlike ears. Her powerful white whiskers kept up a gentle but constant motion. It seemed impossible that the tiny youngster beside her would ever become as large as she was.
“It seems to me,” he began again, “it seems to me as if I had several brothers and sisters.”
As no reply was forthcoming he continued, “Brothers and sisters were with me. But I don’t know how many of them now; it was so long ago, and I was still too small, at that time.”
That “long ago” and “at that time,” had their own meaning, for the little rabbit had been in the world only a few weeks.
Chapter One
WITHOUT CHANGING HER POSITION, HIS mother turned toward him very slightly. But her whiskers moved somewhat more energetically. “Yes, yes!” she said, “you’re getting bigger, Hops my dear. It’s really astonishing how fast you’re growing.”
The diminutive Hops reared himself up straight, sat on his hind legs, raised his ears delightedly. “Where are the others?” he insisted.
“Disappeared,” his mother answered softly.
The small ears flattened. “You disappear sometimes, too,” he said, “but you come back again.”
His mother kept her nose pressed between her forepaws and was silent.
Hops suspected something bad. “When . . . will the others come back again?”
His mother pressed her head still closer between her forepaws and answered even more softly, “Never.”
“Where are they?” Hops was anxious, but he did not give way to it.
“They are lost.”
Hops did not quite understand what he heard. But he was alarmed. After a pause he asked, “And I . . . will I be lost, too?”
His mother trembled. “Hops . . . my beloved Hops . . .” She sighed before she continued, “You must take care, must watch out constantly, constantly. Constantly—do you understand? And you must be able to run quickly, quicker than any other creature in the forest.”
“Oh, but Mother,” Hops solemnly affirmed, “I always do watch out. I don’t even know exactly why, but I do watch out.”
“You’re a good boy,” his mother praised him. “Someday you’ll learn for yourself why we must always be on guard. You’re still my little one.”
“And I can run, too,” Hops exclaimed, “just watch me!”
He began to run, awkwardly, childishly, but with the best of wills. He bounced around his mother, scampering in wider and wider circles.
His mother sat still and watched him. A brief sense of satisfaction warmed her heart. Then she muttered to herself, “One way or another . . .
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