"Frith sees you!" cried Bigwig. "You're not fit to be called a rabbit! May Frith blast you and your foul Owsla full of bullies!"

        At that instant a dazzling claw of lightning streaked down the length of the sky. The hedge and the distant trees seemed to leap forward in the brilliance of the flash. Immediately upon it came the thunder: a high, tearing noise, as though some huge thing were being ripped to pieces close above, which deepened and turned to enormous blows of dissolution. Then the rain fell like a waterfall. In a few seconds the ground was covered with water and over it, to a height of inches, rose a haze formed of a myriad minute splashes. Stupefied with the shock, unable even to move, the sodden rabbits crouched inert, almost pinned to the earth by the rain.

        A small voice spoke in Bigwig's mind.

        "Your storm, Thlayli-rah. Use it."

        Gasping, he struggled up and pushed Blackavar with his foot.

        "Come on," he said, "get hold of Hyzenthlay. We're going."

        He shook his head, trying to blink the rain out of his eyes. Then it was no longer Blackavar who was crouching in front of him but Woundwort, drenched in mud and rain, glaring and scrabbling in the silt with his great claws.

        "I'll kill you myself," said Woundwort.

        His long front teeth were bared like the fangs of a rat. Afraid, Bigwig watched him closely. He knew that Woundwort, with all the advantage of weight, would jump and try to close with him. He must try to avoid him and rely on his claws. He shifted his ground uneasily and felt himself slipping in the mud. Why did Woundwort not jump? Then he realized that Woundwort was no longer looking at him, but staring over his head at something beyond, something that he himself could not see. Suddenly, Woundwort leaped backward and in the same moment, through the all-enveloping sound of the rain, there sounded a raucous clamor.

        "Yark! Yark! Yark!"

        Some big white thing was striking at Woundwort, who was cowering and guarding his head as best he could. Then it was gone, sailing upward and turning in the rain.

        "Meester Pigvig, ees rabbits come!"

        Sights and feelings swirled through Bigwig as though in a dream. The things that were happening no longer seemed connected by anything except his own dazed senses. He heard Kehaar screaming as he dived again to attack Vervain. He felt the rain pouring cold into the open gash in his shoulder. Through the curtain of rain he glimpsed Woundwort dodging among his officers and urging them back into the ditch on the edge of the field. He saw Blackavar striking at Campion and Campion turning to run. Then someone beside him was saying, "Hullo, Bigwig. Bigwig! Bigwig! What do you want us to do?" It was Silver.

        "Where's Hazel?" he said.

        "Waiting at the boat. I say, you're wounded! What--"

        "Then get these does down there," said Bigwig.

        All was confusion. In ones and twos the does, utterly bemused and scarcely able to move or to understand what was said to them, were urged into getting up and stumbling their way down the field. Other rabbits began to appear through the rain: Acorn, clearly frightened, but determined not to run; Dandelion encouraging Pipkin; Speedwell and Hawkbit making toward Kehaar--the only creature visible above the ground haze. Bigwig and Silver brought them together as best they could and made them understand that they were to help to get the does away.

        "Go back to Blackberry, go back to Blackberry," Silver kept repeating. "I left three of our rabbits in different places to mark the way back," he explained to Bigwig. "Blackberry's first, then Bluebell, then Fiver--he's quite near the river."

        "And there is Blackberry," said Bigwig.

        "You did it, then, Bigwig," said Blackberry, shivering. "Was it very bad? Good heavens, your shoulder--"

        "It's not finished yet," said Bigwig. "Has everyone passed you?"

        "You're the last," said Blackberry. "Can we go? This storm's terrifying me!"

        Kehaar alighted beside them.

        "Meester Pigvig," he said, "I fly on does damn rabbits, but dey no run, dey get in ditch. I no catch 'em in dere. Dey coming all along beside you."

        "They'll never give up," said Bigwig. "I warn you, Silver, they'll be at us before it's done. There's thick cover in the water meadow--they'll use that. Acorn, come back, keep away from that ditch!"

        "Go back to Bluebell! Go back to Bluebell!" repeated Silver, running from side to side.

        They found Bluebell by the hedge at the bottom of the field. He was white-eyed and ready to bolt.

        "Silver," he said, "I saw a bunch of rabbits--strangers, Efrafans, I suppose--come out of the ditch over there and slip across into the water meadow. They're behind us now. One of them was the biggest rabbit I've ever seen."

        "Then don't stay here," said Silver. "There goes Speedwell. And who's that? Acorn and two does with him. That's everyone. Come on, quick as you can."

        It was only a short distance now to the river, but among the sodden patches of rushes, the bushes and sedge and deep puddles, they found it next to impossible to tell their direction. Expecting to be attacked at any moment, they scuttered and floundered through the undergrowth, finding here a doe and there one of their own rabbits and forcing them on. Without Kehaar they would certainly have lost all touch with each other and perhaps never reached the river. The gull kept flying backward and forward along the direct line to the bank, only alighting now and then to guide Bigwig toward some straggling doe whom he had spotted going the wrong way.

        "Kehaar," said Bigwig, as they waited for Thethuthinnang to struggle up to them through a half-flattened clump of nettles, "will you go and see whether you can spot the Efrafans? They can't be far away. But why haven't they attacked us? We're all so scattered that they could easily do us a lot of harm. I wonder what they're up to?"

        Kehaar was back in a very short time.

        "Dey hiding at pridge," he said, "all under pushes. I come down, dat peeg fella 'e make for fight me."

        "Did he?" said Bigwig. "The brute's got courage, I'll give him that."

        "Dey t'ink you got to cross river dere or else go all along pank. Dey not know heem poat. You near poat now."

        Fiver came running through the undergrowth.

        "We've been able to get some of them on the boat, Bigwig," he said, "but most of them won't trust me. They just keep asking where you are."

        Bigwig ran behind him and came out on the green path by the bank. All the surface of the river was winking and plopping in the rain. The level did not appear to have risen much as yet. The boat was just as he remembered it--one end against the bank, the other a little way out in the stream. On the raised part at the near end Hazel was crouching, his ears drooping on either side of his head and his flattened fur completely black with rain. He was holding the taut rope in his teeth. Acorn, Hyzenthlay and two more were crouching near him on the wood, but the rest were huddled here and there along the bank. Blackberry was trying unsuccessfully to persuade them to get out on the boat.

        "Hazel's afraid to leave the rope," he said to Bigwig. "Apparently he's bitten it very thin already. All these does will say is that you're their officer."

        Bigwig turned to Thethuthinnang.

        "This is the magic trick now," he said. "Get them over there, where Hyzenthlay's sitting, do you see? All of them --quickly."

        Before she could reply, another doe gave a squeal of fear. A little way downstream, Campion and his patrol had emerged from the bushes and were coming up the path. From the opposite direction Vervain, Chervil and Groundsel were approaching. The doe turned and darted for the undergrowth immediately behind her. Just as she reached it, Woundwort himself appeared in her way, reared up and dealt her a great, raking blow across the face. The doe turned once more and ran blindly across the path and onto the boat.

        Bigwig realized that since the moment when Kehaar had attacked him in the field, Woundwort had not only retained control over his officers but had actually made a plan and put it into effect. The storm and the difficult going had upset the fugitives and disorganized them. Woundwort, on the other hand, had taken his rabbits into the ditch and then made use of it to get them down to the water meadow, unexposed to further attack from Kehaar. Once there, he must have gone straight for the plank bridge--which he evidently knew about--and set an ambush under cover. But as soon as he had grasped that for some reason the runaways were not making for the bridge after all, he had instantly sent Campion to make his way round through the undergrowth, regain the bank downstream and cut them off; and Campion had done this without error or delay. Now Woundwort meant to fight them, here on the bank. He knew that Kehaar could not be everywhere and that the bushes and undergrowth provided enough cover, at a pinch, to dodge him. It was true that the other side had twice his numbers, but most of them were afraid of him and none was a trained Efrafan officer. Now that he had them pinned against the river, he would split them up and kill as many as possible. The rest could run away and come to grief as they might.

        Bigwig began to understand why Woundwort's officers followed him and fought for him as they did.

        "He's not like a rabbit at all," he thought. "Flight's the last thing he ever thinks of. If I'd known three nights ago what I know now, I don't believe I'd ever have gone into Efrafa. I suppose he hasn't realized about the boat, too? It wouldn't surprise me." He dashed across the grass and jumped on the planking beside Hazel.

        The appearance of Woundwort had achieved what Blackberry and Fiver could not. Every one of the does ran from the bank to the boat. Blackberry and Fiver ran with them. Woundwort, following them close, reached the edge of the bank and came face to face with Bigwig. As he stood his ground, Bigwig could hear Blackberry just behind him, speaking urgently to Hazel.

        "Dandelion's not here," said Blackberry. "He's the only one."

        Hazel spoke for the first time. "We shall have to leave him," he answered. "It's a shame, but these fellows will be at us in a moment and we can't stop them."

        Bigwig spoke without taking his eyes from Woundwort. "Just a few more moments, Hazel," he said. "I'll keep them off. We can't leave Dandelion."

        Woundwort sneered up at him. "I trusted you, Thlayli," he said. "You can trust me now. You'll either go into the river or be torn to pieces here--the whole lot of you. There's nowhere left to run."

        Bigwig had caught sight of Dandelion looking out of the undergrowth opposite. He was plainly at a loss.

        "Groundsel! Vervain!" said Woundwort. "Come over here beside me. When I give the word, we'll go straight into them. As for that bird, it's not dangerous--"

        "There it is!" cried Bigwig. Woundwort looked up quickly and leaped back. Dandelion shot out of the bushes, crossed the path in a flash and was on the boat beside Hazel. In the same moment the rope parted and immediately the little punt began to move along the bank in the steady current. When it had gone a few yards, the stern swung slowly outward until it was broadside on to the stream. In this position it drifted to the middle of the river and into the southward bend.

        Looking back, the last thing Bigwig saw was the face of General Woundwort staring out of the gap in the willow herb where the boat had lain. It reminded him of the kestrel on Watership Down which had pounced into the mouth of the hole and missed the mouse.

PART IV Hazel-rah

39.    The Bridges

Boatman dance, boatman sing,

Boatman do most anything,

Dance, boatman, dance.

   Dance all night till the broad daylight,

   Go home with the girls in the morning.

Hey, ho, boatman row,

   Sailing down the river on the Ohio.

American Folk Song

On almost any other river, Blackberry's plan would not have worked. The punt would not have left the bank or, if it had, would have run aground or been fouled by weeds or some other obstruction. But here, on the Test, there were no submerged branches and no gravel spits or beds of weed above the surface at all. From bank to bank the current, regular and unvaried, flowed as fast as a man strolling. The punt slipped downstream smoothly, without any alteration of the speed which it had gained within a few yards of leaving the bank.

        Most of the rabbits had very little idea of what was happening. The Efrafan does had never seen a river and it would certainly have been beyond Pipkin or Hawkbit to explain to them that they were on a boat. They--and nearly all the others--had simply trusted Hazel and done as they were told. But all--bucks and does alike--realized that Woundwort and his followers had vanished. Wearied by all they had gone through, the sodden rabbits crouched without talking, incapable of any feeling but a dull relief and without even the energy to wonder what was going to happen next.

        That they should feel any relief--dull or otherwise--was remarkable in the circumstances and showed both how little they understood their situation and how much fear Woundwort could inspire, for their escape from him seemed to be their only good fortune. The rain was still falling. Already so wet that they no longer felt it, they were nevertheless shivering with cold and weighted with their drenched fur. The punt was holding over half an inch of rainwater. There was one small, slatted floorboard and this was floating. Some of the rabbits, in the first confusion of boarding the punt, had found themselves in this water, but now all had got clear of it--most either to bows or stern, though Thethuthinnang and Speedwell were hunched on the narrow thwart, amidships. In addition to their discomfort, they were exposed and helpless. Finally, there was no way of controlling the punt and they did not know where they were going. But these last were troubles beyond the understanding of everyone but Hazel, Fiver and Blackberry.

        Bigwig had collapsed beside Hazel and lay on his side, exhausted. The feverish courage which had brought him from Efrafa to the river had gone and his wounded shoulder had begun to hurt badly. In spite of the rain and the throbbing pulse down his foreleg, he felt ready to sleep where he was, stretched upon the planking. He opened his eyes and looked up at Hazel.

        "I couldn't do it again, Hazel-rah," he said.

        "You haven't got to," replied Hazel.

        "It was touch and go, you know," said Bigwig. "A chance in a thousand."

        "Our children's children will hear a good story," answered Hazel, quoting a rabbit proverb. "How did you get that wound? It's a nasty one."

        "I fought a member of the Council police," said Bigwig.

        "A what?" The term "Owslafa" was unknown to Hazel.

        "A dirty little beast like Hufsa," said Bigwig.

        "Did you beat him?"

        "Oh, yes--or I shouldn't be here. I should think he'll stop running. I say, Hazel-rah, we've got the does. What's going to happen now?"

        "I don't know," said Hazel. "We need one of these clever rabbits to tell us. And Kehaar--where's he gone? He's supposed to know about this thing we're sitting on."

        Dandelion, crouching beside Hazel, got up at the mention of "clever rabbits," made his way across the puddled floor and returned with Blackberry and Fiver.

        "We're all wondering what to do next," said Hazel.

        "Well," said Blackberry, "I suppose we shall drift into the bank before long and then we can get out and find cover. There's no harm, though, in going a good long way from those friends of Bigwig's."

        "There is," said Hazel. "We're stuck here in full view and we can't run. If a man sees us we're in trouble."

        "Men don't like rain," said Blackberry. "Neither do I, if it comes to that, but it makes us safer just now."

        At this moment Hyzenthlay, sitting just behind him, started and looked up.

        "Excuse me, sir, for interrupting you," she said, as though speaking to an officer in Efrafa, "but the bird--the white bird--it's coming toward us."

        Kehaar came flying up the river through the rain and alighted on the narrow side of the punt. The does nearest to him backed away nervously.

        "Meester 'Azel," he said, "pridge come. You see 'im pridge?"

        It had not occurred to any of the rabbits that they were floating beside the path up which they had come earlier that evening before the storm broke. They were on the opposite side of the hedge of plants along the bank and the whole river looked different. But now they saw, not far ahead, the bridge which they had crossed when they first came to the Test four nights before. This they recognized at once, for it looked the same as it had from the bank.

        "Maybe you go under 'im, maybe not," said Kehaar. "But you sit dere, ees trouble."

        The bridge stretched from bank to bank between two low abutments. It was not arched. Its underside, made of iron girders, was perfectly straight--parallel with the surface and about eight niches above it. Just in time Hazel saw what Kehaar meant. If the punt did pass under the bridge without sticking, it would do so by no more than a claw's breadth. Any creature above the level of the sides would be struck and perhaps knocked into the river. He scuttered through the warm bilgewater to the other end and pushed his way up among the wet, crowded rabbits.

        "Get down in the bottom! Get down in the bottom!" he said. "Silver, Hawkbit--all of you. Never mind the water. You, and you--what's your name? Oh, Blackavar, is it?--get everyone into the bottom. Be quick."

        Like Bigwig, he found that the Efrafan rabbits obeyed him at once. He saw Kehaar fly up from his perch and disappear over the wooden rails. The concrete abutments projected from each bank, so that the narrowed river ran slightly faster under the bridge. The punt had been drifting broadside on, but now one end swung forward, so that Hazel lost his bearings and found that he was no longer looking at the bridge but at the bank. As he hesitated, the bridge seemed to come at him in a dark mass, like snow sliding from a bough. He pressed himself into the bilge. There was a squeal and a rabbit tumbled on top of him. Then a heavy blow vibrated along the length of the punt and its smooth movement was checked. This was followed by a hollow sound of scraping. It grew dark and a roof appeared, very low above him. For a moment Hazel had the vague idea that he was underground. Then the roof vanished, the punt was gliding on and he heard Kehaar calling. They were below the bridge and still drifting downstream.

        The rabbit who had fallen on him was Acorn. He had been struck by the bridge and the blow had sent him flying. However, though dazed and bruised, he seemed to have escaped injury.

        "I wasn't quick enough, Hazel-rah," he said. "I'd better go to Efrafa for a bit."

        "You'd be wasted," said Hazel. "But I'm afraid there's someone at the other end who hasn't been so lucky."

        One of the does had held back from the bilgewater, and the upstream girder under the bridge had caught her across the back. It was plain that she was injured, but how badly Hazel could not tell. He saw Hyzenthlay beside her and it seemed to him that since there was nothing he could do to help, it would probably be best to let them alone. He looked round at his bedraggled, shivering comrades and then at Kehaar, spruce and brisk on the stem.

        "We ought to get back on the bank, Kehaar," he said. "How can we do it? Rabbits weren't meant for this, you know."

        "You not stop poat. But again is nudder pridge more. 'E stop 'im."

        There was nothing to be done but wait. They drifted on and came to a second bend, where the river curved westward. The current did not slacken and the punt came round the bend almost in the middle of the stream, revolving as it did so. The rabbits had been frightened by what had happened to Acorn and to the doe, and remained squatting miserably, half in and half out of the bilge. Hazel crept back to the raised bow and looked ahead.

        The river broadened and the current slackened. He realized that they had begun to drift more slowly. The nearer bank was high and the trees stood close and thick, but on the further bank the ground was low and open. Grassy, it stretched away, smooth as the mown gallops on Watership Down. Hazel hoped that they might somehow drop out of the current and reach that side, but the punt moved quietly on, down the very center of the broad pool. The open bank slipped by and now the trees towered on both sides. Downstream, the pool was closed by the second bridge, of which Kehaar had spoken.

        It was old, built of darkened bricks. Ivy trailed over it and the valerian and creeping mauve toadflax. Well out from either bank stood four low arches--scarcely more than culverts, each filled by the stream to within a foot of the apex. Through them, thin segments of daylight showed from the downstream side. The piers did not project, but against each lay a little accumulation of flotsam, from which driftweed and sticks continually broke away to be carried through the bridge.

        It was plain that the punt would drift against the bridge and be held there. As it approached, Hazel dropped back into the bilgewater. But this time there was no need. Broadside on, the punt struck gently against two of the piers and stopped, pinned squarely across the mouth of one of the central culverts. It could go no further.

        They had floated not quite half a mile in just over fifteen minutes.

        Hazel put his forepaws on the low side and looked gingerly over upstream. Immediately below, a shallow ripple spread all along the waterline, where the current met the woodwork. It was too far to jump to the shore and both banks were steep. He turned and looked upward. The brickwork was sheer, with a projecting course half way between him and the parapet. There was no scrambling up that.

        "What's to be done, Blackberry?" he asked, making his way to the bolt fixed on the bow, with its ragged remnant of painter. "You got us on this thing. How do we get off?"

        "I don't know, Hazel-rah," replied Blackberry. "Of all the ways we could finish up, I never thought of this. It looks as though we'll have to swim."

        "Swim?" said Silver. "I don't fancy it, Hazel-rah. I know it's no distance, but look at those banks. The current would take us down before we could get out: and that means into one of these holes under the bridge."

        Hazel tried to look through the arch. There was very little to be seen. The dark tunnel was not long--perhaps not much longer than the punt itself. The water looked smooth. There seemed to be no obstructions and there was room for the head of a swimming animal between the surface of the water and the apex of the arch. But the segment was so narrow that it was impossible to see exactly what lay on the other side of the bridge. The light was failing. Water, green leaves, moving reflections of leaves, the splashing of the raindrops and some curious thing that appeared to be standing in the water and to be made of vertical gray lines--these were all that could be made out. The rain echoed dismally up the culvert. The hard, ringing noise from under the soffit, so much unlike any sound to be heard in an earth tunnel, was disturbing. Hazel returned to Blackberry and Silver.

        "This is as bad a fix as we've been in," he said. "We can't stay here, but I can't see any way out."

        Kehaar appeared on the parapet above them, flapped the rain out of his wings and dropped down to the punt.

        "Ees finish poat," he said. "Not vait more."

        "But how can we get to the bank, Kehaar?" said Hazel.

        The gull was surprised. "Dog sveem, rat sveem. You no sveem?"

        "Yes, we can swim as long as it's not very far. But the banks are too steep for us, Kehaar. We wouldn't be able to stop the current taking us down one of these tunnels and we don't know what's at the other end."

        "Ees goot--you get out fine."

        Hazel felt at a loss. What exactly was he to understand from this? Kehaar was not a rabbit. Whatever the Big Water was like, it must be worse than this and Kehaar was used to it. He never said much in any case and what he did say was always restricted to the simplest, since he spoke no Lapine. He was doing them a good turn because they had saved his life but, as Hazel knew, he could not help despising them for timid, helpless, stay-at-home creatures who could not fly. He was often impatient. Did he mean that he had looked at the river and considered it as if he were a rabbit? That there was slack water immediately below the bridge, with a low, shelving bank where they could get out easily? That seemed too much to hope for. Or did he simply mean that they had better hurry up and take a chance on being able to do what he himself could do without difficulty? This seemed more likely. Suppose one of them did jump out of the boat and go down with the current--what would that tell the others, if he did not come back?

        Poor Hazel looked about him. Silver was licking Bigwig's wounded shoulder. Blackberry was fidgeting on and off the thwart, strung up, able to feel only too clearly all that Hazel felt himself. As he still hesitated, Kehaar let out a squawk.

        "Yark! Damn rabbits no goot. Vat I do, I show you."

        He tumbled clumsily off the raised bow. There was no gap between the punt and the dark mouth of the culvert. Sitting low in the water like a mallard, he floated into the tunnel and vanished. Peering after him, Hazel could at first see nothing. Then he made out Kehaar's shape black against the light at the far end. It floated into daylight, turned sideways and passed out of the restricted view.

        "What does that prove?" said Blackberry, his teeth chattering. "He may have flown off the surface or put his great webbed feet down. It's not he that's soaked through and shivering and twice as heavy with wet fur."

        Kehaar reappeared on the parapet above.

        "You go now," he said shortly.

        Still the wretched Hazel hung back. His leg had begun to hurt again. The sight of Bigwig--Bigwig of all rabbits--at the end of his tether, half unconscious, playing no part in this desperate exploit, lowered his courage still more. He knew that he had not got it in him to jump into the water. The horrible situation was beyond him. He stumbled on the slippery planking and, as he sat up, found Fiver beside him.

        "I'll go, Hazel," said Fiver quietly. "I think it'll be all right."

        He put his front paws on the edge of the bow. Then, on the instant, all the rabbits froze motionless. One of the does stamped on the puddled floor of the punt. From above came the sounds of approaching footsteps and men's voices, and the smell of a burning white stick.

        Kehaar flew away. Not a rabbit moved. The footsteps grew nearer, the voices louder. They were on the bridge above, no further away than the height of a hedge. Every one of the rabbits was seized by the instinct to run, to go underground. Hazel saw Hyzenthlay looking at him and returned her stare, willing her with all his might to keep still. The voices, the smell of men's sweat, of leather, of white sticks, the pain in his leg, the damp, chuckling tunnel at his very ear--he had known them all before. How could the men not see him? They must see him. He was lying at their feet. He was wounded. They were coming to pick him up.

        Then the sounds and smells were receding into the distance, the thudding of the footsteps diminished. The men had crossed the bridge without looking over the parapet. They were gone.

        Hazel came to. "That settles it," he said. "Everyone's got to swim. Come on, Bluebell, you say you're a water rabbit. Follow me." He got on the thwart and went along it to the side.

        But it was Pipkin that he found next to him.

        "Quick, Hazel-rah," said Pipkin, twitching and trembling. "I'll come, too. Only be quick."

        Hazel shut his eyes and fell over the side into the water.

        As in the Enborne, there was an instant shock of cold. But more than this, and at once, he felt the pull of the current. He was being drawn away by a force like a high wind, yet smooth and silent. He was drifting helplessly down a suffocating, cold run, with no hold for his feet. Full of fear, he paddled and struggled, got his head up and took a breath, scrabbled his claws against rough bricks under water and lost them again as he was dragged on. Then the current slackened, the run vanished, the dark became light and there were leaves and sky above him once more. Still struggling, he fetched up against something hard, bumped off it, struck it again and then for a moment touched soft ground. He floundered forward and found that he was dragging himself through liquid mud. He was out on a clammy bank. He lay panting for several moments and then wiped his face and opened his eyes. The first thing he saw was Pipkin, plastered with mud, crawling to the bank a few feet away.

        Full of elation and confidence, all his terrors forgotten, Hazel crawled over to Pipkin and together they slipped into the undergrowth. He said nothing and Pipkin did not seem to expect him to speak. From the shelter of a clump of purple loosestrife they looked back at the river.

        The water came out from the bridge into a second pool. All round, on both banks, trees and undergrowth grew close. There was a kind of swamp here and it was hard to tell where water ended and woodland began. Plants grew in clumps both in and out of the muddy shallows. The bottom was covered with fine silt and mud that was half water and in this the two rabbits had made furrows as they dragged themselves to shore. Running diagonally across the pool, from the brickwork of the bridge near the opposite bank to a point a little below them on their own side, was a grating of thin, vertical iron rods. In the cutting season the river weed, drifting in tangled mats from the fishing reaches above, was held against this grating and raked out of the pool by men in waders, who piled it to be used as compost. The left bank was a great rubbish heap of rotting weed among the trees. It was a green, rank-smelling place, humid and enclosed.

        "Good old Kehaar!" said Hazel, gazing with satisfaction round the fetid solitude. "I should have trusted him."

        As he spoke, a third rabbit came swimming out from under the bridge. The sight of him, struggling in the current like a fly in a spider's web, filled them both with fear. To watch another in danger can be almost as bad as sharing it. The rabbit fetched up against the grating, drifted a little way along it, found the bottom and crawled out of the turbid water. It was Blackavar. He lay on his side and seemed unaware of Hazel and Pipkin when they came up to him. After a little while, however, he began to cough, vomited some water and sat up.

        "Are you all right?" asked Hazel.

        "More or less," said Blackavar. "But have we got to do much more tonight, sir? I'm very tired."

        "No, you can rest here," said Hazel. "But why did you risk it on your own? We might already have gone under, for all you knew."

        "I thought you gave an order," replied Blackavar.

        "I see," said Hazel. "Well, at that rate you're going to find us a sloppy lot, I'm afraid. Was there anyone else who looked like coming when you jumped in?"

        "I think they're a bit nervous," answered Blackavar. "You can't blame them."

        "No, but the trouble is that anything can happen," said Hazel, fretting. "They may all go tharn, sitting there. The men may come back. If only we could tell them it's all right--"

        "I think we can, sir," said Blackavar. "Unless I'm wrong, it's only a matter of slipping up the bank there and down the other side. Shall I go?"

        Hazel was disconcerted. From what he had gathered, this was a disgraced prisoner from Efrafa--not even a member of the Owsla, apparently--and he had just said that he felt exhausted. He was going to take some living up to.

        "We'll both go," he said. "Hlao-roo, can you stay here and keep a lookout? With any luck, they'll start coming through to you. Help them if you can."

        Hazel and Blackavar slipped through the dripping undergrowth. The grass track which crossed the bridge ran above them, at the top of a steep bank. They climbed the bank and looked out cautiously from the long grass at the verge. The track was empty and there was nothing to be heard or smelled. They crossed it and reached the end of the bridge on the upstream side. Here the bank dropped almost sheer to the river, some six feet below. Blackavar scrambled down without hesitation, but Hazel followed more slowly. Just above the bridge, between it and a thorn bush upstream, was a ledge of turf which overhung the water. Out in the river, a few feet away, the punt lay against the weedy piers.

        "Silver!" said Hazel. "Fiver! Come on, get them into the water. It's all right below the bridge. Get the does in first, if you can. There's no time to lose. The men may come back."

        It was no easy matter to rouse the torpid, bewildered does and make them understand what they had to do. Silver went from one to another. Dandelion, as soon as he saw Hazel on the bank, went at once to the bow and plunged in. Speedwell followed, but as Fiver was about to go Silver stopped him.

        "If all our bucks go, Hazel," he said, "the does will be left alone and I don't think they'll manage it."

        "They'll obey Thlayli, sir," said Blackavar, before Hazel could reply. "I think he's the one to get them started."

        Bigwig was still lying in the bilgewater, in the place he had taken up when they came to the first bridge. He seemed to be asleep, but when Silver nuzzled him he raised his head and looked about in a dazed manner.

        "Oh, hello, Silver," he said. "I'm afraid this shoulder of mine's going to be a bother. I feel awfully cold, too. Where's Hazel?"

        Silver explained. Bigwig got up with difficulty and they saw that he was still bleeding. He limped to the thwart and climbed on it.

        "Hyzenthlay," he said, "your friends can't be any wetter, so we'll get them to jump in now. One by one, don't you think? Then there'll be no risk of them scratching or hurting each other as they swim."

        In spite of what Blackavar had said, it was a long time before everyone had left the boat. There were in fact ten does altogether--though none of the rabbits knew the number--and although one or two responded to Bigwig's patient urging, several were so much exhausted that they remained huddled where they were, or looked stupidly at the water until others were brought to take their place. From time to time Bigwig would ask one of the bucks to give a lead and in this way Acorn, Hawkbit and Bluebell all scrambled over the side. The injured doe, Thrayonlosa, was clearly in a bad way and Blackberry and Thethuthinnang swam through together, one in front of her and one behind.

        As darkness closed in, the rain stopped. Hazel and Blackavar went back to the bank of the pool below the bridge. The sky cleared and the oppression lifted as the thunder moved away eastward. But it was fu Inlé before Bigwig himself came through the bridge with Silver and Fiver. It was as much as ever he could do to keep afloat, and when he reached the grating he rolled over in the water, belly uppermost, like a dying fish. He drifted into the shallows and, with Silver's help, pulled himself out. Hazel and several of the others were waiting for him, but he cut them short with a flash of his old bullying manner. "Come on, get out of the way," he said. "I'm going to sleep now, Hazel, and Frith help you if you say I'm not."

        "That's how we go on, you see," said Hazel to the staring Blackavar. "You'll get used to it after a bit, Now, let's look for somewhere dry that no one else has found and then perhaps we can sleep, too."

        Every dry spot among the undergrowth seemed to be crowded with exhausted, sleeping rabbits. After searching for a time they found a fallen tree trunk, from the underside of which the bark had pulled away. They crept beneath the twigs and leaves, settled themselves in the smooth, curved trough--which soon took on some of the warmth of their bodies--and slept at once.

40.    The Way Back

           Dame Hickory, Dame Hickory,

           Here's a wolf at your door,

           His teeth grinning white.

           And his tongue wagging sore!

"Nay," said Dame Hickory, "Ye False Faerie!"

But a wolf t'was indeed, and famished was he.

Walter de la Mare, Dame Hickory

The first thing that Hazel learned the next morning was that Thrayonlosa had died during the night. Thethuthinnang was distressed, for it was she who had picked Thrayonlosa as one of the more sturdy and sensible does in the Mark and persuaded her to join in the escape. After they had come through the bridge together, she had helped her ashore and fallen asleep beside her in the undergrowth, hoping that she might have recovered by the next day. But she had woken to find Thrayonlosa gone and, searching, had found her in a clump of reeds downstream. Evidently the poor creature had felt that she was going to die and, in the manner of animals, had slipped away.

        The news depressed Hazel. He knew that they had been lucky to get so many does out of Efrafa and to escape from Woundwort without having to stand and fight. The plan had been a good one, but the storm and the frightening efficiency of the Efrafans had nearly defeated it. For all the courage of Bigwig and of Silver, they would have failed without Kehaar. Now Kehaar was going to leave them, Bigwig was wounded, and his own leg was none too good. With the does to look after, they would not be able to travel in the open as fast or as easily as they had on the way down from Watership. He would have liked to stay where they were for a few days, so that Bigwig could recover his strength and the does find their feet and get used to life outside a warren. But the place, he realized, was hopelessly inhospitable. Although there was good cover, it was too wet for rabbits. Besides, it was evidently close to a road busier than any they had known. Soon after daylight they began to hear and smell hrududil passing, not so far away as the breadth of a small field. There was continual disturbance and the does in particular were startled and uneasy. Thrayonlosa's death made matters worse. Worried by the noise and vibration and unable to feed, the does kept wandering downstream to look at the body and whisper together about the strange and dangerous surroundings.

        He consulted Blackberry, who pointed out that probably it would not be long before men found the boat; then very likely several would be close by for some time. This decided Hazel that they had better set out at once and try to reach somewhere where they could rest more easily. He could hear and smell that the swamp extended a long way downstream. With the road lying to the south, the only way seemed to be northward, over the bridge, which was

in any case the way home.

        Taking Bigwig with him, he climbed the bank to the grass track. The first thing they saw was Kehaar, picking

slugs out of a clump of hemlock near the bridge. They came up to him without speaking and began to nibble the short grass nearby.

        After a little while Kehaar said, "Now you getting mudders, Meester 'Azel. All go fine, eh?"

        "Yes. We'd never have done it without you, Kehaar. I hear you turned up just in time to save Bigwig last night."

        "Dis bad rabbit, pig fella, 'e go fight me. Plenty clever, too."

        "Yes. He got a shock for once, though."

        "Ya, ya. Meester 'Azel, soon is men come. Vat you do now?"

        "We're going back to our warren, Kehaar, if we can get there."

        "Ees finish here now for me. I go to Peeg Vater."

        "Shall we see you again, Kehaar?"

        "You go back hills? Stay dere?"

        "Yes, we mean to get there. It's going to be hard going with so many rabbits, and there'll be Efrafan patrols to dodge, I expect."

        "You get dere, later on ees vinter, plenty cold, plenty storm on Peeg Vater. Plenty bird come in. Den I come back, see you vere you live."

        "Don't forget, then, Kehaar, will you?" said Bigwig. "We shall be looking out for you. Come down suddenly, like you did last night."

        "Ya, ya, frighten all mudders und liddle rabbits, all liddle Pigvigs run avay."

        Kehaar arched his wings and rose into the air. He flew over the parapet of the bridge and upstream. Then he turned in a circle to the left, came back over the grass track and flew straight down it, skimming just over the rabbits' heads. He gave one of his raucous cries and was gone to the southward. They gazed after him as he disappeared above the trees.

        "Oh, fly away, great bird so white," said Bigwig. "You know, he made me feel I could fly, too. That Big Water! I wish I could see it."

        As they continued to look in the direction where Kehaar had gone, Hazel noticed for the first time a cottage at the far end of the track, where the grass sloped up to join the road. A man, taking care to keep still, was leaning over the hedge and watching them intently. Hazel stamped and bolted into the undergrowth of the swamp, with Bigwig hard on his heels.

        "You know what he's thinking about?" said Bigwig. "He's thinking about the vegetables in his garden."

        "I know," replied Hazel. "And we shan't be able to keep this lot away from them once they get the idea into their heads. The quicker we push on the better."

        Shortly afterward the rabbits set out across the park to the north. Bigwig soon found that he was not up to a long journey. His wound was painful and the shoulder muscle would not stand hard use. Hazel was still lame and the does, though willing and obedient, showed that they knew little about the life of hlessil. It was a trying time.

        In the days that followed--days of clear sky and fine weather--Blackavar proved his worth again and again, until Hazel came to rely on him as much as on any of his veterans. There was a great deal more to him than anyone could have guessed. When Bigwig had determined not to come out of Efrafa without Blackavar, he had been moved entirely by pity for a miserable, helpless victim of Woundwort's ruthlessness. It turned out, however, that Blackavar, when not crushed by humiliation and ill-treatment, was a good cut above the ordinary. His story was an unusual one. His mother had not been born an Efrafan. She had been one of the rabbits taken prisoner when Woundwort attacked the warren at Nutley Copse. She had mated with an Efrafan captain and had had no other mate. He had been killed on Wide Patrol. Blackavar, proud of his father, had grown up with the resolve to become an officer in the Owsla. But together with this--and paradoxically--there had come to him from his mother a certain resentment against Efrafa and a feeling that they should have no more of him than he cared to give them. Captain Mallow, to whose Mark--the Right Fore--he had been sent on trial, had praised his courage and endurance but had not failed to notice the proud detachment of his nature. When the Right Flank needed a junior officer to help Captain Chervil, it was Avens and not Blackavar who had been selected by the Council. Blackavar, who knew his own worth, felt convinced that his mother's blood had prejudiced the Council against him. While still full of his wrongs he had met Hyzenthlay and made himself a secret friend and adviser of the discontented does in the Right Fore. He had begun by urging them to try to get the Council's consent to their leaving Efrafa. If they had succeeded they would have asked for him to be allowed to go with them. But when the does' deputation to the Council failed, Blackavar turned to the idea of escape. At first he had meant to take the does with him, but his nerve, strained to the limit, as Bigwig's had been, by the dangers and uncertainties of conspiracy, had given way and in the end he had simply made a dash on his own, to be caught by Campion. Under the punishment inflicted by the Council his mercurial spirit had fallen low and he had become the apathetic wretch the sight of whom had so much shocked Bigwig. Yet at the whispered message in the hraka pit this spirit had flickered up again where another's might well have failed to do so, and he had been ready to set all on the hazard and have another shot. Now, free among these easy-going strangers, he saw himself as a trained Efrafan using his skill to help them in their need. Although he did all that he was told, he did not hesitate to make suggestions as well, particularly when it came to reconnoitering and looking for signs of danger. Hazel, who was ready to accept advice from anybody when he thought it was good, listened to most of what he said and was content to leave it to Bigwig--for whom, naturally, Blackavar entertained a tremendous respect--to see that he did not overreach himself in his warm-hearted, rather candid zeal.

        After two or three days of slow, careful journeying, with many halts in cover, they found themselves, late one afternoon, once more in sight of Caesar's Belt, but further west than before, close to a little copse at the top of some rising ground. Everyone was tired and when they had fed--"evening silflay every day, just as you promised," said Hyzenthlay to Bigwig--Bluebell and Speedwell suggested that it might be worthwhile to dig some scrapes in the light soil under the trees and live there for a day or two. Hazel felt willing enough, but Fiver needed persuasion.

        "I know we can do with a rest, but somehow I don't altogether like it, Hazel-rah," he said. "I suppose I've got to try to think why?"

        "Not on my account," answered Hazel. "But I doubt you'll shift the others this time. One or two of these does are 'ready for mudder,' as Kehaar would say, and that's the real reason why Bluebell and the rest are prepared to be at the trouble of digging scrapes. Surely it'll be all right at that rate, won't it? You know what they say--'Rabbit underground, rabbit safe and sound.' "

        "Well, you may be right," said Fiver. "That Vilthuril's a beautiful doe. I'd like a chance to get to know her better. After all, it's not natural to rabbits, is it?--on and on day after day."

        Later, however, when Blackavar returned with Dandelion from a patrol they had undertaken on their own initiative, he came out more strongly against the idea.

        "This is no place to stop, Hazel-rah," he said. "No Wide Patrol would bivouac here. It's fox country. We ought to try to get further before dark."

        Bigwig's shoulder had been hurting him a good deal during the afternoon and he felt low and surly. It seemed to him that Blackavar was being clever at other people's expense. If he got his way they would have to go on, tired as they were, until they came to somewhere which was suitable by Efrafan standards. There they would be as safe--no more and no less--than they would have been if they had stayed at this copse; but Blackavar would be the clever fellow who had saved them from a fox that had never existed outside his own fancy. His Efrafan scoutcraft act was getting to be a bore. It was time someone called his bluff.

        "There are likely to be foxes anywhere about the downs," said Bigwig sharply. "Why is this fox country more than anywhere else?"

        Tact was a quality which Blackavar valued about as much as Bigwig did; and now he made the worst possible reply.

        "I can't exactly tell you why," he said. "I've formed a strong impression, but it's hard to explain quite what it's based on."

        "Oh, an impression, eh?" sneered Bigwig. "Did you see any hraka? Pick up any scent? Or was it just a message from little green mice singing under a toadstool?"

        Blackavar felt hurt. Bigwig was the last rabbit he wanted to quarrel with.

        "Ye think I'm a fool, then," he answered, his Efrafan accent becoming more marked. "No, there was neether hraka ner scent, but I still think that this is a place where a fox comes. On these patrols we used to do, ye know,

we--"

        "Did you see or smell anything?" said Bigwig to Dandelion.

        "Er--well, I'm not really quite sure," said Dandelion. "I mean, Blackavar seems to know an awful lot about patrolling and he asked me whether I didn't feel a sort of--"

        "Well, we can go on like this all night," said Bigwig. "Blackavar, do you know that earlier this summer, before we had the benefit of your experience, we went for days across every kind of country--fields, heather, woods, downs--and never lost one rabbit?"

        "It's the idea of scrapes, that's all," said Blackavar apologetically, "New scrapes get noticed; and digging can be heard a surprisingly long way, ye know."

        "Let him alone," said Hazel, before Bigwig could speak again. "You didn't get him out of Efrafa to bully him. Look, Blackavar, I suppose I've got to decide this. I think you're probably right and there is a certain amount of risk. But we're at risk all the time until we get back to our warren and everyone's so tired that I think we might just as well stop here for a day or two. We shall be all the better for it."

        Enough scrapes were finished by soon after sunset and next day, sure enough, all the rabbits felt a great deal better for a night underground. As Hazel had foreseen, there was some mating and a scuffle or two, but no one was hurt. By the evening a kind of holiday spirit prevailed. Hazel's leg was stronger and Bigwig felt fitter than at any time since he went into Efrafa. The does, harassed and bony two days before, were beginning to look quite sleek.

        On the second morning, silflay did not begin until some time after dawn. A light wind was blowing straight into the north bank of the copse, where the scrapes had been dug, and Bluebell, when he came up, swore he could smell rabbits on it.

        "It's old Holly pressing his chin glands for us, Hazel-rah," he said. "A rabbit's sneeze on the morning breeze sets homesick hearts aglow--"

        "Sitting with his rump in a chicory clump and longing for a nice plump doe," replied Hazel.

        "That won't do, Hazel-rah," said Bluebell. "He's got two does up there."

        "Only hutch does," replied Hazel. "I dare say they're fairly tough and fast by now, but all the same they'll never be quite like our own kind. Clover, for instance--she'd never go far from the hole on silflay, because she knew she couldn't run as fast as we can. But these Efrafan does, you see--they've been kept in by sentries all their lives. Yet now there aren't any, they wander about quite happily. Look at those two, right away under the bank there. They feel they can--Oh, great Frith!"

        As he spoke a tawny shape, dog-like, sprang out of the overhanging nut bushes as silently as light from behind a cloud. It landed between the two does, grabbed one by the neck and dragged her up the bank in a flash. The wind veered and the reek of fox came over the grass. With stamping and flashing of tails every rabbit on the slope dashed for cover.

        Hazel and Bluebell found themselves crouched with Blackavar. The Efrafan was matter-of-fact and detached.

        "Poor little beast," he said. "You see, their instincts are weakened by life in the Mark. Fancy feeding under bushes on the windward side of a wood! Never mind, Hazel-rah, these things happen. But look, I tell you what. Unless there are two hombil, which would be very bad luck, we've got till ni-Frith at least to get away. That homba won't be hunting any more for some time. I suggest we all move on as soon as we can."

        With a word of agreement, Hazel went out to call the rabbits together. They made a scattered but swift run to the northeast, along the edge of a field of ripening wheat. No one spoke of the doe. They had covered more than three quarters of a mile before Bigwig and Hazel halted to rest and to make sure that no one had fallen behind. Blackavar came up with Hyzenthlay, Bigwig said,

        "You told us how it would be, didn't you? And I was the one who wouldn't listen."

        "Told you?" said Blackavar. "I don't understand."

        "That there was likely to be a fox."

        "I don't remember, I'm afraid. But I don't see that any of us could possibly have known. Anyway, what's a doe more or less?"

        Bigwig looked at him in astonishment, but Blackavar, apparently unconcerned either to stress what he had said or to break off the talk, simply began to nibble the grass. Bigwig, puzzled moved away and himself began to feed a little distance off, with Hyzenthlay and Hazel.

        "What's he getting at?" he asked after a while. "You were all there when he warned us, two nights ago, that there was likely to be a fox. I treated him badly."

        "In Efrafa," said Hyzenthlay, "if a rabbit gave advice and the advice wasn't accepted, he immediately forgot it and so did everyone else. Blackavar thought what Hazel decided; and whether it turned out later to be right or wrong was all the same. His own advice had never been given."

        "I can believe that," said Bigwig. "Efrafa! Ants led by a dog! But we're not in Efrafa now. Has he really forgotten that he warned us?"

        "Probably he really has. But whether or not, you'd never get him to admit that he warned you or to listen while you told him he'd been right. He could no more do that than pass hraka underground."

        "But you're an Efrafan. Do you think like that, too?"

        "I'm a doe," said Hyzenthlay.

*      *      *

        During the early afternoon they began to approach the Belt and Bigwig was the first to recognize the place where Dandelion had told the story of the Black Rabbit of Inlé.

        "It was the same fox, you know," he said to Hazel. "That's almost certain. I ought to have realized how likely it was that--"

        "Look here," said Hazel, "you know very well what we owe to you. The does all think El-ahrairah sent you to get them out of Efrafa. They believe no one else could have done it. As for what happened this morning, it was my fault as much as yours. But I never supposed we would get home without losing some rabbits. In fact we've lost two and that's better than I expected. We can get back to the Honeycomb tonight if we press on. Let's forget about the homba now, Bigwig--it can't be altered--and try to--Hello, who's this?"

        They were coming to a thicket of juniper and dog roses, tangled at ground level with nettles and trails of bryony on which the berries were now beginning to ripen and turn red. As they stopped to pick a line into the undergrowth, four big rabbits appeared out of the long grass and sat looking down at them. One of the does, coming up the slope a little way behind, stamped and turned to bolt. They heard Blackavar check her sharply.

        "Well, why don't you answer his question, Thlayli?" said one of the rabbits. "Who am I?"

        There was a pause. Then Hazel spoke.

        "I can see they're Efrafans because they're marked," he said. "Is that Woundwort?"

        "No," said Blackavar, at his shoulder. "That's Captain Campion."

        "I see," said Hazel. "Well, I've heard of you, Campion. I don't know whether you mean us any harm, but the best thing you can do is to let well alone. As far as we're concerned, our dealings with Efrafa are finished."

        "You may think that," replied Campion, "but you'll find it's otherwise. That doe behind you must come with us; and so must any others that are with you."

        As he spoke, Silver and Acorn appeared lower down the slope, followed by Thethuthinnang. After a glance at the Efrafans, Silver spoke quickly to Thethuthinnang, who slipped back through the burdocks. Then he came up to Hazel.

        "I've sent for the white bird, Hazel," he said quietly.

        As a piece of bluff it was effective. They saw Campion look upward nervously and another of the patrol glanced back to the cover of the bushes.

        "What you're saying is stupid," said Hazel to Campion. "There are a lot of us here and unless you've got more rabbits than I can see, we're too many for you."

        Campion hesitated. The truth was that for once in his life he had acted rashly. He had seen Hazel and Bigwig approaching, with Blackavar and one doe behind them. In his eagerness to have something really worthwhile to show on his return to the Council, he had jumped to the conclusion that they were alone. The Efrafans usually kept fairly close together in the open and it had not occurred to Campion that other rabbits might straggle more widely. He had seen a golden opportunity to attack--perhaps kill--the detestable Thlayli and Blackavar, together with their one companion--who seemed to be lame--and bring the doe back to the Council. This he could certainly have done; and he had decided to confront rather than ambush them, in the hope that the bucks would surrender without fighting. But now, as more rabbits began to appear in ones and twos, he realized that he had made a mistake.

        "I have a great many more rabbits," he said. "The does must stay here. The rest of you can go. Otherwise we shall kill you."

        "Very well," said Hazel. "Bring your whole patrol into the open and we'll do as you say."

        By this time a considerable number of rabbits was coming up the slope. Campion and his patrol looked at them in silence but made no move.

        "You'd better stay where you are," said Hazel at length. "If you try to interfere with us it will be the worse for you. Silver and Blackberry, take the does and go on. The rest of us will join you."

        "Hazel-rah," whispered Blackavar, "the patrol must be killed--all of them. They mustn't report back to the General."

        This had also occurred to Hazel. But as he thought of the dreadful fight and the four Efrafans actually torn to pieces--for that was what it would mean--he could not find it in his heart to do it. Like Bigwig, he felt a reluctant liking for Campion. Besides, it would take some doing. Quite probably some of his own rabbits would be killed--certainly wounded. They would not reach the Honeycomb that night and they would leave a fresh blood trail wherever they went. Apart from his dislike of the whole idea, there were disadvantages that might be fatal.

        "No, we'll let them alone," he replied firmly.

        Blackavar was silent and they sat watching Campion as the last of the does disappeared through the bushes.

        "Now," said Hazel, "take your patrol and go the same way that you saw us come. Don't speak--go."

        Campion and the patrol made off downhill and Hazel, relieved to be rid of them so easily, hurried after Silver, with the others close behind.

        Once through the Belt, they made excellent progress. After the rest of a day and a half the does were in good shape. The promise of an end to the journey that night and the thought that they had escaped both the fox and the patrol made them eager and responsive. The only cause of delay was Blackavar, who seemed uneasy and kept hanging about in the rear. At last, in the late afternoon, Hazel sent for him and told him to go ahead, on the line of the path they were following, and look out for the long strip of the beech hanger in the dip on the morning side. Blackavar had not been gone very long before he came racing back.

        "Hazel-rah, I've been quite close to that wood you spoke of," he said, "and there are two rabbits playing about on a patch of short grass just outside it."

        "I'll come and see," said Hazel. "Dandelion, you come, too, will you?"

        As they ran down the hill to the right of the track, Hazel fairly skipped to recognize the beech hanger. He noticed one or two yellow leaves and a faint touch of bronze here and there in the green boughs. Then he caught sight of Buckthorn and Strawberry running toward them across the grass.

        "Hazel-rah!" cried Buckthorn. "Dandelion! What happened? Where are the others? Did you get any does? Is everyone all right?"

        "They'll be here very soon," said Hazel. "Yes, we've got a lot of does and everyone who went has come back. This is Blackavar, who's come out of Efrafa."

        "Good for him," said Strawberry. "Oh, Hazel-rah, we've watched at the end of the wood every evening since you went. Holly and Boxwood are all right--they're back at the warren: and what do you think? Clover's going to kindle. That's fine, isn't it?"

        "Splendid," said Hazel. "She'll be the first. My goodness, we've had a time, I can tell you. And so I will--what a story!--but it must wait a bit. Come on--let's go and bring the others in."

        By sunset the whole party--twenty rabbits all told--had made their way up the length of the beech hanger and reached the warren. They fed among the dew and the long shadows, with twilight already fallen in the fields below. Then they crowded down into the Honeycomb to hear Hazel and Bigwig tell the story of their adventures to those who had waited so eagerly and so long to hear it.

        As the last rabbits disappeared underground the Wide Patrol, which had followed them from Caesar's Belt with superlative skill and discipline, veered away in a half-circle to the east and then turned for Efrafa. Campion was expert at finding a night's refuge in the open. He planned to rest until dawn and then cover the three miles back by evening of the following day.

41.    The Story of Rowsby Woof and the Fairy Wogdog

Be not merciful unto them that offend of malicious wickedness. They grin like a dog and run about through the city. But thou, O Lord, shalt have them in derision. Thou shalt laugh all the heathen to scorn.

Psalm 59

Now came the dog days--day after day of hot, still summer, when for hours at a time light seemed the only thing that moved; the sky--sun, clouds and breeze--awake above the drowsing downs. The beech leaves grew darker on the boughs and fresh grass grew where the old had been nibbled close. The warren was thriving at last and Hazel could sit basking on the bank and count their blessings. Above and under ground, the rabbits fell naturally into a quiet, undisturbed rhythm of feeding, digging and sleeping. Several fresh runs and burrows were made. The does, who had never dug in their lives before, enjoyed the work. Both Hyzenthlay and Thethuthinnang told Hazel that they had had no idea how much of their frustration and unhappiness in Efrafa had been due simply to not being allowed to dig. Even Clover and Haystack found that they could manage pretty well and boasted that they would bear the warren's first litters in burrows that they had dug themselves. Blackavar and Holly became close friends. They talked a great deal about their different ideas of scouting and tracking, and made some patrols together, more for their own satisfaction than because there was any real need. One early morning they persuaded Silver to come with them and traveled over a mile to the outskirts of Kingsclere, returning with a tale of mischief and feasting in a cottage garden. Blackavar's hearing had weakened since the mutilation of his ears; but Holly found that his power of noticing and drawing conclusions from anything unusual was almost uncanny and that he seemed to be able to become invisible at will.

        Sixteen bucks and ten does made a happy enough society for a warren. There was some bickering here and there, but nothing serious. As Bluebell said, any rabbits who felt discontented could always go back to Efrafa; and the thought of all that they had faced together was enough to take the sting out of anything that might have made a real quarrel. The contentment of the does spread to everyone else, until one evening Hazel remarked that he felt a perfect fraud as Chief Rabbit, for there were no problems and hardly a dispute to be settled.

        "Have you thought about the winter yet?" asked Holly.

        Four or five of the bucks, with Clover, Hyzenthlay and Vilthuril, were feeding along the sunny west side of the hanger about an hour before sunset. It was still hot and the down was so quiet that they could hear the horses tearing the grass in the paddock of Cannon Heath Farm, more than half a mile away. It certainly did not seem a time to think of winter.

        "It'll probably be colder up here than any of us have been used to," said Hazel. "But the soil's so light and the roots break it up so much that we can dig a lot deeper before the cold weather comes. I think we ought to be able to get below the frost. As for the wind, we can block some of the holes and sleep warm. Grass is poor in winter, I know; but anyone who wants a change can always go out with Holly here and try his luck at pinching some greenstuff or cattle roots. It's a time of year to be careful of the elil, though. Myself, I shall be quite happy to sleep underground, play bob-stones and hear a few stories from time to time."

        "What about a story now?" said Bluebell. "Come on, Dandelion. 'How I Nearly Missed the Boat.' What about that?"

        "Oh, you mean 'Woundwort Dismayed,' " said Dandelion. "That's Bigwig's story--I wouldn't presume to tell it. But it makes a change to be thinking about winter on an evening like this. It reminds me of a story I've listened to but never tried to tell myself. So some of you may know it and perhaps some won't. It's the story of Rowsby Woof and the Fairy Wogdog."

        "Off you go," said Fiver, "and lay it on thick."

        "There was a big rabbit," said Dandelion. "There was a small rabbit. There was El-ahrairah; and he had the frost in his fine new whiskers. The earth up and down the runs of the warren was so hard that you could cut your paws on it, and the robins answered each other across the bare, still copses, 'This is my bit here. You go and starve in your own.'

        "One evening, when Frith was sinking huge and red in a green sky, El-ahrairah and Rabscuttle limped trembling through the frozen grass, picking a bite here and there to carry them on for another long night underground. The grass was as brittle and tasteless as hay, and although they were hungry, they had been making the best of the miserable stuff so long that it was as much as they could do to get it down. At last Rabscuttle suggested that they might take a risk for once in a way and slip across the fields to the edge of the village, where there was a big vegetable garden.

        "This particular garden was bigger than any of the others round about. The man who worked in it lived in a house at one end and he used to dig or cut great quantities of vegetables, put them into a hrududu and drive them away. He had put wire all round the garden to keep rabbits out. All the same, El-ahrairah could usually find a way in if he wanted to; but it was dangerous, because the man had a gun and often shot jays and pigeons and hung them up.

        " 'It isn't only the gun we'd be risking, either,' said El-ahrairah, thinking it over. 'We'd have to keep an eye open for that confounded Rowsby Woof as well.'

        "Now, Rowsby Woof was the man's dog; and he was the most objectionable, malicious, disgusting brute that ever licked a man's hand. He was a big, woolly sort of animal with hair all over his eyes and the man kept him to guard the vegetable garden, especially at night. Rowsby Woof, of course, did not eat vegetables himself and anyone might have thought that he would be ready to let a few hungry animals have a lettuce or a carrot now and then and no questions asked. But not a bit of it. Rowsby Woof used to run loose from evening till dawn the next day; and not content with keeping men and boys out of the garden, he would go for any animals he found there--rats, rabbits, hares, mice, even moles--and kill them if he could. The moment he smelled anything in the nature of an intruder he would start barking and kicking up a shine, although very often it was only this foolish noise which warned a rabbit and enabled him to get away in time. Rowsby Woof was reckoned to be a tremendous ratter and his master had boasted about this skill of his so often and showed him off so much that he had become revoltingly conceited. He believed himself to be the finest ratter in the world. He ate a lot of raw meat (but not in the evening, because he was left hungry at night to keep him active) and this made it rather easier to smell him coming. But even so, he made the garden a dangerous place.

        " 'Well, let's chance Rowsby Woof for once,' said Rabscuttle. 'I reckon you and I ought to be able to give him the slip if we have to.'

        "El-ahrairah and Rabscuttle made their way across the fields to the outskirts of the garden. When they got there, the first thing they saw was the man himself, with a white stick burning away in his mouth, cutting row after row of frosted cabbages. Rowsby Woof was with him, wagging his tail and jumping about in a ridiculous manner. After a time the man piled as many of the cabbages as he could into a wheel thing and pushed them away to the house. He came back several times and when he had taken all the cabbages to the door of the house he began carrying them inside.

        " 'What's he doing that for?' asked Rabscuttle.

        " 'I suppose he wants to get the frost out of them tonight,' replied El-ahrairah, 'before he takes them away in the hrududu tomorrow.'

        " 'They'd be much better to eat with the frost out of them, wouldn't they?' said Rabscuttle. 'I wish we could get at them while they're in there. Still, never mind. Now's our chance. Let's see what we can do up this end of the garden while he's busy down there.'

        "But hardly had they crossed the top of the garden and got among the cabbages than Rowsby Woof had winded them and down he came, barking and yelping, and they were lucky to get out in time.

        " 'Dirty little beasts,' shouted Rowsby Woof. 'How--how! How--how dare you come snou--snou--snouting round here? Get out--out! Out--out!'

        " 'Contemptible brute!' said El-ahrairah, as they scurried back to the warren with nothing to show for all their trouble. 'He's really annoyed me. I don't know yet how it's going to be done, but, by Frith and Inlé, before this frost thaws, we'll eat his cabbages inside the house and make him look a fool into the bargain!'

        " 'That's saying too much, master,' said Rabscuttle. 'A pity to throw your life away for a cabbage, after all we've done together.'

        " 'Well, I shall be watching my chance,' said El-ahrairah. 'I shall just be watching my chance, that's all.'

        "The following afternoon Rabscuttle was out, nosing along the top of the bank beside the lane, when a hrududu came by. It had doors at the back and these doors had somehow come open and were swinging about as the hrududu went along. There were things inside wrapped up in bags like the ones men sometimes leave about the fields; and as the hrududu passed Rabscuttle, one of these bags fell out into the lane. When the hrududu had gone Rabscuttle, who hoped that the bag might have something to eat inside, slipped down into the lane to have a sniff at it. But he was disappointed to find that all it contained was some kind of meat. Later he told El-ahrairah about his disappointment.

        " 'Meat?' said El-ahrairah. 'Is it still there?'

        " 'How should I know?' said Rabscuttle. 'Beastly stuff.'

        " 'Come with me,' said El-ahrairah. 'Quickly, too.'

        "When they got to the lane the meat was still there. El-ahrairah dragged the bag into the ditch and they buried it.

        " 'But what good will this be to us, master?' said Rabscuttle.

        " 'I don't know yet,' said El-ahrairah. 'But some good it will surely be, if the rats don't get it. Come home now, though. It's getting dark.'

        "As they were going home, they came on an old black wheel-covering thrown away from a hrududu, lying in the ditch. If you've ever seen these things, you'll know that they're something like a huge fungus--smooth and very strong, but pad-like and yielding too. They smell unpleasant, and are no good to eat.

        " 'Come on,' said El-ahrairah immediately. 'We have to gnaw off a good chunk of this. I need it.'

        "Rabscuttle wondered whether his master was going mad, but he did as he was told. The stuff had grown fairly rotten and before long they were able to gnaw off a lump about as big as a rabbifs head. It tasted dreadful, but El-ahrairah carried it carefully back to the warren. He spent a lot of time that night nibbling at it and after morning silflay the next day he continued. About ni-Frith he woke Rabscuttle, made him come outside and put the lump in front of him.

        " 'What does that look like?' he said. 'Never mind the smell. What does it look like?'

        "Rabscuttle looked at it. 'It looks rather like a dog's black nose, master,' he answered, 'except that it's dry.'

        " 'Splendid,' said El-ahrairah, and went to sleep.

        "It was still frosty--very clear and cold--that night, with half a moon, but fu Inlé, when all the rabbits were keeping warm underground, El-ahrairah told Rabscuttle to come with him. El-ahrairah carried the black nose himself and on the way he pushed it well into every nasty thing he could find. He found a--"

        "Well, never mind," said Hazel. "Go on with the story."

        "In the end," continued Dandelion, "Rabscuttle kept well away from him, but El-ahrairah held his breath and still carried the nose somehow, until they got to the place where they had buried the meat.

        " 'Dig it up,' said El-ahrairah. 'Come on.'

        "They dug it up and the paper came off. The meat was all bits joined together in a kind of trail like a spray of bryony, and poor Rabscuttle was told to drag it along to the bottom of the vegetable garden. It was hard work and he was glad when he was able to drop it.

        " 'Now,' said El-ahrairah, 'we'll go round to the front.'

        "When they got to the front, they could tell that the man had gone out. For one thing, the house was all dark but, besides, they could smell that he had been through the gate a little while before. The front of the house had a flower garden and this was separated from the back and the vegetable garden by a high, close-boarded fence that ran right across and ended in a big clump of laurels. Just the other side of the fence was the back door that led into the kitchen.

        "El-ahrairah and Rabscuttle went quietly through the front garden and peeped through a crack in the fence. Rowsby Woof was sitting on the gravel path, wide awake and shivering in the cold. He was so near that they could see his eyes blink in the moonlight. The kitchen door was shut, but nearby, along the wall, there was a hole above the drain where a brick had been left out. The kitchen floor was made of bricks and the man used to wash it with a rough broom and sweep the water out through the hole. The hole was plugged up with an old cloth to keep out the cold.

        "After a little while El-ahrairah said in a low voice,

        " 'Rowsby Woof! O Rowsby Woof!'

        "Rowsby Woof sat up and looked about him, bristling.

        " 'Who's there?' he said. 'Who are you?'

        " 'O Rowsby Woof!' said El-ahrairah, crouching on the other side of the fence. 'Most fortunate, most blessed Rowsby Woof! Your reward is at hand! I bring you the best news in the world!'

        " 'What?' said Rowsby Woof. 'Who's that? None of your tricks, now!'

        " 'Tricks, Rowsby Woof?' said El-ahrairah. 'Ah, I see you do not know me. But how should you? Listen, faithful, skillful hound. I am the Fairy Wogdog, messenger of the great dog spirit of the East, Queen Dripslobber. Far, far in the East her palace lies. Ah, Rowsby Woof, if only you could see her mighty state, the wonders of her kingdom! The carrion that lies far and wide upon the sands! The manure, Rowsby Woof! The open sewers! Oh, how you would jump for joy and run nosing all about!'

        "Rowsby Woof got to his feet and looked about in silence. He could not tell what to make of the voice, but he was suspicious.

        " 'Your fame as a ratter has come to the ears of the Queen,' said El-ahrairah. 'We know you--and honor you--as the greatest ratter in the world. That is why I am here. But poor, bewildered creature! I see you are perplexed, and well you may be. Come here, Rowsby Woof! Come close to the fence and know me better!'

        "Rowsby Woof came up to the fence and El-ahrairah pushed the rubber nose into the crack and moved it about. Rowsby Woof stood close, sniffing.

        " 'Noble rat-catcher,' whispered El-ahrairah, 'it is indeed I, the Fairy Wogdog, sent to honor you!'

        " 'Oh, Fairy Wogdog!' cried Rowsby Woof, dribbling and piddling all over the gravel. 'Ah, what elegance! What aristocratic distinction! Can that really be decayed cat that I smell? With a delicate overtone of rotten camel! Ah, the gorgeous East!'

        ("What on earth's 'camel'?" said Bigwig.

        "I don't know," replied Dandelion. "But it was in the story when I heard it, so I suppose it's some creature or other.")

        " 'Happy, happy dog!' said El-ahrairah. 'I must tell you that Queen Dripslobber her very self has expressed her gracious wish that you should meet her. But not yet, Rowsby Woof, not yet. First you must be found worthy. I am sent to bring you both a test and a proof. Listen, Rowsby Woof. Beyond the far end of the garden there lies a long rope of meat. Aye, real meat, Rowsby Woof, for though we are fairy dogs, yet we bring real gifts to noble, brave animals such as you. Go now--find and eat that meat. Trust me, for I will guard the house until you return. That is the test of your belief.'

        "Rowsby Woof was desperately hungry and the cold had got into his stomach, but still he hesitated. He knew that his master expected him to guard the house.

        " 'Ah, well,' said El-ahrairah, 'never mind. I will depart. In the next village there lives a dog--'

        " 'No, no,' cried Rowsby Woof. 'No, Fairy Wogdog, do not leave me! I trust you! I will go at once! Only guard the house and do not fail me!'

        " 'Have no fear, noble hound,' said El-ahrairah. 'Only trust the word of the great Queen.'

        "Rowsby Woof went bounding away in the moonlight and El-ahrairah watched him out of sight.

        " 'Are we to go into the house now, master?' asked Rabscuttle. 'We shall have to be quick.'

        " 'Certainly not,' said El-ahrairah. 'How could you suggest such double-dealing? For shame, Rabscuttle! We will guard the house.'

        "They waited silently and after a while Rowsby Woof returned, licking his lips and grinning. He came sniffing up to the fence.

        " 'I perceive, honest friend,' said El-ahrairah, 'that you found the meat as swiftly as though it had been a rat. The house is safe and all is well. Now hark. I shall return to the Queen and tell her of all that has passed. It was her gracious purpose that if you showed yourself worthy tonight, by trusting her messenger, she would herself send for you and honor you. Tomorrow night she will be passing through this land on her way to the Wolf Festival of the North and she means to break her journey in order that you may appear before her. Be ready, Rowsby Woof!'

        " 'Oh, Fairy Wogdog!' cried Rowsby Woof. 'What joy it will be to grovel and abase myself before the Queen! How humbly I shall roll upon the ground! How utterly shall I make myself her slave! What menial cringing will be mine! I will show myself a true dog!'

        " 'I do not doubt it,' said El-ahrairah. 'And now, farewell. Be patient and await my return!'

        "He withdrew the rubber nose and very quietly they crept away.

        "The following night was, if anything, still colder. Even El-ahrairah had to pull himself together before he could set out over the fields. They had hidden the rubber nose outside the garden and it took them some time to get it ready for Rowsby Woof. When they had made sure that the man had gone out, they went cautiously into the front garden and up to the fence. Rowsby Woof was padding up and down outside the back door, his breath steaming in the frosty air. When El-ahrairah spoke, he put his head on the ground between his front paws and whined for joy.

        " 'The Queen is coming, Rowsby Woof,' said El-ahrairah from behind the nose, 'with her noble attendants, the fairies Postwiddle and Sniffbottom. And this is her wish. You know the crossroads in the village, do you not?'

        " 'Yes, yes!' whined Rowsby Woof. 'Yes, yes! Oh, let me show how abject I can be, dear Fairy Wogdog. I will--'

        " 'Very well,' said El-ahrairah. 'Now, O fortunate dog, go to the crossroads and await the Queen. She is coming on the wings of night. It is far that she must come, but wait patiently. Only wait. Do not fail her and great blessing will be yours,'

        " 'Fail her? No, no!' cried Rowsby Woof. 'I will wait like a worm upon the road. Her beggar am I, Fairy Wogdog! Her mendicant, her idiot, her--'

        " 'Quite right, most excellent,' said El-ahrairah. 'Only make haste.'

        "As soon as Rowsby Woof had gone, El-ahrairah and Rabscuttle went quickly through the laurels, round the end of the fence and along to the back door. El-ahrairah pulled the cloth out of the hole above the drain with his teeth and led the way into the kitchen.

        "The kitchen was as warm as this bank and at one end was a great pile of vegetables ready for the hrududu in the morning--cabbages, brussels sprouts and parsnips. They were thawed out and the delicious smell was quite

overpowering. El-ahrairah and Rabscuttle began at once to make amends for the past days of frozen grass and tree bark.

        " 'Good, faithful fellow,' said El-ahrairah with his mouth full. 'How grateful he will be to the Queen for keeping him waiting. He will be able to show her the full extent of his loyalty, won't he? Have another parsnip, Rabscuttle.'

        "Meanwhile, down at the crossroads, Rowsby Woof waited eagerly in the frost, listening for the coming of Queen Dripslobber. After a long time he heard footsteps. They were not the steps of a dog but of a man. As they came near, he realized that they were the steps of his own master. He was too stupid to run away or hide, but merely remained where he was until his master--who was returning home--came up to the crossroads.

        " 'Why, Rowsby Woof,' said his master, 'what are you doing here?'

        "Rowsby Woof looked foolish and nosed about. His master was puzzled. Then a thought came to him.

        " 'Why, good old chap,' he said, 'you came to meet me, did you? Good fellow, then! Come on, we'll go home together.'

        "Rowsby Woof tried to slip away, but his master grabbed him by the collar, tied him by a bit of string he had in his pocket and led him home.

        "Their arrival took El-ahrairah by surprise. It fact, he was so busy stuffing cabbage that he heard nothing until

the doorhandle rattled. He and Rabscuttle had only just time to slip behind a pile of baskets before the man came

in, leading Rowsby Woof. Rowsby Woof was quiet and dejected and did not even notice the smell of rabbit, which

anyway was all mixed up with the smell of the fire and the larder. He lay on the mat while the man made some

sort of drink for himself.

        "El-ahrairah was watching his chance to dash out of the hole in the wall. But the man, as he sat drinking and

puffing away at a white stick, suddenly looked round and got up. He had noticed the draft coming in through the open hole. To the rabbits' horror, he picked up a sack and plugged the hole up very tightly indeed. Then he finished his drink, made up the fire and went away to sleep, leaving Rowsby Woof shut in the kitchen. Evidently he thought it too cold to turn him out for the night.

        "At first Rowsby Woof whined and scratched at the door, but after a time he came back to the mat by the fire and lay down. El-ahrairah moved very quietly along the wall until he was behind a big metal box in the corner under the sink. There were sacks and old papers here, too, and he felt fairly sure that Rowsby Woof could not manage to see behind it. As soon as Rabscuttle had joined him, he spoke.

        " 'O Rowsby Woof!' whispered El-ahrairah.

        "Rowsby Woof was up in a flash.

        " 'Fairy Wogdog!' he cried. 'Is that you I hear?'

        " 'It is indeed,' said El-ahrairah. 'I am sorry for your disappointment, Rowsby Woof. You did not meet the Queen.'

        " 'Alas, no,' said Rowsby Woof: and he told what had happened at the crossroads.

        " 'Never mind,' said El-ahrairah. Do not be downhearted, Rowsby Woof. There was good reason why the Queen did not come. She received news of danger--ah, great danger, Rowsby Woof!--and avoided it in time. I myself am here at the risk of my own safety to warn you. You are lucky indeed that I am your friend, for otherwise your good master must have been stricken with mortal plague.'

        " 'With plague?' cried Rowsby Woof. 'Oh, how, good fairy?'

        " 'Many fairies and spirits there are in the animal kingdoms of the East,' said El-ahrairah. 'Some are friends and there are those--may misfortune strike them down--who are our deadly enemies. Worst of them all, Rowsby Woof, is the great rat spirit, the giant of Sumatra, the curse of Hamelin. He dares not openly fight our noble Queen, but he works by stealth, by poison, by disease. Soon after you left me, I learned that he has sent his hateful rat goblins through the clouds, carrying sickness. I warned the Queen; but still I remained here, Rowsby Woof, to warn you. If the sickness falls--and the goblins are very near--it will harm not you, but your master it will slay--and me, too, I fear. You can save him, and you alone. I cannot.'

        " 'Oh, horror!' cried Rowsby Woof. 'There is no time to be lost! What must I do, Fairy Wogdog?'

        " 'The sickness works by a spell,' said El-ahrairah. 'But if a real dog of flesh and blood could run four times round the house, barking as loudly as he could, then the spell would be broken and the sickness would have no power. But alas! I forgot! You are shut in, Rowsby Woof. What is to be done? I fear that all is lost!'

        " 'No, no!' said Rowsby Woof. 'I will save you, Fairy Wogdog, and my dear master, too. Leave it to me!'

        "Rowsby Woof began to bark. He barked to raise the dead. The windows shook. The coal fell in the grate. The noise was terrifying. They could hear the man upstairs, shouting and cursing. Still Rowsby Woof barked. The man came stamping down. He flung open the window and listened for thieves, but he could hear nothing, partly because there was nothing to hear and partly because of the ceaseless barking. At last he picked up his gun, flung open the door and went cautiously out to see what was the matter. Out shot Rowsby Woof, bellowing like a bull, land tore around the house. The man followed him at a run, leaving the door wide.

        " 'Quick!' said El-ahrairah. 'Quicker than Wogdog from the Tartar's bow! Come on!'

        "El-ahrairah and Rabscuttle dashed into the garden and disappeared through the laurels. In the field beyond they paused for a moment. From behind came the sounds of yelping and woofing, mixed with shouts and angry cries of 'Come 'ere, damn you!'

        " 'Noble fellow,' said El-ahrairah. 'He has saved his master, Rabscuttle. He has saved us all. Let us go home and sleep sound in our burrow.'

        "For the rest of his life Rowsby Woof never forgot the night when he had waited for the great Dog Queen. True, it was a disappointment, but this, he felt, was a small matter, compared with the recollection of his own noble conduct and of how he had saved both his master and the good fairy Wogdog from the wicked rat spirit."

42.    News at Sunset

You will be sure to prove that the act is unjust and hateful to the gods?

Yes, indeed, Socrates; at least, if they will listen to me.

Plato, Euthyphro

As he came to the end of his story, Dandelion remembered that he was supposed to be relieving Acorn as sentry. The post was a little way away, near the eastern corner of the wood, and Hazel--who wanted to see how Boxwood and Speedwell were getting on with a hole they were digging--went with Dandelion along the foot of the bank. He was just going down the new hole when he noticed that some small creature was pattering about in the grass. It was the mouse that he had saved from the kestrel. Pleased to see that he was still safe and sound, Hazel turned back to have a word with him. The mouse recognized him and sat up, washing his face with his front paws and chattering effusively.

        "Is a good a days, a hot a days. You like? Plenty for eata, keepa warm is a no trouble. Down in a bottom a hill is a harvest. I go for a corn a, but is a long a way. I tink a you go away, is a not a long a you come a back, yes?"

        "Yes," said Hazel, "a lot of us went away, but we found what we were looking for and now we've come back for good."

        "Is a good. Is a lots of rabbits a now, keepa grass a short."

        "What difference does it make to him if the grass is short?" said Bigwig, who, with Blackavar, was lolloping and nibbling close by. "He doesn't eat it."

        "Is a good a for get about, you know?" said the mouse in a familiar tone which made Bigwig shake his ears with irritation. "Is a run along the queek--but is a no seeds a from a short a grass. Now is a warren a here and now a today is a new a rabbits a come, soon is another warren a more. New rabbits is a your friends a too?"

        "Yes, yes, all friends," said Bigwig, turning away. "There was something I wanted to say, Hazel, about the newborn rabbits, when they're ready to come above ground."

        Hazel, however, had remained where he was, looking intently at the mouse.

        "Wait a moment, Bigwig," he said. "What did you say, mouse, about another warren? Where is there going to be another warren?"

        The mouse was surprised. "You not a know? Not a your friends?"

        "I don't know until you tell me. What did you mean about new rabbits and another warren soon?" His tone was urgent and inquisitive.

        The mouse became nervous and, after the manner of his kind, began to say what he thought the rabbits would like to hear.

        "Maybe is a no warren. Is a plenty good a rabbits 'ere, is all a my friends. Is a no more rabbits. Not a for want other rabbits."

        "But what other rabbits?" persisted Hazel.

        "No, sir. No, sir, no other rabbits, is a not a go for soon a rabbits, all stay 'ere are my friends, a save a me a very good a my life, zen 'ow can I if a she mek me?" twittered the mouse.

        Hazel considered this lot briefly, but it beat him.

        "Oh, come on, Hazel," said Bigwig. "Let the poor little beast alone. I want to talk to you."

        Hazel ignored him. Going close to the mouse, he bent his head and spoke quietly and firmly.

        "You've often said you're our friend," he said. "If you are, tell me, and don't be afraid, what you know about other rabbits coming."

        The mouse looked confused. Then he said, "I not see other rabbits, sir, but a my brother 'e say yellowhammer say is a new rabbits, plenty, plenty rabbits, come to combe over on a morning side. Maybe is a lots a rubbish. I tell you a wrong, you no like a mouse for more, not a friend a more."

        "No, that's all right," said Hazel. "Don't worry. Just tell me again. Where did the bird say these new rabbits were?"

        " 'E say is a come just a now on a morning side. I not a see."

        "Good fellow," said Hazel. "That's very helpful." He turned back to the others. "What d'you make of this, Bigwig?" he asked.

        "Not much," answered Bigwig. "Long-grass rumors. These little creatures say anything and change it five times a day. Ask him again fu Inlé--he'll tell you something else."

        "If you're right, then I'm wrong and we can all forget it," said Hazel. "But I'm going to get to the bottom of this. Someone must go and see. I'd go myself, but I've got no speed with this leg."

        "Well, leave it for tonight, anyway," said Bigwig. "We can--"

        "Someone must go and see," repeated Hazel firmly. "A good patroller, too. Blackavar, go and get Holly for me, will you?"

        "I'm here, as it happens," said Holly, who had come along the top of the bank while Hazel was speaking. "What's the trouble, Hazel-rah?"

        "There's a rumor of strangers on the down, on the morning side," replied Hazel, "and I wish I knew more. Can you and Blackavar run over that way--say, as far as the top of the combe--and find out what's going on?"

        "Yes, of course, Hazel-rah," said Holly. "If there really are some other rabbits there, we'd better bring them back with us, hadn't we? We could do with a few more."

        "It depends who they are," said Hazel. "That's what I want to find out. Go at once, Holly, will you? Somehow it worries me not to know."

        Holly and Blackavar had hardly set off when Speedwell appeared above ground. He had an excited, triumphant look which attracted everyone's attention immediately. He squatted in front of Hazel and looked round him in silence, to make sure of his effect.

        "You've finished the hole?" asked Hazel.

        "Never mind the hole," answered Speedwell. "I didn't come up to say that. Clover's had her litter. All good, healthy kittens. Three bucks and three does, she says."

        "You'd better go up in the beech tree and sing that," said Hazel. "See that everybody knows! But tell them not to go crowding down disturbing her."

        "I shouldn't think they would," said Bigwig. "Who'd be a kitten again, or even want to see one--blind and deaf and no fur?"

        "Some of the does may want to see them," said Hazel. "They're excited, you know. But we don't want Clover disturbed into eating them or anything miserable like that."

        "It looks as though we really are going to live a natural life again at last, doesn't it?" said Bigwig, as they browsed their way along the bank. "What a summer it's been! I keep dreaming I'm back in Efrafa, you know; but it'll pass off, I suppose. One thing I brought back out of that place, though, and that's the value of keeping a warren hidden. As we get bigger, Hazel, we ought to take care of that. We'll do better than Efrafa, though. When we've reached the right size, rabbits can be encouraged to leave."

        "Well, don't you leave," said Hazel, "or I'll tell Kehaar to bring you back by the scruff of the neck. I'm relying on you to produce us a really good Owsla."

        "It's certainly something to look forward to," said Bigwig. "Take a pack of young fellows across to the farm and chase the cats out of the barn to get an appetite. Well, it'll come. I say, this grass is as dry as horsehair on barbed wire, isn't it? What about a run down the hill to the fields--just you and I and Fiver? Corn's been cut, you know, and there should be good pickings. I expect they're going to burn off the field, but they haven't done it yet."

        "No, we must wait a bit," said Hazel. "I want to hear what Holly and Blackavar have to say when they come in."

        "That needn't keep you long," replied Bigwig. "Here they come already, unless I'm much mistaken. Straight down the open track, too! Not bothered about keeping hidden, are they? What a rate they're going!"

        "There's something wrong," said Hazel, staring at the approaching rabbits.

        Holly and Blackavar reached the long shadow of the wood at top speed, as though they were being pursued. The watchers expected them to slow down as they came to the bank, but they kept straight on and appeared actually to be going to run underground. At the last moment Holly stopped, looked about him and stamped twice. Blackavar disappeared down the nearest hole. At the stamping, all the rabbits above ground ran for cover.

        "Here, wait a minute," said Hazel, pushing past Pipkin and Hawkbit as they came across the grass. "Holly, what's the alarm? Tell us something, instead of stamping the place to pieces. What's happened?"

        "Get the holes filled in!" gasped Holly. "Get everyone underground! There's not a moment to lose." His eyes rolled white and he panted foam over his chin.

        "Is it men, or what? There's nothing to be seen, heard or smelled. Come on, tell us something and stop gibbering, there's a good chap."

        "It'll have to be quick, then," said Holly. "That combe--it's full of rabbits from Efrafa."

        "From Efrafa? Fugitives, do you mean?"

        "No," said Holly, "not fugitives. Campion's there. We ran right into him and three or four more that Blackavar recognized. I believe Woundwort's there himself. They've come for us--don't make any mistake about that."

        "You're sure it's more than a patrol?"

        "I'm certain," answered Holly. "We could smell them; and we heard them, too--below us in the combe. We wondered what so many rabbits could be doing there and we were going down to see when we suddenly came face to face with Campion. We looked at him and he looked at us and then I realized what it must mean and we turned and ran. He didn't follow us--probably because he'd had no orders. But how long will it take them to get here?"

        Blackavar had returned from underground, bringing Silver and Blackberry.

        "We ought to leave at once, sir," he said to Hazel. "We might be able to get quite a long way before they come."

        Hazel looked about him. "Anyone who wants to go can go," he said. "I shan't. We made this warren ourselves and Frith only knows what we've been through on account of it. I'm not going to leave it now."

        "Neither am I," said Bigwig. "If I'm for the Black Rabbit, there's one or two from Efrafa will come with me."

        There was a short silence.

        "Holly's right to want to stop the holes," went on Hazel. "It's the best thing to do. We fill the holes in, good and thorough. Then they have to dig us out. The warren's deep. It's under a bank, with tree roots all through it and over the top. How long can all those rabbits stay on the down without attracting elil? They'll have to give it up."

        "You don't know these Efrafans," said Blackavar. "My mother used to tell me what happened at Nutley Copse. It would be better to go now."

        "Well, go on, then," answered Hazel. "I'm not stopping you. And I'm not leaving this warren. It's my home." He looked at Hyzenthlay, heavy with young, who was sitting in the mouth of the nearest hole and listening to the talk. "How far do you think she'll get? And Clover--do we leave her or what?"

        "No, we must stay," said Strawberry. "I believe El-ahrairah will save us from this Woundwort; and if he doesn't, I'm not going back to Efrafa, I'll tell you that."

        "Fill in the holes," said Hazel.

        As the sun set, the rabbits fell to clawing and scrabbling in the runs. The sides were hard with the hot weather. It was not easy to get started, and when the soil began to fall, it was light and powdery and did little to block the holes. It was Blackberry who hit upon the idea of working outward from inside the Honeycomb itself, scratching down the ceilings of the runs where they came into the meeting hall and blocking the holes by breaking the underground walls into them. One run, leading up into the wood, was left open for coming and going. It was the one where Kehaar used to shelter and the lobby at the mouth was still cluttered with guano. As Hazel passed the place, it occurred to him that Woundwort did not know that Kehaar had left them. He dug out as much of the mess as he could and scattered it about. Then, as the work went on below, he squatted on the bank and watched the darkening eastern skyline.

        His thoughts were very sad. Indeed, they were desperate. Although he had spoken resolutely in front of the others, he knew only too well how little hope there was of saving the warren from the Efrafans. They knew what they were doing. No doubt they had their methods of breaking into a closed warren. It was the faintest of chances that elil would disperse them. Most of the Thousand hunted rabbits for food. A stoat or a fox took a rabbit and took no more until it was ready to hunt again. But the Efrafans were accustomed to a death here and there. Unless General Woundwort himself were killed, they would stay until the job was done. Nothing would stop them, short of some unexpected catastrophe.

        But suppose that he himself were to go and talk to Woundwort? Might there not just possibly be a chance of getting him to see sense? Whatever had happened at Nutley Copse, the Efrafans could not fight to the finish against rabbits like Bigwig, Holly and Silver without losing lives--probably a good many lives. Woundwort must know this. Perhaps it might not be too late, even now, to persuade him to agree to a new plan--a plan that would be as good for one warren as the other.

        "And perhaps it might be," thought Hazel grimly. "But it's a possible chance and so I'm afraid the Chief Rabbit has got to take it. And since this savage brute is probably not to be trusted, I suppose the Chief Rabbit must go alone."

        He returned to the Honeycomb and found Bigwig.

        "I'm off to talk to General Woundwort, if I can get hold of him," he said. "You're Chief Rabbit until I come back. Keep them at it."

        "But, Hazel," said Bigwig, "wait a moment. It's not safe--"

        "I shan't be long," said Hazel. "I'm just going to ask him what he's up to."

        A moment later he was down the bank and limping up the track, pausing from time to time to sit up and look about him for an Efrafan patrol.

43.    The Great Patrol

What is the world, O soldiers?

                It is I.

        I, this incessant snow,

          This northern sky;

        Soldiers, this solitude

        Through which we go

                Is I.

Walter de la Mare, Napoleon

When the punt floated down the river in the rain, part of General Woundwort's authority went with it. He could not have appeared more openly and completely at a loss if Hazel and his companions had flown away over the trees. Until that very moment he had shown up strongly, a most formidable adversary. His officers had been demoralized by Kehaar's unexpected attack. He had not. On the contrary, he had kept up the pursuit in spite of Kehaar and had actually carried out a scheme to cut off the fugitives' retreat. Cunning and resourceful in adversity, he had nearly succeeded in hurting the gull when he leaped at him out of the close cover by the plank bridge. Then, when he had his quarry cornered in a place where Kehaar could not have done a great deal to help them, they had suddenly shown their own cunning greater than his, and left him bewildered on the bank. He had overheard the very word--tharn--spoken by one of his officers to another as they returned to Efrafa through the rain. Thlayli, Blackavar and the does of the Near Hind had vanished. He had tried to stop them and he had conspicuously failed.

        For a great part of that night Woundwort remained awake, considering what was best to be done. The following day he called a Council meeting. He pointed out that it would be no good taking an expedition down the river to look for Thlayli unless it were strong enough to defeat him if it found him. That would mean taking several officers and a number of the Owsla. There would be the risk of trouble at home while they were away. There might be another break-out. The odds were that they would not find Thlayli at all, for there would be no trail and they did not know where to search for him. If they did not find him, they would look even bigger fools when they came back.

        "And fools we look now," said Woundwort. "Make no mistake about that. Vervain will tell you what the Marks are saying--that Campion was chased into the ditch by the white bird and Thlayli called down lightning from the sky and Frith knows what besides."

        "The best thing," said old Snowdrop, "will be to say as little about it as possible. Let it blow over. They've got short memories."

        "There's one thing I think worth doing," said Woundwort. "We know now that there was one place where we did find Thlayli and his gang, only nobody realized it at the time. That was when Mallow was after them with his patrol, just before he was killed by the fox. Something tells me that where they were once, there they'll be again, sooner or later.

        "But we can hardly stay out there with enough rabbits to fight them, sir," said Groundsel, "and it would mean digging in and living there for some time."

        "I agree with you," replied Woundwort. "A patrol will be stationed there continuously until further notice. They'll dig scrapes and live there. They'll be relieved every two days. If Thlayli comes, he's to be watched and followed secretly. When we know where he's taken the does, then we may be able to deal with him. And I'll tell you this," he ended, glaring round at them with his great, pale eyes. "If we do find out where he is, I shall be ready to go to a great deal of trouble. I told Thlayli I'd kill him myself. He may have forgotten that, but I haven't."

        Woundwort led the first patrol in person, taking Groundsel to show him where Mallow had picked up the strangers' southward trail. They dug scrapes among the scrub along the edge of Caesar's Belt and waited. After two days their hopes were lower. Vervain relieved Woundwort. He was relieved two days later by Campion. By this time there were captains in the Owsla who said privately to each other that the General was in the grip of an obsession. Some way would have to be found of getting him to drop it before it went too far. At the Council meeting the next evening it was suggested that the patrol should be discontinued in two days' time. Woundwort, snarling, told them to wait and see. An argument began, behind which he sensed more opposition than he had ever encountered before. In the middle of this, with a dramatic effect that could not have been better timed from the General's point of view, Campion and his patrol came in, dead beat, with the report that they had met Thlayli and his rabbits exactly where  Woundwort had said they would. Unseen, they had followed them to the warren, which, though a long way off, was not too distant to be attacked, especially since no time would have to be spent in searching for it. It did not appear to be very large and could probably be surprised.

        The news put an end to all opposition and brought both Council and Owsla back under Woundwort's undisputed control. Several of the officers were for starting at once, but Woundwort, now that he was sure of his followers and his enemy, took his time. Having learned from Campion that he had actually come face to face with Thlayli, Blackavar and the rest, he decided to wait some little while, in case they might be on their guard. Besides, he wanted time both to reconnoiter the way to Watership and to organize the expedition. His idea was that, if possible, they should make the journey in one day. This would forestall any possible rumors of their approach. To satisfy himself that they could do this and still be fit to fight when they arrived, he took Campion and two others, and himself covered the three and a half miles to the down east of Watership. Here, he grasped at once the best way to approach the beech hanger without being seen or smelled. The prevailing wind was westerly, as at Efrafa. They would arrive at evening and then assemble and rest in the combe south of Cannon Heath Down. As soon as twilight fell and Thlayli and his rabbits had gone underground, they would come along the ridge and attack the warren. With luck, there would be no warning whatever. They would be safe for the night in the captured warren and the following day he himself and Vervain would be able to return to Efrafa. The remainder, under Campion, could have a day's rest and then make their way back with the does and any other prisoners there might be. The whole thing could be finished in three days.

        It would be best not to take too many rabbits. Anyone not strong enough to go the distance and then fight would only be a nuisance. In the event, speed might turn out to be everything. The slower the journey, the more dangerous it would be, and stragglers would attract elil and discourage the rest. Besides, as Woundwort very well knew, his leadership was going to be vital. Every rabbit would need to feel that he was close to the General; and if he felt himself one of a picked band as well, that would be all to the good.

        The rabbits to go were chosen most carefully. There were in fact about twenty-six or -seven of them, half Owsla and the rest promising youngsters recommended by their Mark officers. Woundwort believed in emulation and he let it be known that there would be plenty of chances to win rewards. Campion and Chervil were kept busy taking out endurance patrols, and tussles and training fights were organized at morning silflay. The members of the expedition were excused all sentry duties and allowed to silflay whenever they wished.

        They started before dawn one clear August morning, going due north in groups along the banks and hedges. Before they had reached the Belt, Groundsel's party was attacked by a pair of stoats, one old and the other a yearling. Woundwort, hearing the squealing from behind him, covered the distance in a few moments and set upon the veteran stoat with slashing teeth and great kicks from his needle-clawed back paws. With one of its forelegs ripped to the shoulder, it turned and made off, the younger one following.

        "You ought to be able to see to these things yourself," said Woundwort to Groundsel. "Stoats aren't dangerous. Come on."

        Shortly after ni-Frith, Woundwort went back to pick up stragglers. He found three, one injured by a piece of glass. He stopped the bleeding, brought the three up to rejoin their groups and then called a halt to rest and feed, himself keeping a watch round about. It was very hot and some of the rabbits were showing signs of exhaustion. Woundwort formed these into a separate group and took charge of it himself.

        By the early evening--about the same time as Dandelion was beginning the story of Rowsby Woof--the Efrafans had skirted an enclosure of pigs east of Cannon Heath Farm and were slipping into the combe south of Cannon Heath Down. Many were tired and, in spite of their tremendous respect for Woundwort, there was a certain feeling that they had come a long way from home. They were ordered to take cover, feed, rest and wait for sunset.

        The place was deserted, except for yellowhammers and a few mice pattering about in the sun. Some of the rabbits went to sleep in the long grass. The slope was already in shadow when Campion came running down with the news that he had come face to face with Blackavar and Holly in the upper part of the combe.

        Woundwort was annoyed. "What made them come traipsing over here, I wonder?" he said. "Couldn't you have killed them? Now we've lost surprise."

        "I'm sorry, sir," said Campion. "I wasn't really alert at the time and I'm afraid they were a bit too quick for me. I didn't pursue them because I wasn't sure whether you'd want me to."

        "Well, it may not make much difference," said Woundwort. "I don't see what they can do. But they'll try to do something, I suppose, now they know we're here."

        As he went among his rabbits, looking them over and encouraging them, Woundwort considered the situation. One thing was clear--there was no longer the chance of catching Thlayli and the rest off their guard. But perhaps they were already so much frightened that they would not fight at all? The bucks might give up the does to save their own lives. Or they might already be on the run, in which case they must be followed and caught at once, for they were fresh and his own rabbits were tired and could not pursue them far. He ought to find out quickly. He turned to a young rabbit of the Neck Mark who was feeding close at hand.

        "Your name's Thistle, isn't it?" he asked.

        "Thistle, sir," answered the rabbit.

        "Well, you're the very fellow I want," said Woundwort. "Go and find Captain Campion and tell him to meet me up there by that juniper--do you see where I mean?--at once. You'd better come there, too. Be quick: there's no time to lose."

        As soon as Campion and Thistle had joined him, Woundwort took them up to the ridge. He meant to see what was happening over at the beech hanger. If the enemy were already in flight, Thistle could be sent back with a message to Groundsel and Vervain to bring everyone up immediately. If they were not, he would see what threats could do.

        They reached the track above the combe and began to make their way along it with some caution, since the sunset was in their eyes. The light west wind carried a fresh smell of rabbits.

        "If they are running, they haven't gone far," said Woundwort. "But I don't think they are running. I think they're still in their warren."

        At that moment a rabbit came out of the grass and sat up in the middle of the track. He paused for a few moments and then moved toward them. He was limping and had a strained, resolute look.

        "You're General Woundwort, aren't you?" said the rabbit. "I've come to talk to you."

        "Did Thlayli send you?" asked Woundwort.

        "I'm a friend of Thlayli," replied the rabbit. "I've come to ask why you're here and what it is you want."

        "Were you on the riverbank in the rain?" said Woundwort.

        "Yes, I was."

        "What was left unfinished there will be finished now," said Woundwort. "We are going to destroy you."

        "You won't find it easy," replied the other. "You'll take fewer rabbits home than you brought. We should both do better to come to terms."

        "Very well," said Woundwort. "These are the terms. You will give back all the does who ran from Efrafa and you will hand over the deserters Thlayli and Blackavar to my Owsla."

        "No, we can't agree to that. I've come to suggest something altogether different and better for us both. A rabbit has two ears; a rabbit has two eyes, two nostrils. Our two warrens ought to be like that. They ought to be together--not fighting. We ought to make other warrens between us--start one between here and Efrafa, with rabbits from both sides. You wouldn't lose by that, you'd gain. We both would. A lot of your rabbits are unhappy now and it's all you can do to control them, but with this plan you'd soon see a difference. Rabbits have enough enemies as it is. They ought not to make more among themselves. A mating between free, independent warrens--what do you say?"

        At that moment, in the sunset on Watership Down, there was offered to General Woundwort the opportunity to show whether he was really the leader of vision and genius which he believed himself to be, or whether he was no more than a tyrant with the courage and cunning of a pirate. For one beat of his pulse the lame rabbit's idea shone clearly before him. He grasped it and realized what it meant. The next, he had pushed it away from him. The sun dipped into the cloud bank and now he could see clearly the track along the ridge, leading to the beech hanger and the bloodshed for which he had prepared with so much energy and care.

        "I haven't time to sit here talking nonsense," said Woundwort. "You're in no position to bargain with us. There's nothing more to be said. Thistle, go back and tell Captain Vervain I want everyone up here at once."

        "And this rabbit, sir," asked Campion. "Shall I kill him?"

        "No," replied Woundwort. "Since they've sent him to ask our terms, he'd better take them back.--Go and tell Thlayli that if the does aren't waiting outside your warren, with him and Blackavar, by the time I get down there, I'll tear the throat out of every buck in the place by ni-Frith tomorrow."

        The lame rabbit seemed about to reply, but Woundwort had already turned away and was explaining to Campion what he was to do. Neither of them bothered to watch the lame rabbit as he limped back by the way he had come.

44.    A Message from El-ahrairah

The enforced passivity of their defence, the interminable waiting, became insupportable. Day and night they heard the muffled thud of the picks above and dreamt of the collapse of the grotto and of every ghastly eventuality. They were subject to "castle-mentality" in its most extreme form.