b.u.mper, The White Rabbit.

by George Ethelbert Walsh.

INTRODUCTION TO THE TWILIGHT ANIMAL STORIES

By the Author

All little boys and girls who love animals should become acquainted with b.u.mper the white rabbit, with Bobby Gray Squirrel, with Buster the bear, and with White Tail the deer, for they are all a jolly lot, brave and fearless in danger, and so lovable that you won't lay down any one of the books without saying wistfully, "I almost wish I had them really and truly as friends and not just storybook acquaintances." That, of course, is a splendid wish; but none of us could afford to have a big menagerie of wild animals, and that's just what you would have to do if you went outside of the books. b.u.mper had many friends, such as Mr. Blind Rabbit, Fuzzy Wuzz and Goggle Eyes, his country cousins; and Bobby Gray Squirrel had his near cousins, Stripe the chipmunk and Webb the flying squirrel; while Buster and White Tail were favored with an endless number of friends and relatives. If we turned them all loose from the books, and put them in a ten-acre lot--but no, ten acres wouldn't be big enough to accommodate them, perhaps not a hundred acres.

So we will leave them just where they are--in the books--and read about them, and let our imaginations take us to them where we can see them playing, skipping, singing, and sometimes fighting, and if we read very carefully, and _think_ as we go along, we may come to know them even better than if we went out hunting for them.

Another thing we should remember. By leaving them in the books, hundreds and thousands of other boys and girls can enjoy them, too, sharing with us the pleasures of the imagination, which after all is one of the greatest things in the world. In gathering them together in a real menagerie, we would be selfish both to b.u.mper, Bobby, Buster, White Tail and their friends as well as to thousands of other little readers who could not share them with us. So these books of Twilight Animal Stories are dedicated to all little boys and girls who love wild animals. All others are forbidden to read them! They wouldn't understand them if they did.

So come out into the woods with me, and let us listen and watch, and I promise you it will be worth while.

b.u.mPER THE WHITE RABBIT

STORY I

WHERE b.u.mPER CAME FROM

There was once an old woman who had so many rabbits that she hardly knew what to do. They ate her out of house and home, and kept the cupboard so bare she often had to go to bed hungry. But none of the rabbits suffered this way. They all had their supper, and their breakfast, too, even if there wasn't a crust left in the old woman's cupboard.

There were big rabbits and little rabbits; lean ones and fat ones; comical little youngsters who played pranks upon their elders, and staid, serious old ones who never laughed or smiled the livelong day; boy rabbits and girl rabbits, mother rabbits and father rabbits, and goodness knows how many aunts, uncles, nephews, nieces, cousins, second cousins and distant relatives-in-law! They all lived under one big roof in the backyard of the good old woman who kept them, and they had such jolly times together that it seemed a shame to separate them.

But once every day the old woman chose several of her pets, and carried them away in a basket to a certain street corner of the city where she offered them for sale. She was dreadfully poor, and often when she returned home at night, counting her money, she would murmur: "It's a cabbage for them or a loaf of bread for myself. I can't get both."

She didn't always get the loaf of bread, but the rabbits always had their cabbage. They were all pink-eyed, white rabbits, and people were willing to pay good prices for them. But the whitest and pinkest-eyed of them all was b.u.mper, a tiny rabbit when he was born, and not very big when the old woman took him away on his first trip to the street corner. b.u.mper had never seen so many people before, and he was a little shy and frightened at first; but Jimsy and Wheedles, his brothers, laughed at his fears, and told him not to mind.

After that he plucked up courage, and when a little girl suddenly ran out of the crowd and picked him up in her arms, he tried not to be afraid.

"Oh, you sweet little thing!" the girl exclaimed, pinching his ears softly. "Where did you come from, and where did you get those pink eyes and those long, fluffy ears?"

Then the girl kissed b.u.mper and rubbed his nose against her soft, fresh young cheek; but when the old lady approached, all smiles, and said, "Want him, dear?" she put him down in the basket again.

"Want him? Of course, I want him!" she replied a little scornfully. "But I can't buy him to-day. I spent all my birthday money on candies and cakes.

Take him now before I steal him and run away."

She was a pretty girl, with red hair, a dimple in her chin, and one big freckle on the end of her nose; but her eyes were blue, and they made b.u.mper think of the sky which he could see through a hole in the roof of his house. I suppose it was because he had pink eyes that he thought blue was so becoming to little girls.

That night when he got home, b.u.mper was bursting with excitement. The day's experience was enough to cause this, but the words of the little girl who had spent all of her birthday money for candies and cakes were fresh in his mind. The first thing he did when he got in his box was to pester his mother with so many questions that she had hard work answering them.

"A little girl asked me where I came from, mother, and I couldn't answer her. Where did I come from?"

"Why, dear, from a s...o...b..ll, of course. How else could you be so white?"

"And have I pink eyes?" That was the little girl's second question.

"What color did you think they were?" asked b.u.mper's mother, smiling.

"Look at the eyes of your brothers and sisters."

b.u.mper looked in Jimsy's and Wheedle's eyes, and saw they were pink, but he was still doubtful. "But mine," he added, "are you sure they're pink?

They might be green or yellow--"

Mother rabbit laughed and hopped over to a basin of water which the good old woman kept filled for her pets. "Look in that," she said, "and then tell me what you see."

Trembling with excitement, b.u.mper plunged both front paws in the basin, and the water rippled in little waves so that he could see nothing. He was terribly disappointed at first, for the water was a little dirty, and he was afraid the black specks floating in it might be the reflection of his eyes. Then the water cleared as the dirt settled at the bottom, and straight up from the depths there glowed two tiny pink spots. b.u.mper watched them in silence until his mother asked: "What do you see, dear?"

"Two pink stars!" he murmured.

Mother rabbit, like all fond mothers, smiled and leaned over to kiss the wet nose of her little one. Jimsy and Wheedles and all the other rabbits were anxious to see the two pink stars in the water, and they crowded around the basin to get a look. They held their breath in amazement, for wonder of wonders! instead of two, there were a dozen tiny pink stars!

They twinkled and flashed, and when they bobbed their heads up the stars faded away or disappeared entirely.

Mother rabbit, who was very fond of her little ones, smiled proudly, and said:

"All my children have pink eyes!"

"But don't all rabbits have pink eyes?" asked b.u.mper, whose little brain was still bursting with questions.

"No, dear, they do not--only those rabbits that come from s...o...b..a.l.l.s have pink eyes."

"Oh!" exclaimed one and all, and particularly b.u.mper, who had started all this probing into the family history.

Then the last question of the little girl popped up into his head, and without waiting to catch his breath, or to give his mother time to think up a suitable answer, he blurted it out.

"Where did I get these long, fluffy ears, mother? The little girl said they were long and fluffy."

Just to make sure he had not been deceived, he pulled them right down between his two front paws, and looked at them. They were, indeed, long, silky and fluffy, and as white as snow.

Mother rabbit shook her head slowly just as if she intended to scold, and then said in the softest, gentlest of voices:

"I'm afraid that little girl has been putting vain ideas into your head, dear. You must be careful, and not let compliments about your eyes and ears spoil you. If you do people won't like you."

b.u.mper promised not to be spoilt by listening to what little girls said, and then eagerly repeated his question.

"Why, that is simple enough," Mother rabbit answered, having had time to think. "When you were only a little s...o...b..ll, we had to hang you up to dry, and that pulled your ears out."

That was an answer good enough for any rabbit, and b.u.mper should have been satisfied, but he had a very inquisitive mind.

"But why didn't I melt when I was hung up to dry?" he asked quickly.

"s...o...b..a.l.l.s melt in the sun, don't they?"

"Yes," gravely, "so they do, dear, if you leave them in the sun too long.

But it was mother's business to see that you didn't melt. It's like baking bread or cake. If you leave the dough in the oven too long it burns up, and then it isn't either bread or cake. It's very hard to know just when it's done, and it's harder"--sighing aloud--"for mothers to know just when a s...o...b..ll is turning into a white rabbit, and when it's beginning to melt away into nothing. Now don't ask me any more questions to-night. It's bed time, and little rabbits with pink eyes should be fast asleep."