“DON’T go, Peter Rabbit! Don’t go!” begged Danny Meadow Mouse.
Peter hopped to the edge of the Old Briar-patch and looked over the
moonlit, snow-covered meadows to the hill back of Farmer Brown’s
house. On that hill was the young peach orchard of which Tommy Tit the
Chickadee had told him, and ever since Peter’s mouth had watered and
watered every time he thought of those young peach-trees and the tender
bark on them.
“I think I will, Danny, just this once,” said Peter. “It’s a long way,
and I’ve never been there before; but I guess it’s just as safe as the
Meadows or the Green Forest.
“Oh I’m as bold as bold can be!
Sing hoppy-hippy-hippy-hop-o!
I’ll hie me forth the world to see!
Sing hoppy-hippy-hippy-hop-o!
My ears are long,
My legs are strong,
So now good day;
I’ll hie away!
Sing hoppy-hippy-hippy-hop-o!”
And with that, Peter Rabbit left the dear safe Old Briar-patch, and
away he went lipperty-lipperty-lip, across the Green Meadows towards
the hill and the young orchard back of Farmer Brown’s house.
Danny Meadow Mouse watched him go and shook his head in disapproval.
“Foolish, foolish, foolish!” he said over and over to himself. “Why
can’t Peter be content with the good things that he has?”
Peter Rabbit hurried along through the moonlight, stopping every few
minutes to sit up to look and listen. He heard the fierce hunting call
of Hooty the Owl way over in the Green Forest, so he felt sure that at
present there was nothing to fear from him. He knew that since their
return to the Green Meadows and the Green Forest, Granny and Reddy Fox
had kept away from Farmer Brown’s, so he did not worry about them.
All in good time Peter came to the young orchard. It was just as
Tommy Tit the Chickadee had told him. Peter hopped up to the nearest
peach-tree and nibbled the bark. My, how good it tasted! He went all
around the tree, stripping off the bark. He stood up on his long hind
legs and reached as high as he could. Then he dug the snow away and ate
down as far as he could. When he could get no more tender young bark,
he went on to the next tree.
Now though Peter didn’t know it, he was in the very worst kind of
mischief. You see, when he took off all the bark all the way around
the young peach-tree he killed the tree, for you know it is on the
inside of the bark that the sap which gives life to a tree and makes
it grow goes up from the roots to all the branches. So when Peter ate
the bark all the way around the trunk of the young tree, he had made it
impossible for the sap to come up in the spring. Oh, it was the very
worst kind of mischief that Peter Rabbit was in.
But Peter didn’t know it, and he kept right on filling that big stomach
of his and enjoying it so much that he forgot to watch out for danger.
Suddenly, just as he had begun on another tree, a great roar right
behind him made him jump almost out of his skin. He knew that voice,
and without waiting to even look behind him, he started for the stone
wall on the other side of the orchard. Right at his heels, his great
mouth wide open, was Bowser the Hound.