NIBBLE RABBIT MAKES MORE FRIENDS
Told at Twilight Stories
By JOHN BRECK
MOSTLY ABOUT NIBBLE THE BUNNY
NIBBLE RABBIT MAKES MORE FRIENDS
THE SINS OF SILVERTIP THE FOX
THE COON’S TRICKS
THE WAVY TAILED WARRIOR
TAD COON’S GREAT ADVENTURE
THE BAD LITTLE OWLS
THE JAY BIRD WHO WENT TAME
[Illustration: Watch makes friends with Nibble]
Told at Twilight Stories
NIBBLE RABBIT MAKES MORE FRIENDS
by
John Breck
Illustrated by
William T. Andrews
Garden City—New York
Doubleday, Page & Company
1923
COPYRIGHT, 1923,
BY DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT
OF TRANSLATION INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES
INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN
COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY THE ASSOCIATED NEWSPAPERS
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES
AT
THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS, GARDEN CITY, N. Y.
First Edition
CONTENTS
I. Why Nibble Bunny Was Puzzled
II. How Nibble the Bunny Was Caught
III. How Nibble Tricked a Foe—and Made a Friend
IV. Why Dogs Love Babies
V. Nibble Has His Doubts About Dogs
VI. The Cleverness of Chirp Sparrow
VII. How a Bunny Could Help a Boy
VIII. How the Funny Bunny Smelled a Joke
IX. The Great Woodchuck Fur Charm Against Owls
X. What Doctor Muskrat Thought About Traps
XI. The Singular Mishap of Doctor Muskrat
XII. Tommy Peele’s Friends Stand Up For Him
XIII. Wise Words from a Wise Beast
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Watch makes friends with Nibble
Nibble squirmed and flounced like a fish
The White Cow makes friends with Nibble
“Here he is. I’ve got him.”
The old doctor was puffing
Snoof Woodchuck comes out of his hole
“Clang!” That ugly trap had Doctor Muskrat
Tommy’s tall rubber boots spattered through the slush
NIBBLE RABBIT MAKES MORE FRIENDS
CHAPTER I
WHY NIBBLE BUNNY WAS PUZZLED
You remember all the funny things Nibble heard about Man from the
guests who came to his Storm Party. That was the time the Big Hollow
Oak blew down, and the brave little bunny who lived at Doctor
Muskrat’s Pond rescued all the poor homeless folk who had been shaken
out of it. He showed them the way to a fine little tent all made of
cornstalks out in the Broad Field.
It was so nice and snug and comfortable, the minute they tucked their
tails inside it, and caught their breaths, and sleeked down their fur
and their feathers, they forgot all about how the Terrible Storm was
having a tantrum outside. They had plenty of room to dance, and plenty
of corn for refreshments—why, the party was as big a success as if
they’d held it in a hired hall with engraved invitations.
But the most fun they had was talking about folks like you and me. And
if you’d laid an ear to a crack before the wind tucked the snow
blanket all around them, you wouldn’t have been very much flattered by
what they said, either.
You might have overheard the bats insisting that Man looked like a
frog. (You might say that about some folks, of course, but certainly
not about you or me.) You’d prob’ly have heard the partridge say that
Man was brown and wrinkly, like Grandpop Snapping-Turtle. (The man
they saw certainly must have worn some funny clothes.) Chatter
Squirrel said Man was pink and tan. (His pink was sunburn—the kind the
fellows get down at the swimming-hole.)
Everyone just knew that everyone else was wrong. Then Gimlet
Woodpecker insisted Man came as many shapes and sizes and colours as
the flowers. And then they didn’t know what to think. There were just
two things they all agreed on: he didn’t have a tail, and—he was
dangerous. Nibble didn’t say anything, ’cause he’d never seen one.
But the first time he set eyes on Tommy Peele, he made up his mind
they were all wrong—excepting about the tail. The little boy looked to
him like a red-wing blackbird. (That was ’cause Tommy had on his new
red mittens and his dark blue sweater and his shiny rubber boots.) But
dangerous? He certainly didn’t look it. Still—when Silvertip the Fox
only caught a glimpse of him, he turned tail and ran.
So Nibble made up his mind to copy the mouse motto: “Say nothing and
stay cautious.” At least that’s what he thought he was—too cautious
for anything. Wasn’t it perfectly safe and proper to dig into that
queer lair where the mice were holding a party of their own? Wasn’t it
nice and dark as his own hole? And nobody could possibly see him.
How was a bunny to know it was a soapbox? Or that it was part of a
“figger-four” trap? Or that Tommy had set it ’specially for him?
You see he hadn’t been caught. He’d dug into it on purpose, because
those nice little mice had invited him. And there the three of them
were busy feasting when they heard the clump! clump! clump! of the
clumsy hind paws of that little boy.
“Mice,” he said, “it’s that Man!”
Before he could twiddle a tail, Tommy’s red mitten was across the
hole, and Tommy’s bare pink paw was closing on—the lady mouse. Then
things began to fly!
Nibble was among them. He flew to the next little cornstalk tent, his
heart thumping faster than his paws. “They were all of them right!” he
gasped. “That Man is dangerous—dangerous as Silvertip himself. Poor
Satin-skin! I s’pose that’s the end of her.”
He never thought of saying, “Poor Tommy Peele!” But Tommy was the
right one to feel sorry for. Satin-skin had closed her little needle
teeth on his finger. And before Nibble had taken a long breath he
heard a voice squeaking, “Weeak! weeak! weeak!” which is mouse for,
“I’m lost! Where are you?”
“Here!” he thumped with both hind feet. And who should come scuttling
in but Satin-skin herself? He could feel her tremble all over as she
tried to squirm right under him.
“My ears!” Nibble exclaimed. “I thought that Man had caught you!”
“No, I caught him!” wept the little lady mouse. “But he shook me so
hard I was scared to let go again. And when I did, he sent me tail
over ears. I tell you, it was awful! wee-eeak!”
“Shh! he’ll hear you,” Nibble warned. “There, your head will stop
whirling pretty soon.” He knew just how she felt, ’cause he’d felt the
same way himself—the time he tumbled off the back of that Red Cow he
took for a log when Silvertip was chasing him.
But Tommy wasn’t even thinking about Satin-skin, let alone listening
for her. He stamped his tall rubber boots and sucked his poor nipped
finger. “Funniest thing!” he wondered to himself. “I just know there
was a rabbit in that trap. I saw him go in there. I don’t guess it’s
very much good. I’ll try the pitcher-wire.”
[Illustration: Nibble squirmed and flounced like a fish on the end of a
line.]
So he pulled on his red mitten and tramped off to the path in the
bushes by the fence he’d seen Nibble slip through. This time he bent
down a springy sapling and tied a loop of wire to the tip of it—the
soft kind you use to hang pictures. And he pegged the lower edge of
the loop across Nibble’s pathway.