Granny And Reddy Fox Hunt In Vain
Old Mother Nature’s plans for good
Quite often are not understood.
—_Old Granny Fox_.
Tommy Tit and Drummer the Woodpecker and Yank Yank the Nuthatch and
Sammy Jay and Chatterer the Red Squirrel were not the only ones who
were out and about as soon as the great storm ended. Oh, my, no! No,
indeed! Everybody who was not sleeping the winter away, or who had not
a store of food right at hand, was out. But not all were so fortunate
as Tommy Tit and his friends in finding a good meal.
Peter Rabbit and Mrs. Peter came out of the hole in the heart of the
dear Old Briar-patch, where they had managed to keep comfortably warm,
and at once began to fill their stomachs with bark from young trees and
tender tips of twigs. It was very coarse food, but it would take away
that empty feeling. Mrs. Grouse burst out of the snow and hurried to
get a meal before dark. She had no time to be particular, and so she
ate spruce buds. They were very bitter and not much to her liking, but
she was too hungry, and night was too near for her to be fussy. She was
thankful to have that much.
Granny Fox and Reddy were out too. They didn’t need to hurry because,
as you know, they could hunt all night, but they were so hungry that
they just had to be looking for something to eat. They knew, of course,
that everybody else would be out, and they hoped that some of these
little people would be so weak that they could easily be caught. That
seems like a dreadful hope, doesn’t it? But one of the first laws of
Old Mother Nature is self-preservation. That means to save your own
life first. So perhaps Granny and Reddy are not to be blamed for hoping
that some of their neighbors might be caught easily because of the
great storm. They were very hungry indeed, and they could not eat bark
like Peter Rabbit, or buds like Mrs. Grouse, or seeds like Whitefoot
the Woodmouse. Their teeth and stomachs are not made for such food.
It was hard going for Granny and Reddy Fox. The snow was soft and deep
in many places, and they had to keep pretty close to those places where
rough Brother North Wind had blown away enough of the snow to make
walking fairly easy. They soon found that their hope that they would
find some of their neighbors too weak to escape was quite in vain. When
jolly, round, red Mr. Sun dropped down behind the Purple Hills to go
to bed, their stomachs were quite as empty as when they had started
out.
“We’ll go down to the Old Briar-patch. I don’t believe it will be of
much use, but you never can tell until you try. Peter Rabbit may take
it into his silly head to come outside,” said Granny, leading the way.
When they reached the dear Old Briar-patch they found that Peter was
not outside. In fact, peering between the brambles and bushes, they
could see his little brown form bobbing about as he hunted for tender
bark. He had already made little paths along which he could hop easily.
Peter saw them almost as soon as they saw him.
“Hard times these,” said Peter pleasantly. “I hope your stomachs are
not as empty as mine.” He pulled a strip of bark from a young tree and
began to chew it. This was more than Reddy could stand. To see Peter
eating while his own stomach was just one great big ache from emptiness
was too much.
“I’m going in there and catch him, or drive him out where you can catch
him, if I tear my coat all to pieces!” snarled Reddy.
Peter stopped chewing and sat up. “Come right along, Reddy. Come right
along if you want to, but I would advise you to save your skin and your
coat,” said he.
Reddy’s only reply was a snarl as he pushed his way under the brambles.
He yelped as they tore his coat and scratched his face, but he kept on.
Now Peter’s paths were very cunningly made. He had cut them through the
very thickest of the briars just big enough for himself and Mrs. Peter
to hop along comfortably. But Reddy is so much bigger that he had to
force his way through and in places crawl flat on his stomach, which
was very slow work, to say nothing of the painful scratches from the
briars. It was no trouble at all for Peter to keep out of his way, and
before long Reddy gave up. Without a word Granny Fox led the way to the
Green Forest. They would try to find where Mrs. Grouse was sleeping
under the snow. But though they hunted all night, they failed to find
her, for she wisely had gone to bed in a spruce-tree.