It isn't good for us to be too smart. It sometimes makes us vain, and then
one day we overdo it. Bumper had some excuse for playing the trick on Mr.
Crow and Mr. Fox, for his life depended upon it; but his success was
giving him a little swelled head. He began to feel that he could get out
of any danger by using his wits.
"It takes a city rabbit to find a way out of difficulty," he reflected, as
he lay snugly in the hollow trunk of the tree. "These country animals are
dull-witted. I do hope my cousins of the woods are not so stupid. Perhaps
they are, and that's why people say rabbits are cunning but very stupid."
This sort of reasoning was the very thing that got him in trouble, and
nearly caused his death. He was so sure that he had outwitted Mr. Fox, he
decided after a while to leave the hollow trunk, and eat some of the green
leaves and branches growing around outside.
But he knew less about the cunning and patience of the fox than he
thought. Instead of trotting off in the woods, chagrined and disgusted by
his defeat, the fox was lying low ready to pounce on the white rabbit the
moment he showed himself. He was so still that Bumper couldn't hear the
rustle of a leaf or the snap of a twig.
"I think I'll go out now," Bumper said finally. "I'm dreadfully hungry."
Instead of poking his head out cautiously to investigate, he walked
straight from the hollow trunk into the very jaws of the fox. There was a
sharp click of teeth, and Bumper felt a terrible pain in one of his long
ears. He must have leaped five feet in the air, and another five feet
sideways. The fox had missed his neck by an inch, but to make up for this
mistake, he now pursued the rabbit, leaping nearly as high in the air to
catch him as Bumper.
Terrified by the attack, and not knowing what to do, the white rabbit
jumped this way and that, clearing high bushes and landing in dense
thickets that tore his fur and hurt him terribly. But the fox followed
him, paying no attention to the briers and thorns.
It was a narrow escape. For a moment Bumper thought his time had come. He
couldn't get back to the hollow tree trunk, and there was no other
hiding-place near that the fox couldn't follow him in.
It certainly would have gone hard with him, and the rest of his adventures
could never have been told, if a couple of blue jays hadn't built a nest
in a tree directly over him. The commotion in the bushes startled the
birds, and with loud, shrill cries they darted down to see what was doing.
The sight of the fox angered them. Foxes robbed birds' nests whenever they
got a chance, and the blue jays knew this. Therefore, a fox in the
neighborhood of their home was not to be tolerated.
They flew down like two blue streaks and landed their sharp bills on the
head and face of Mr. Fox. One stroke came so near to one of his eyes that
he dodged and ducked, and stopped pursuing Bumper long enough to snap at
the birds.
But the blue jays were prepared for this, and they kept well beyond his
reach. As soon as he turned from them to the rabbit again they flew back
to the attack. They punished him unmercifully, pecking at him until he was
so angry that he could hardly see straight.
Meanwhile, of course, Bumper was taking advantage of this interruption. He
was running through the underbrush as fast as he could until he was far
ahead. Right and left he searched for a hole or any kind of an opening he
could crawl in. And there, just ahead of him, appeared what he was looking
for! This time it was the hollow branch of a giant tree hanging down, with
one end still attached to the trunk.
Bumper was in the hollow branch like a flash. Mr. Fox reached it just a
moment too late, and to vent his anger at losing the rabbit the second
time he clawed and snapped at the branch as if he would rip it asunder.
But the limb, with a decayed heart, had a stout shell, and the fox soon
gave it up in disgust.
Now, the hollow branch, as you know, had one end on the ground, and the
other still attached to the trunk where the wind had broken it off. So
Bumper found his hole slanting upward, and as he crawled through to the
other end he was actually climbing a tree. Perhaps you have heard that
rabbits can't climb trees, but Bumper did in this instance.
When he reached the upper end, he found himself ten feet from the ground,
with Mr. Fox below and unable to reach him. It was such an unusual sight
to see a rabbit up a tree that the fox was more puzzled than ever. "Could
white rabbits climb trees?" he asked himself.
Between his discouragement at being twice outwitted, and his amazement at
finding a white rabbit with pink eyes that could climb a tree, Mr. Fox
finally dropped his tail between his legs and trotted away. Bumper watched
him go, and sighed with relief. The blue jays were equally relieved in
mind, and once more returned to their home to guard it against invasion.
When Bumper stuck his head out of the upper end of the big tree branch, he
noticed that he was up among the birds which had been singing a lively
concert until he interrupted them. There were birds which Bumper had never
seen before, some with startling plumage, and others with voices that
sounded like flutes.
They did not renew their singing, but perked their heads sideways and
watched this strange thing popping out of the hollow limb. Finally one of
them, Mrs. Oriole, clad in a suit of gold, streaked with black and gray,
spoke.
"It's Mr. Rabbit's ghost, I do believe. Mr. Fox must have caught him after
all."
"If it's a ghost, I'd like to have some of his white fur for my nest,"
remarked Rusty the Blackbird. "I think I'll steal some."
"He's a pretty lively ghost," warned Piney the Purple Finch. "I wouldn't
venture too near."
Bumper blinked his pink eyes at them, and smiled.
"I'm not a ghost yet," he said. "I'm quite alive and well, but very
hungry. If you don't mind I'll eat a few of these delicious green leaves."
The birds watched him in silence. They were as curious and puzzled as the
Crow had been. Finally, Mr. Pine Grosbeak plucked up courage to approach
nearer.
"If you're really alive," he said, "let me pluck some of those beautiful
white hairs as souvenirs. I never saw such lovely fur before."
"You can have one hair," laughed Bumper, "just to prove to you that I'm a
real live rabbit."
Mr. Pine Grosbeak took him at his word, and plucked a hair from his back.
It made Bumper wince.
"Surely you'll give me one, too, for my nest," added Piney the Purple
Finch, and without waiting for consent he plucked two. Rusty the Blackbird
came swooping down next. "I need some of your beautiful white fur to show
my little ones," he said. "I'll take three."
The other birds expressed their admiration, and then begged a few hairs,
too. There was Mrs. Crested Flycatcher, and Mrs. Phoebe Bird, and little
Towhee the Chewink. The process of extracting a few hairs from his back
caused Bumper exquisite pain, but he wanted to be obliging, especially as
the birds all admired and flattered him.
But when Mr. Woodpecker, who had been rapping on the dead trees of the
woods, appeared, Bumper decided it was time for him to call a halt.
"That's all I can spare," he said, and darted back into the hollow branch.
He was glad to make friends with the birds, but he didn't want to be
robbed of all the clothes he had.