Robin Fedden, Crusader Castles

"They've stopped digging, Hazel-rah," said Speedwell. "As far as I can tell, there's no one in the hole."

        In the close darkness of the Honeycomb, Hazel pushed past three or four of his rabbits crouching among the tree roots and reached the higher shelf where Speedwell lay listening for sounds from above. The Efrafans had reached the hanger at early twilight and at once begun a search along the banks and among the trees to find out how big the warren was and where its holes were. They had been surprised to find so many holes in such a small area, for not many of them had had experience of any warren but Efrafa, where very few holes served the needs of many rabbits. At first they had supposed that there must be a large number of rabbits underground. The silence and emptiness of the open beechwood made them suspicious, and most kept outside, nervous of an ambush. Woundwort had to reassure them. Their enemies, he explained, were fools who made more runs than any properly organized warren needed. They would soon discover their mistake, for every one would be opened, until the place became impossible to defend. As for the droppings of the white bird, scattered in the wood, it was plain that they were old. There were no signs whatever that the bird was anywhere near. Nevertheless, many of the rank and file continued to look cautiously about them. At the sudden cry of a peewit on the down, one or two bolted and had to be brought back by their officers. The story of the bird which had fought for Thlayli in the storm had lost nothing in the telling up and down the burrows of Efrafa.

        Woundwort told Campion to post sentries and keep a patrol round about, while Vervain and Groundsel tackled the blocked holes. Groundsel set to work along the bank, while Vervain went into the wood, where the mouths of the holes lay between the tree roots. He came at once upon the open run. He listened, but all was quiet. Vervain (who was more used to dealing with prisoners than with enemies) ordered two of his rabbits to make their way down it. The discovery of the silent, open run gave him the hope that he might be able to seize the warren by a sudden dash to the very center. The wretched rabbits, obeying his orders, were met by Silver and Buckthorn at a point where the run opened out. They were cuffed and mauled and barely got out with their lives. The sight of them did nothing to encourage Vervain's party, who were reluctant to dig and made little headway during the darkness before moonrise.

        Groundsel, who felt that he ought to set an example, himself dug his way into the loose, fallen soil of one of the bank runs. Plowing over the soft earth like a fly on summer butter and holding his head clear, he suddenly found himself face to face with Blackavar, who sank his front teeth into his throat. Groundsel, with no freedom to use his weight, screamed and kicked out as best he could. Blackavar hung on and Groundsel--a heavy rabbit, like all the Efrafan officers--dragged him forward a short distance before he could rid himself of his grip. Blackavar spat out a mouthful of fur and jumped clear, clawing with his front paws. But Groundsel had already gone. He was lucky not to have been more severely wounded.

        It became clear to Woundwort that it was going to be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to take the warren by attack down the defended runs. There would be a good chance of success if several runs could be opened and then tackled at the same time, but he doubted whether his rabbits would attempt it, after what they had seen. He realized that he had not given enough thought, earlier on, to what he would have to do if he lost surprise and had to force an entry: he had better give it some thought now. As the moon rose, he called Campion in and talked it over with him.    Campion's suggestion was that they should simply starve the warren out. The weather was warm and dry and they could easily stay two or three days. This Woundwort rejected impatiently. In his own mind, he was not altogether certain that daylight might not bring the white bird down upon them. They ought to be underground by dawn. But, apart from this secret anxiety, he felt that his reputation depended on a fighting victory. He had brought his Owsla to get at these rabbits, knock them down and beat them. A siege would be a miserable anti-climax. Also, he wanted to get back to Efrafa as soon as he could. Like most warlords, he was never very confident about what was going on behind his back. 

        "If I remember rightly," he said, "after the main part of the warren at Nutley Copse was taken and the fighting was as good as over, there were a few rabbits who shut themselves into a smaller burrow where it was difficult to get at them. I said they were to be dealt with and then I went back to Efrafa with the prisoners. How were they dealt with and who did it, do you know?"

        "Captain Mallow did it," said Campion. "He's dead, of course; but I expect there's someone here who was with him. I'll go and find out."

        He returned with a heavy, stolid Owsla sentry named Ragwort, who at first had some difficulty in understanding what it was that the General wanted to know. At last, however, he said that when he had been with Captain Mallow, more than a year ago, the Captain had told them to dig a hole straight down into the ground. In the end the earth had given way under them and they had fallen down among some rabbits, whom they had fought and beaten.

        "Well, that's about the only way it can be done," said Woundwort to Campion. "And if we get them all onto it, relieving each other in shifts, we should have a way into the place before dawn. You'd better get your sentries out again--not more than two or three--and we'll make a start at once."

        Soon after, Hazel and his rabbits, below in the Honeycomb, heard the first sounds of scratching above. It was not long before they realized that the digging was going on at two points. One was at the north end of the Honeycomb, above the place where the tree roots formed a kind of cloister in the burrow. Here the roof, latticed through and through with fine roots, was very strong. The other seemed to be more or less above the open center of the Honeycomb, but rather nearer to the south end, where the hall broke up into bays and runs with columns of earth between. Beyond these runs lay several of the warren's burrows. One, lined with fur torn from her own belly, contained Clover and the pile of grass and leaves, covered over with earth, in which her newborn litter were sleeping.

        "Well, we seem to be putting them to a great deal of trouble," said Hazel. "That's all to the good. It'll blunt their claws and I should think they'll be tired out before they've done. What do you make of it, Blackberry?"

        "I'm afraid it's a bad lookout, Hazel-rah," replied Blackberry. "It's true they're in trouble up at the top end. There's a lot of ground above us there and the roots will hold them up for a long time. But down this end it's easier for them. They're bound to dig through fairly soon. Then the roof will come in; and I can't see that we can do anything to stop them."

        Hazel could feel him trembling as he spoke. As the sounds of digging continued, he sensed fear spreading all through the burrow. "They'll take us back to Efrafa," whispered Vilthuril to Thethuthinnang. "The warren police--"

        "Be quiet," said Hyzenthlay. "The bucks aren't talking like that and why should we? I'd rather be here now, as we are, than never have left Efrafa."

        It was bravely said, but Hazel was not the only one who could tell her thoughts. Bigwig remembered the night in Efrafa when he had calmed her by talking of the high downs and the certainty of their escape. In the dark, he nuzzled Hazel's shoulder and pressed him over to one side of the wide burrow.

        "Listen, Hazel," he said, "we're not finished yet. Not by a long way. When the roof breaks, they'll come down into this end of the Honeycomb. But we can get everybody back into the sleeping burrows behind and block the runs that lead to them. They'll be no better off."

        "Well, if we do that, it'll last a bit longer," said Hazel. "But they'll soon be able to break into the sleeping burrows, once they're in here."

        "They'll find me there when they do," said Bigwig, "and one or two more besides. I shouldn't wonder if they didn't decide to go home."

        With a kind of wry envy, Hazel realized that Bigwig was actually looking forward to meeting the Efrafan assault. He knew he could fight and he meant to show it. He was not thinking of anything else. The hopelessness of their chances had no important place in his thoughts. Even the sound of the digging, clearer already, only set him thinking of the best way to sell his life as dearly as he could. But what else was there for any of them to do? At least Bigwig's preparations would keep the others busy and perhaps do something to dispel the silent fear that filled all the warren.

        "You're quite right, Bigwig," he said. "Let's prepare a little reception. Will you tell Silver and the others what you want and get them started?"

        As Bigwig began to explain his plan to Silver and Holly, Hazel sent Speedwell to the north end of the Honeycomb to listen to the digging and keep reporting what he could make out about its progress. As far as he could see, it would make little difference whether the roof-fall came there or in the center, but at least he ought to try to show the others that he was keeping his wits about him.

        "We can't break these walls down to stop the run between, Bigwig," said Holly. "They hold the roof up at this end, you know."

        "I know that," answered Bigwig. "We'll dig into the walls of the sleeping burrows behind. They'll need to be bigger anyway, if we're all going to get in there together. Then kick the loose earth back into the spaces between the columns. Stop the whole thing right up."

        Since he had come out of Efrafa, Bigwig's standing was very high. Seeing him in good heart, the others set aside their fear as best they could and did as he told them, enlarging the burrows beyond the south end of the Honeycomb and piling up the soft earth in the entry runs until what had been a colonnade began to become a solid wall. It was during a pause in this work that Speedwell reported that the digging above the north end had stopped. Hazel went and crouched beside him, listening for some time. There was nothing to be heard. He went back to where Buckthorn sat guarding the foot of the single open run--Kehaar's run, as it was called.

        "You know what's happened?" he said. "They've realized they're all among the beech roots up there, so they've chucked it. They'll be going harder at the other end now."

        "I suppose so, Hazel-rah," replied Buckthorn. After a little he said, "D'you remember the rats in the barn? We got out of that all right, didn't we? But I'm afraid we shan't get out of this. It's a pity, after all we've done together."

        "Yes, we shall," said Hazel, with all the conviction he could muster. But he knew that if he stayed he would not be able to keep up the pretense. Buckthorn--a decent, straightforward fellow if ever there was one--where would he be by ni-Frith tomorrow? And he himself--where had he led them, with all his clever schemes? Had they come over the common, among the shining wires, through the thunderstorm, the culverts on the great river, to die at the claws of General Woundwort? It was not the death they deserved; it was not the right end of the clever track they had run. But what could stop Woundwort? What could save them now? Nothing, he knew--unless some tremendous blow were to fall upon the Efrafans from outside: and of that there was no chance. He turned away from Buckthorn.

        Scratch, scratch: scratch, scratch came the sound of the digging above. Crossing the floor in the dark, Hazel found himself beside another rabbit, who was crouching silently on the near side of the new-piled wall. He stopped, sniffing. It was Fiver.

        "Aren't you working?" he asked listlessly.

        "No," replied Fiver. "I'm listening."

        "To the digging, you mean?"

        "No, not the digging. There's something I'm trying to hear--something the others can't hear. Only I can't hear it either. But it's close. Deep. Leaf-drift, deep. I'm going away, Hazel--going away." His voice grew slow and drowsy. "Falling. But it's cold. Cold."

        The air in the dark burrow was stifling. Hazel bent over Fiver, pushing the limp body with his nose.

        "Cold," muttered Fiver. "How--how. How--how cold!"

        There was a long silence.

        "Fiver?" said Hazel. "Fiver? Can you hear me?"

        Suddenly a terrible sound broke from Fiver; a sound at which every rabbit in the warren leaped in dreadful fear; a sound that no rabbit had ever made, that no rabbit had the power to make. It was deep and utterly unnatural. The rabbits working on the far side of the wall crouched terrified. One of the does began to squeal.

        "Dirty little beasts," yelped Fiver. "How--how dare you? Get out--out! Out--out!"

        Bigwig burst through the piled earth, twitching and panting.

        "In the name of Frith, stop him!" he gasped. "They'll all go mad!"

        Shuddering, Hazel clawed at Fiver's side.

        "Wake! Fiver, wake!"

        But Fiver was lying in a deep stupor.

        In Hazel's mind, green branches were straining in the wind. Up and down they swayed, thresh and ply. There was  something--something he could glimpse between them. What was it? Water he sensed; and fear. Then suddenly he saw clearly, for an instant, a little huddle of rabbits on the bank of a stream at dawn, listening to the sound of yelping in the wood above and the scolding of a jay.

        "If I were you, I shouldn't wait until ni-Frith. I should go now. In fact, I think you'll have to. There's a large dog loose in the wood. There's a large dog loose in the wood."

        The wind blew, the trees shook their myriads of leaves. The stream was gone. He was in the Honeycomb, facing Bigwig in the dark, across the motionless body of Fiver. The scratching from above was louder and closer.

        "Bigwig," said Hazel, "do as I say at once, there's a good fellow. We've got hardly any time. Go and get Dandelion and Blackberry and bring them to me at the foot of Kehaar's run, quickly."

        At the foot of the run Buckthorn was still in his place. He had not moved at Fiver's cry, but his breath was short and his pulse very quick. He and the other three rabbits gathered about Hazel without a word.

        "I've got a plan," said Hazel. "If it works, it'll finish Woundwort for good and all. But I've no time to explain. Every moment counts now. Dandelion and Blackberry, you come with me. You're to go straight up out of this run and through the trees to the down. Then northward, over the edge and down to the fields. Don't stop for anything. You'll go faster than I shall. Wait for me by the iron tree at the bottom."

        "But Hazel--" said Blackberry.

        "As soon as we've gone," said Hazel, turning to Bigwig, "you're to block this run and get everyone back behind the wall you've made. If they break in, hold them up as long as you can. Don't give in to them on any account. El-ahrairah has shown me what to do."

        "But where are you going, Hazel?" asked Bigwig.

        "To the farm," said Hazel, "to gnaw another rope. Now, you two, follow me up the run: and don't forget, you stop for nothing until you're down the hill. If there are rabbits outside, don't fight--run."

        Without another word he dashed up the tunnel and out into the wood, with Blackberry and Dandelion on his heels.

45.    Nuthanger Farm Again

Cry Havoc! And let slip the dogs of war.

Shakespeare, Julius Caesar

At that moment General Woundwort, out on the open grass below the bank, was facing Thistle and Ragwort in the checkered yellow moonlight of the small hours.

        "You weren't put at the mouth of that run to listen," he said. "You were put there to stop anyone breaking out. You had no business to leave it. Get back at once."

        "I give you my word, sir," said Thistle querulously, "there's some animal down there that is not a rabbit. We both heard it."

        "And did you smell it?" asked Woundwort.

        "No, sir. No tracks or droppings either. But we both heard an animal and it was no rabbit."

        Several of the diggers had left their work and were gathered nearby, listening. A muttering began.

        "They had a homba that killed Captain Mallow. My brother was there. He saw it."

        "They had a great bird that turned into a shaft of lightning."

        "There was another animal that took them away down the river."

        "Why can't we go home?"

        "Stop that!" said Woundwort. He went up to the group. "Who said that? You, was it? Very well, go home. Go on, hurry up. I'm waiting. That's the way--over there."

        The rabbit did not move. Woundwort looked slowly round.

        "Right," he said. "Anyone else who wants to go home can get on with it. It's a nice long way and you'll have no officers, because they'll all be busy digging, including myself. Captain Vervain, Captain Groundsel, will you come with me? You, Thistle, go out there and fetch Captain Campion. And you, Ragwort, get back to the mouth of that run you had no business to leave."

        Very soon the digging was resumed. The hole was deep now--deeper than Woundwort had expected and still there was no sign of a fall. But all three rabbits could sense that not far below them there lay a hollow space.

        "Keep at it," said Woundwort. "It won't take long now."

        When Campion came in, he reported that he had seen three rabbits running away over the down to the north. One appeared to be the lame rabbit. He had been about to pursue them but had returned in response to the order brought by Thistle.

        "It doesn't matter," said Woundwort. "Let them go. There'll be three less when we get in. What, you again?" he snapped, as Ragwort appeared beside him. "What is it this time?"

        "The open run, sir," said Ragwort. "It's been broken in and stopped from down below."

        "Then you can start doing something useful," said Woundwort. "Get that root out. No, that one, you fool."

        The digging continued, as the first streaks of light began to come into the east.

*      *      *

        The great field at the foot of the escarpment had been reaped, but the straw had not yet been burned and lay in long pale rows upon the darker stubble, tenting over the bristling stalks and the weeds of harvest--knotgrass and pimpernel, fluellen and speedwell, heartsease and persicary--colorless and still in the old moonlight. Between the lines of straw the expanse of stubble was as open as the down.

        "Now," said Hazel, as they came out from the belt of hawthorn and dogwood where the pylon stood, "are you both sure you understand what we're going to do?"

        "It's a tall order, isn't it, Hazel-rah?" answered Dandelion. "But we've got to try it, that's certain. There's nothing else that'll save the warren now."

        "Come on, then," said Hazel. "The going's easy, anyway--half as far now the field's been cut. Don't bother about cover--just run in the open. Keep with me, though. I'll go as fast as I can."

        They crossed the field easily enough, Dandelion running ahead. The only alarm came when they startled four partridges, which whirred away over the hedge to the west and sailed down, spread-winged, into the field beyond. Soon they reached the road and Hazel halted among the quickset on top of the nearer bank.

        "Now, Blackberry," he said, "this is where we leave you. Lie close and don't move. When the time comes, don't break too soon. You've got the best head of any of us. Use it--and keep it, too. When you get back, go to ground in Kehaar's run and stay there till things are safe. Have you got your line clear?"

        "Yes, Hazel-rah," replied Blackberry. "But, as far as I can see, I may have to run from here to the iron tree without a check. There's no cover."

        "I know," said Hazel. "It can't be helped. If the worst comes to the worst, you'll have to turn for the hedge and then keep popping in and out of it. Do whatever you like. There's no time for us to stay and work it out. Only make sure you get back to the warren. It all depends on you."

        Blackberry burrowed his way into the moss and ivy round the base of the thorn. The other two crossed the road and made uphill toward the sheds beside the lane.

        "Good roots they keep there," said Hazel, as they passed them and reached the hedge. "Pity we've no time just now. When this is over we'll have a nice, quiet raid on the place."

        "I hope we do, Hazel-rah," said Dandelion. "Are you going straight up the lane? What about cats?"

        "It's the quickest way," said Hazel. "That's all that matters now."

        By this time the first light was clear and several larks were up. As they approached the great ring of elm trees, they heard once more the quick sighing and rustling above them and one yellow leaf came spinning down to the edge of the ditch. They reached the top of the slope and saw before them the barns and the farmyard. Bird-song was breaking out all round and the rooks were calling from high in the elms, but nothing--not even a sparrow--moved on the ground. Straight in front, on the other side of the farmyard, close to the house, stood the dog kennel. The dog was not to be seen, but the rope, tied to the eye bolt on the flat roof, trailed over the edge and disappeared across the straw-covered threshold.

        "We're in time," said Hazel. "The brute's still asleep. Now, Dandelion, you mustn't make any mistake. You lie in the grass just there, opposite the kennel. When the rope's gnawed through you'll see it fall. Unless the dog's ill or deaf, it'll be alert by then; probably before, I'm afraid, but that's my lookout. It's up to you to attract it and make it chase you all the way down to the road. You're very fast. Take care it doesn't lose you. Use the hedges if you want to; but remember it'll be trailing the rope. Get it down to Blackberry. That's all that matters."

        "If we ever meet again, Hazel-rah," said Dandelion, as he took cover in the grass verge, "we ought to have the makings of the best story ever."

        "And you'll be the chap to tell it," said Hazel. He moved away in a half-circle to the morning side and reached the wall of the farmhouse. Then he began to hop cautiously along the wall, in and out of the narrow flower bed. His head was a tumult of smells--phlox in bloom, ashes, cow dung, dog, cat, hens, stagnant water. He came to the back of the kennel, reeking of creosote and of rank straw. A half-used bale of straw stood against it--no doubt clean bedding which, in the dry weather, had not been put back under cover. Here at least was one piece of luck, for he had expected to have trouble in getting on the roof. He scrambled up the straw. Across part of the felted roof lay a torn piece of old blanket, wet with dew. Hazel sat up, sniffing, and put his forepaws on it. It did not slip. He pulled himself up.

        How much noise had he made? How strong was his scent over the tar and straw and farmyard? He waited, tense to jump, expecting movement below. There was no sound. In a terrible miasma of dog smell, which gripped him with fear and called "Run! Run!" down every nerve, he crept forward to where the eye bolt was screwed into the roof. His claws scraped slightly and he stopped again. Still there was no movement. He crouched down and began to nibble and gnaw at the thick cord.

        It was easier than he had thought it would be. It was a good deal easier than the cord on the punt, though about as thick. The punt cord had been drenched through with rain, pliant, slippery and fibrous. This, though dewy on the outside, was dry-cored and light. In very little time the clean inside was showing. His chisel-like foreteeth bit steadily and he felt the dry strands rip. The cord was as good as half through already.

        At that moment he felt the heavy weight of the dog move beneath him. It stretched, shuddered and yawned. The rope moved a little and the straw rustled. The foul smell of it came strong, in a cloud.

        "It doesn't matter if it hears me now," thought Hazel. "If only I can get the rope bitten through quickly, it doesn't matter. The dog'll go to Dandelion, if only I can be quick enough to make sure that the rope breaks when it begins to tug."

        He ripped at the cord again and sat back for a quick breath, looking across the track to where Dandelion was waiting. Then he froze and stared. A short distance behind Dandelion, in the grass, was the white-chested tabby, wide-eyed, tail lashing, crouching. It had seen both himself and Dandelion. As he watched, it crept a length nearer. Dandelion was lying still, watching the front of the kennel intently, as he had been told. The cat tensed itself to spring.

        Before he knew what he was doing, Hazel stamped on the hollow roof. Twice he stamped and then turned to leap to the ground and run. Dandelion, reacting instantly, shot out of the grass to the open gravel. In the same moment, the cat jumped and landed exactly where he had been lying. The dog gave two quick, sharp barks and rushed out of the kennel. It saw Dandelion at once and ran to the full extent of the rope. The rope went taut, held for an instant and then parted at the point where Hazel had gnawed it to a thread. The kennel jerked forward, tilted, fell back and struck the ground with a jolt. Hazel, already off balance, clawed at the blanket, missed his footing and fell over the edge. He landed heavily on his weak leg and lay kicking. The dog was gone.

        Hazel stopped kicking and lay still. There was a spurt of pain along his haunch, but he knew that he could move. He remembered the raised floor of the barn across the farmyard. He could limp the short distance, get under the floor and then make his way to the ditch. He raised himself on his forelegs.

        On the instant he was knocked sideways and felt himself pressed down. There was a light but sharp pricking beneath the fur across his back. He lashed out with his hind legs, but struck nothing. He turned his head. The cat was on him, crouched half across his body. Its whiskers brushed his ear. Its great green eyes, the pupils contracted to vertical black slits in the sunshine, were staring into his own.

        "Can you run?" hissed the cat. "I think not".

46.    Bigwig Stands His Ground

Hard pounding this, gentlemen. Let's see who will pound longest.

The Duke of Wellington (at Waterloo)

Groundsel scrambled up the steep slope of the shaft and rejoined Woundwort in the pit at the top.

        "There's nothing left to dig, sir," he said. "The bottom will fall in if anyone goes down there now."

        "Can you make out what's below?" asked Woundwort. "Is it a run or a burrow we shall be into?"

        "I'm fairly sure it's a burrow, sir," answered Groundsel. "In fact, it feels to me as though there's an unusually big space underneath."

        "How many rabbits are in it, do you think?"

        "I couldn't hear any at all. But they may be keeping quiet and waiting to attack us when we break in."

        "They haven't done much attacking up to now," said Woundwort. "A poor lot, I'd say--skulking underground, and some of them running away in the night. I don't fancy we'll have much trouble."

        "Unless, sir--" said Groundsel.

        Woundwort looked at him and waited.

        "Unless the--the animal attacks us, sir," said Groundsel. "Whatever it is. It's not like Ragwort to imagine anything. He's very stolid. I'm only trying to think ahead," he added, as Woundwort still said nothing.

        "Well," said Woundwort at last, "if there is an animal, it'll find out that I'm an animal, too." He came out on the bank, where Campion and Vervain were waiting with a number of the other rabbits.

        "We've done all the hard work now," he said. "We'll be able to take our does home as soon as we've finished down below. The way we'll go about it is this. I'm going to break the bottom of the hole in and go straight down into the burrow underneath. I want only three others to follow, otherwise there'll be complete confusion and we shall all be fighting each other. Vervain, you come behind me and bring two more. If there's any trouble we'll deal with it. Groundsel, you follow. But you're to stay in the shaft, understand? Don't jump down until I tell you. When we know where we are and what we're doing, you can bring a few more in."

        There was not a rabbit in the Owsla but had confidence in Woundwort. As they heard him preparing to go first into the depths of the enemy warren as calmly as though he were looking for dandelions, his officers' spirits rose. It seemed to them quite likely that the place would be given up without any fighting at all. When the General had led the final assault at Nutley Copse he had killed three rabbits underground and no more had dared to oppose him, although there had been some hard tussles in the outer runs the day before.

        "Very well," said Woundwort. "Now, I don't want anyone straying away. Campion, you see to that. As soon as we get one of the blocked runs opened from inside, you can fill the place up. Keep them together here till I let you know and then send them in fast."

        "Best of luck, sir," said Campion.

        Woundwort jumped into the pit, flattened his ears and went down the shaft. He had already decided that he was not going to stop to listen. There was no point, since he meant to break in at once whether there was anything to be heard or not. It was more important that he should not seem to hesitate or cause Vervain to do so; and that the enemy, if they were there, should have the shortest possible time in which to hear him coming. Below, there would be either a run or a burrow. Either he would have to fight immediately or else there would first be a chance to look round and sense where he was. It did not matter. What mattered was finding rabbits and killing them.

        He came to the bottom of the shaft. As Groundsel had said, it was plainly thin--brittle as ice on a puddle--chalk, pebbles and light soil. Woundwort scored it across with his foreclaws. Slightly damp, it held a moment and then fell inward, crumbling. As it fell, Woundwort followed it.

        He fell about the length of his own body--far enough to tell him that he was in a burrow. As he landed he kicked out with his hind legs and then dashed forward, partly to be out of Vervain's way as he followed and partly to reach the wall and face about before he could be attacked from behind. He found himself against a pile of soft earth--evidently the end of a blocked run leading out of the burrow--and turned. A moment later Vervain was beside him. The third rabbit, whoever he was, seemed to be in difficulties. They could both hear him scrabbling in the fallen soil.

        "Over here," said Woundwort sharply.

        The rabbit, a powerful, heavy veteran by the name of Thunder, joined them, stumbling.

        "What's the matter?" asked Woundwort.

        "Nothing, sir," answered Thunder, "only there's a dead rabbit on the floor and it startled me for a moment."

        "A dead rabbit?" said Woundwort. "Are you sure he's dead? Where is he?"

        "Over there, sir, by the shaft."

        Woundwort crossed the burrow quickly. On the far side of the rubble that had fallen in from the shaft was lying the inert body of a buck. He sniffed at it and then pressed it with his nose.

        "He's not been dead long," he said. "He's nearly cold but not stiff. What do you make of it, Vervain? Rabbits don't die underground.

        "It's a very small buck, sir," answered Vervain. "Didn't fancy the idea of fighting us, perhaps, and the others killed him when he said so."

        "No, that won't do. There's not a scratch on him. Well, leave him, anyway. We've got to get on, and a rabbit this size isn't going to make any difference, dead or alive."

        He began to move along the wall, sniffing as he went. He passed the mouths of two blocked runs, came to an opening between thick tree roots and stopped. The place was evidently very big--bigger than the Council burrow at Efrafa. Since they were not being attacked, he could turn the space to his own advantage by getting some more rabbits in at once. He went back quickly to the foot of the shaft. By standing on his hind legs he could just rest his forepaws on the ragged lip of the hole.

        "Groundsel?" he said.

        "Yes, sir?" answered Groundsel from above.

        "Come on," said Woundwort, "and bring four others with you. Jump to this side"--he moved slightly--"there's a dead rabbit on the floor--one of theirs."

He was still expecting to be attacked at any moment, but the place remained silent. He continued to listen, sniffing the close air, while the five rabbits dropped one by one into the burrow. Then he took Groundsel over to the two blocked runs along the eastern wall.

        "Get these open as quick as you can," he said, "and send two rabbits to find out what's behind the tree roots beyond. If they're attacked you're to go and join in at once."

        "You know, there's something strange about the wall at the other end, sir," said Vervain, as Groundsel began setting his rabbits to work. "Most of it's hard earth that's never been dug. But in one or two places there are piles of much softer stuff. I'd say that runs leading through the wall have been filled up very recently--probably since yesterday evening."

        Woundwort and Vervain went carefully along the south wall of the Honeycomb, scratching and listening.

        "I believe you're right," said Woundwort. "Have you heard any movement from the other side?"

        "Yes, sir, just about here," said Vervain.

        "We'll get this pile of soft earth down," said Woundwort. "Put two rabbits on it. If I'm right and Thlayli's on the other side, they'll run into trouble before long. That's what we want--to force him to attack them."

        As Thunder and Thistle began to dig, Woundwort crouched silently behind them, waiting.

*      *      *

        Even before he heard the roof of the Honeycomb fall in, Bigwig knew that it could be only a matter of time before the Efrafans found the soft places in the south wall and set to work to break through one of them. That would not take long. Then he would have to fight--probably with Woundwort himself; and if Woundwort closed with him and used his weight, he would have little chance. Somehow he must manage to hurt him at the outset, before he expected it. But how?

        He put the problem to Holly.

        "The trouble is this warren wasn't dug to be defended," said Holly. "That was what the Slack Run was for, back at home, so the Threarah once told me. It was made so that if we ever had to, we could get down beneath an enemy and come up where he wasn't expecting us."

        "That's it!" cried Bigwig. "That's the idea! Look, I'm going to dig myself into the floor of the run just behind this blocked opening. Then you cover me with earth. It won't be noticed--there's so much digging and mess in the place already. I know it's a risk, but it'll be better than just trying to stand up in front of a rabbit like Woundwort."

        "But suppose they break through the wall somewhere else?" said Holly.

        "You must try to make them do it here," replied Bigwig. "When you hear them on the other side, make a noise--do a bit of scratching or something--just above where I am. Anything to get them interested. Come on, help me to dig. And, Silver, get everyone back out of the Honeycomb now and close this wall completely."

        "Bigwig," said Pipkin, "I can't wake Fiver. He's still lying out there in the middle of the floor. What's to be done?"

        "I'm afraid there's nothing we can do now," replied Bigwig. "It's a great pity, but we'll have to leave him."

        "Oh, Bigwig," cried Pipkin, "let me stay out there with him! You'll never miss me, and I can go on trying--"

        "Hlao-roo," said Holly as kindly as he could, "if we lose no one but Fiver before this business is ended, then the Lord Frith himself will be fighting for us. No, I'm sorry, old chap, not another word. We need you, we need everyone. Silver, see that he goes back with the others."

        When Woundwort dropped through the roof of the Honeycomb, Bigwig was already lying under a thin covering of soil on the other side of the south wall, not far from Clover's burrow.

*      *      *

        Thunder sank his teeth into a piece of broken root and pulled it out. There was an instant fall of earth and a gap opened where he had been digging. The soil no longer reached to the roof. It was only a broad pile of soft earth, half filling the run. Woundwort, still waiting silently, could smell and hear a considerable number of rabbits on the far side. He hoped that now they might come into the open burrow and try to attack him. But they made no move.

        When it came to fighting, Woundwort was not given to careful calculation. Men, and larger animals such as wolves, usually have an idea of their own numbers and those of the enemy and this affects their readiness to fight and how they go about it. Woundwort had never had any need to think like this. What he had learned from all his experience of fighting was that nearly always there are those who want to fight and those who do not but feel they cannot avoid it. More than once he had fought alone and imposed his will on crowds of other rabbits. He held down a great warren with the help of a handful of devoted officers. It did not occur to him now--and if it had, he would not have thought it mattered--that most of his rabbits were still outside; that those who were with him were fewer than those on the other side of the wall and that until Groundsel had got the runs open they could not get out even if they wanted to. This sort of thing does not count among fighting rabbits. Ferocity and aggression are everything. What Woundwort knew was that those beyond the wall were afraid of him and that on this account he had the advantage.

        "Groundsel," he said, "as soon as you've got those runs open, tell Campion to send everyone down here. The rest of you, follow me. We'll have this business finished by the time the others get in to join us."

        Woundwort waited only for Groundsel to bring back the two rabbits who had been sent to search among the tree roots at the north end of the burrow. Then, with Vervain behind him, he climbed the pile of fallen earth and thrust his way into the narrow run. In the dark he could hear and smell the rustling and crowding of rabbits--both bucks and does--ahead of him. There were two bucks directly in his path, but they fell back as he plowed through the loose soil. He plunged forward and felt the ground suddenly turn beneath him. The next moment a rabbit started up from the earth at his feet and sank his teeth in the pit of his near foreleg, just where it joined the body.

        Woundwort had won almost every fight of his life by using his weight. Other rabbits could not stop him and once they went down they seldom got up. He tried to push now, but his back legs could get no purchase in the pile of loose, yielding soil behind him. He reared up and, as he did so, realized that the enemy beneath him was crouching in a scooped-out trench the size of his own body. He struck out and felt his claws score deeply along the back and haunch. Then the other rabbit, still keeping his grip under Woundwort's shoulder, thrust upward with his hind legs braced against the floor of the trench. Woundwort, with both forefeet off the ground, was thrown over on his back on the earth pile. He lashed out, but the enemy had already loosed his hold and was beyond his reach.

        Woundwort stood up. He could feel the blood running down the inside of his near foreleg. The muscle was wounded. He could not put his full weight on it. But his own claws, too, were bloody and this blood was not his.

        "Are you all right, sir?" asked Vervain, behind him.

        "Of course I'm all right, you fool," said Woundwort. "Follow me close."

        The other rabbit spoke from in front of him.

        "You told me once to start by impressing you, General. I hope I have."

        "I told you once that I would kill you myself," replied Woundwort, "There is no white bird here, Thlayli." He advanced for the second time.

        Bigwig's taunt had been deliberate. He hoped that Woundwort would fly at him and so give him a chance to bite him again. But as he waited, pressed to the ground, he realized that Woundwort was too clever to be drawn. Always quick to size up any new situation, he was coming forward slowly, keeping close to the ground himself. He meant to use his claws. Afraid, listening to Woundwort's approach, Bigwig could hear the uneven movement of his forepaws, almost within striking distance. Instinctively he drew back and as he did so the thought came with the sound: "The near forepaw's dragging. He can't use it properly." Leaving his right flank exposed, he struck out on his near side.

        His claws found Woundwort's leg, ripping sideways; but before he could draw back, Woundwort's whole weight came down on him and the next moment his teeth had met in his right ear. Bigwig squealed, pressed down and thrashing from side to side. Woundwort, feeling his enemy's fear and helplessness, loosed his hold of the ear and rose above him, ready to bite and tear him across the back of the neck. For an instant he stood above the helpless Bigwig, his shoulders filling the run. Then his injured foreleg gave way and he lurched sideways against the wall. Bigwig cuffed him twice across the face and felt the third blow pass through his whiskers as he sprang back. The sound of his heavy breathing came plainly from the top of the earth pile. Bigwig, the blood oozing from his back and ear, stood his ground and waited. Suddenly he realized that he could see the dark shape of General Woundwort faintly outlined where he crouched above him. The first traces of daylight were glimmering through the broken roof of the Honeycomb behind.

47.    The Sky Suspended

Ole bull he comes for me, wi's head down. But I didn't flinch ... I went fo 'e. 'Twas him as did th' flinchin'.

Flora Thompson, Lark Rise

When Hazel stamped, Dandelion leaped instinctively from the grass verge. If there had been a hole he would have made for it. For the briefest instant he looked up and down the gravel. Then the dog was rushing upon him and he turned and made for the raised barn. But before he reached it he realized that he must not take refuge under the floor. If he did, the dog would check: very likely a man would call it back. He had to get it out of the farmyard and down to the road. He altered direction and raced up the lane toward the elms.

        He had not expected the dog to be so close behind him. He could hear its breath and the loose gravel flying under its paws.

        "It's too fast for me!" he thought. "It's going to catch me!" In another moment it would be on him and then it would roll him over, snapping his back and biting out his life. He knew that hares, when overtaken, dodge by turning more quickly and neatly than the pursuing dog and doubling back on their track. "I shall have to double," he thought desperately. "But if I do, it will hunt me up and down the lane and the man will call it off, or else I shall have to lose it by going through the hedge: then the whole plan will fail."

        He tore over the crest and down toward the cattle shed. When Hazel had told him what he was to do, it had seemed to him that his task would consist of leading the dog on and persuading it to follow him. Now he was running simply to save his life, and that at a speed he had never touched before, a speed he knew he could not keep up.

        In actual fact Dandelion covered three hundred yards to the cattle shed in a good deal less than half a minute. But as he reached the straw at the entrance it seemed to him that he had run forever. Hazel and the farmyard were long, long ago. He had never done anything in his life but run in terror down the lane, feeling the dog's breath at his haunches. Inside the gate a big rat ran across in front of him and the dog checked at it for a moment. Dandelion gained the nearest shed and went headlong between two bales of straw at the foot of a pile. It was a narrow place and he turned round only with some difficulty. The dog was immediately outside, scratching eagerly, whining and throwing up loose straw as it sniffed along the foot of the bales.

        "Sit tight," said a young rat, from the straw close beside him. "It'll be off in a minute. They're not like cats, you know."

        "That's the trouble," said Dandelion, panting and rolling the whites of his eyes. "It mustn't lose me; and time's everything."

        "What?" said the rat, puzzled. "What you say?"

        Without answering, Dandelion slipped along to another crack, gathered himself a moment and then broke cover, running across the yard to the opposite shed. It was open-fronted and he went straight through to the boarding along the back. There was a gap under the broken end of a board and here he crept into the field beyond. The dog, following, thrust its head into the gap and pushed, barking with excitement. Gradually the loose board levered open like a trapdoor until it was able to force its way through.

        Now that he had a better start, Dandelion kept in the open and ran down the field to the hedge beside the road. He knew he was slower, but the dog seemed slower, too. Choosing a thick part, he went through the hedge and crossed the road. Blackberry came to meet him, scuttering down the further bank. Dandelion dropped exhausted in the ditch. The dog was not twenty feet away on the other side of the hedge. It could not find a big enough gap.

        "It's faster than ever I thought," gasped Dandelion, "but I've taken the edge off it. I can't do any more. I must go to ground. I'm finished."

        It was plain that Blackberry was frightened.

        "Frith help me!" he whispered. "I'll never do it!"

        "Go on, quick," said Dandelion, "before it loses interest. I'll overtake you and help if I can."

        Blackberry hopped deliberately into the road and sat up. Seeing him, the dog yelped and thrust its weight against the hedge. Blackberry ran slowly along the road toward a pair of gates that stood opposite each other further down. The dog stayed level with him. As soon as he was sure that it had seen the gate on its own side and meant to go to it, Blackberry turned and climbed the bank. Out in the stubble he waited for the dog to reappear.

        It was a long time coming; and when at last it pushed its way between the gatepost and the bank into the field, it paid him no attention. It nosed along the foot of the bank, put up a partridge and bounced after it and then began to scratch about in a clump of dock plants. For some time Blackberry felt too terrified to move. Then, in desperation, he hopped slowly toward it, trying to act as though he had not noticed that it was there. It dashed after him, but almost at once seemed to lose interest and returned to its nosing and sniffing over the ground. Finally, when he was utterly at a loss, it set off over the field of its own accord, padding easily along beside one of the rows of threshed straw, trailing the broken cord and pouncing in and out at every squeak and rustle. Blackberry, sheltering behind a parallel row, kept level with it. In this manner they covered the distance to the pylon line, halfway to the foot of the down. It was here that Dandelion caught up with him.

        "It's not fast enough, Blackberry! We must get on. Bigwig may be dead."

        "I know, but at least it's going the right way. I couldn't get it to move at all, to start with. Can't we--"

        "It's got to come up the down at speed or there'll be no surprise. Come on, we'll draw it together. We'll have to get ahead of it first, though."

        They ran fast through the stubble until they neared the trees. Then they turned and crossed the dog's line in full view. This time it pursued instantly and the two rabbits reached the undergrowth at the bottom of the steep with no more than ten yards to spare. As they began to climb they heard the dog crashing through the brittle elders. It barked once and then they were out on the open slope with the dog running mute behind them.

*      *      *

        The blood ran over Bigwig's neck and down his foreleg. He watched Woundwort steadily where he crouched on the earth pile, expecting him to leap forward at any moment. He could hear a rabbit moving behind him, but the run was so narrow that he could not have turned even if it had been safe to do so.

        "Everyone all right?" he asked.

        "They're all right," replied Holly. "Come on, Bigwig, let me take your place now. You need a rest."

        "Can't," panted Bigwig. "You couldn't get past me here--no room--and if I go back that brute'll follow--next thing you'd know he'd be loose in the burrows. You leave it to me. I know what I'm doing."

        It had occurred to Bigwig that in the narrow run even his dead body would be a considerable obstacle. The Efrafans would either have to get it out or dig round it and this would mean more delay. In the burrow behind him he could hear Bluebell, who was apparently telling the does a story. "Good idea," he thought. "Keep 'em happy. More than I could do if I had to sit there."

        "So then El-ahrairah said to the fox, 'Fox you may smell and fox you may be, but I can tell your fortune in the water.' "

        Suddenly Woundwort spoke.

        "Thlayli," he said, "why do you want to throw your life away? I can send one fresh rabbit after another into this run if I choose. You're too good to be killed. Come back to Efrafa. I promise I'll give you the command of any Mark you like. I give you my word."

        "Silflay hraka, u embleer rah," replied Bigwig.

        " 'Ah ha,' said the fox, 'tell my fortune, eh? And what do you see in the water, my friend? Fat rabbits running through the grass, yes, yes?' "

        "Very well," said Woundwort. "But remember, Thlayli, you yourself can stop this nonsense whenever you wish."

        " 'No,' replied El-ahrairah, 'it is not fat rabbits that I see in the water, but swift hounds on the scent and my enemy flying for his life.' "

        Bigwig realized that Woundwort also knew that in the run his body would be nearly as great a hindrance dead as alive. "He wants me to come out on my feet," he thought. "But it's Inlé, not Efrafa, that I shall go to from here."

        Suddenly Woundwort leaped forward in a single bound and landed full against Bigwig like a branch falling from a tree. He made no attempt to use his claws. His great weight was pushing, chest to chest, against Bigwig's. With heads side by side they bit and snapped at each other's shoulders. Bigwig felt himself sliding slowly backward. He could not resist the tremendous pressure. His back legs, with claws extended, furrowed the floor of the run as he gave ground. In a few moments he would be pushed bodily into the burrow behind. Putting his last strength into the effort to remain where he was, he loosed his teeth from Woundwort's shoulder and dropped his head, like a cart horse straining at a load. Still he was slipping. Then, very gradually it seemed, the terrible pressure began to slacken. His claws had a hold of the ground. Woundwort, teeth sunk in his back, was snuffling and choking. Though Bigwig did not know it, his earlier blows had torn Woundwort across the nose. His nostrils were full of his own blood, and with jaws closed in Bigwig's fur he could not draw his breath. A moment more and he let go his hold. Bigwig, utterly exhausted, lay where he was. After a few moments he tried to get up, but a faintness came over him and a feeling of turning over and over in a ditch of leaves. He closed his eyes. There was silence and then, quite clearly, he heard Fiver speaking in the long grass. "You are closer to death than I. You are closer to death than I."

        "The wire!" squealed Bigwig. He jerked himself up and opened his eyes. The run was empty. General Woundwort was gone.

*      *      *

        Woundwort clambered out into the Honeycomb, now dimly lit down the shaft by the daylight outside. He had never felt so tired. He saw Vervain and Thunder looking at him uncertainly. He sat on his haunches and tried to clean his face with his front paws.

        "Thlayli won't give any more trouble," he said. "You'd better just go in and finish him off, Vervain, since he won't come out."

        "You're asking me to fight him, sir?" asked Vervain.

        "Well, just take him on for a few moments," answered Woundwort. "I want to start them getting this wall down in one or two other places. Then I'll come back."

        Vervain knew that the impossible had happened. The General had come off worst. What he was saying was, "Cover up for me. Don't let the others know."

        "What in Frith's name happens now?" thought Vervain. "The plain truth is that Thlayli's had the best of it all along, ever since he first met him in Efrafa. And the sooner we're back there the better."

        He met Woundwort's pale stare, hesitated a moment and then climbed on the earth pile. Woundwort limped across to the two runs, halfway down the eastern wall, which Groundsel had been told to get open. Both were now clear at the entrances and the diggers were out of sight in the tunnels. As he approached, Groundsel backed down the further tunnel and began cleaning his claws on a projecting root.

        "How are you getting on?" asked Woundwort.

        "This run's open, sir," said Groundsel, "but the other will take a bit longer, I'm afraid. It's heavily blocked."

        "One's enough," said Woundwort, "as long as they can come down it. We can bring them in and start getting that end wall down."

        He was about to go up the run himself when he found Vervain beside him. For a moment he thought that he was going to say that he had killed Thlayli. A second glance showed him otherwise.

        "I've--er--got some grit in my eye, sir," said Vervain. "I'll just get it out and then I'll have another go at him."

        Without a word Woundwort went back to the far end of the Honeycomb. Vervain followed.

        "You coward," said Woundwort in his ear. "If my authority goes, where will yours be in half a day? Aren't you the most hated officer in Efrafa? That rabbit's got to be killed."

        Once more he climbed on the earth pile. Then he stopped. Vervain and Thistle, raising their heads to peer past him from behind, saw why. Thlayli had made his way up the run and was crouching immediately below. Blood had matted the great thatch of fur on his head, and one ear, half severed, hung down beside his face. His breathing was slow and heavy.

        "You'll find it much harder to push me back from here, General," he said.

        With a sort of weary, dull surprise, Woundwort realized that he was afraid. He did not want to attack Thlayli again. He knew, with flinching certainty, that he was not up to it. And who was? he thought. Who could do it? No, they would have to get in by some other way and everyone would know why.

        "Thlayli," he said, "we've unblocked a run out here. I can bring in enough rabbits to pull down this wall in four places. Why don't you come out?"

        Thlayli's reply, when it came, was low and gasping, but perfectly clear.

        "My Chief Rabbit has told me to defend this run and until he says otherwise I shall stay here."

        "His Chief Rabbit?" said Vervain, staring.

        It had never occurred to Woundwort or any of his officers that Thlayli was not the Chief Rabbit of his warren. Yet what he said carried immediate conviction. He was speaking the truth. And if he was not the Chief Rabbit, then somewhere close by there must be another, stronger rabbit who was. A stronger rabbit than Thlayli. Where was he? What was he doing at this moment?

        Woundwort became aware that Thistle was no longer behind him.

        "Where's that young fellow gone?" he said to Vervain.

        "He seems to have slipped away, sir," answered Vervain.

        "You should have stopped him," said Woundwort. "Fetch him back."

        But it was Groundsel who returned to him a few moments later.

        "I'm sorry, sir," he said, "Thistle's gone up the opened run. I thought you'd sent him or I'd have asked him what he was up to. One or two of my rabbits seem to have gone with him--I don't know what for, I'm sure."

        "I'll give them what for," said Woundwort. "Come with me."

        He knew now what they would have to do. Every rabbit he had brought must be sent underground to dig and

every blocked gap in the wall must be opened. As for Thlayli, he could simply be left where he was and the less said about him the better. There must be no more fighting in narrow runs, and when the terrible Chief Rabbit finally appeared he would be pulled down in the open, from all sides.

        He turned to re-cross the burrow, but remained where he was, staring. In the faint patch of light below the ragged hole in the roof, a rabbit was standing--no Efrafan, a rabbit unknown to the General. He was very small and was looking tensely about him--wide-eyed as a kitten above ground for the first time--as though by no means sure where he might be. As Woundwort watched, he raised a trembling forepaw and passed it gropingly across his face. For a moment some old, flickering, here-and-gone feeling stirred in the General's memory--the smell of wet cabbage leaves in a cottage garden, the sense of some easy-going, kindly place, long forgotten and lost.

        "Who the devil's that?" asked General Woundwort.

        "It--it must be the rabbit that's been lying there, sir," answered Groundsel. "The rabbit we thought was dead."

        "Oh, is that it?" said Woundwort. "Well, he's just about your mark, isn't he, Vervain? That's one of them you might be able to tackle, at all events. Hurry up," he sneered, as Vervain hesitated, uncertain whether the General were serious, "and come on out as soon as you've finished."

        Vervain advanced slowly across the floor. Even he could derive little satisfaction from the prospect of killing a tharn rabbit half his own size, in obedience to a contemptuous taunt. The small rabbit made no move whatever, either to retreat or to defend himself, but only stared at him from great eyes which, though troubled, were certainly not those of a beaten enemy or a victim. Before his gaze, Vervain stopped in uncertainty and for long moments the two faced each other in the dim light. Then, very quietly and with no trace of fear, the strange rabbit said,

        "I am sorry for you with all my heart. But you cannot blame us, for you came to kill us if you could."

        "Blame you?" answered Vervain. "Blame you for what?"

        "For your death. Believe me, I am sorry for your death."

        Vervain in his time had encountered any number of prisoners who, before they died, had cursed or threatened him, not uncommonly with supernatural vengeance, much as Bigwig had cursed Woundwort in the storm. If such things had been liable to have any effect on him, he would not have been head of the Owslafa. Indeed, for almost any utterance that a rabbit in this dreadful situation could find to make, Vervain was unthinkingly ready with one or other of a stock of jeering rejoinders. Now, as he continued to meet the eyes of this unaccountable enemy--the only one he had faced in all the long night's search for bloodshed--horror came upon him and he was filled with a sudden fear of his words, gentle and inexorable as the falling of bitter snow in a land without refuge. The shadowy recesses of the strange burrow seemed full of whispering, malignant ghosts and he recognized the forgotten voices of rabbits done to death months since in the ditches of Efrafa.

        "Let me alone!" cried Vervain. "Let me go! Let me go!"

        Stumbling and blundering, he found his way to the opened run and dragged himself up it. At the top he came upon Woundwort, listening to one of Groundsel's diggers, who was trembling and white-eyed.

        "Oh, sir," said the youngster, "they say there's a great Chief Rabbit bigger than a hare; and a strange animal they heard--"

        "Shut up!" said Woundwort. "Follow me, come on."

        He came out on the bank, blinking in the sunlight. The rabbits scattered about the grass stared at him in horror, several wondering whether this could really be the General. His nose and one eyelid were gashed and his whole face was masked with blood. As he limped down from the bank his near foreleg trailed and he staggered sideways. He scrambled into the open grass and looked about him.

        "Now," said Woundwort, "this is the last thing we have to do, and it won't take long. Down below, there's a kind of wall." He stopped, sensing all around him reluctance and fear. He looked at Ragwort, who looked away. Two other rabbits were edging off through the grass. He called them back.

        "What do you think you're doing?" he asked.

        "Nothing, sir," replied one. "We only thought that--"

        All of a sudden Captain Campion dashed round the corner of the hanger. From the open down beyond came a single, high scream. At the same moment two strange rabbits, running together, leaped the bank into the wood and disappeared down one of the blocked tunnels.

        "Run!" cried Campion, stamping. "Run for your lives!"

        He raced through them and was gone over the down. Not knowing what he meant or where to run, they turned one way and another. Five bolted down the opened run and a few more into the wood. But almost before they had begun to scatter, into their midst bounded a great black dog, snapping, biting and chasing hither and thither like a fox in a chicken run.

        Woundwort alone stood his ground. As the rest fled in all directions he remained where he was, bristling and snarling, bloody-fanged and bloody-clawed. The dog, coming suddenly upon him face to face among the rough tussocks, recoiled a moment, startled and confused. Then it sprang forward; and even as they ran, his Owsla could hear the General's raging, squealing cry, "Come back, you fools! Dogs aren't dangerous! Come back and fight!"

48.    Dea ex Machina

And as I was green and carefree, famous among the barns

About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home,

In the sun that is young once only ...

Dylan Thomas, Fern Hill

When Lucy woke, the room was already light. The curtains were not drawn and the pane of the open casement reflected a gleam of sun which she could lose and find by moving her head on the pillow. A wood pigeon was calling in the elms. But it was some other sound, she knew, that had woken her--a sharp sound, a part of the dream which had drained away, as she woke, like water out of a washbasin. Perhaps the dog had barked. But now everything was quiet and there was only the flash of sun from the windowpane and the sound of the wood pigeon, like the first strokes of a paint brush on a big sheet of paper when you were still not sure how the picture was going to go. The morning was fine. Would there be any mushrooms yet? Was it worth getting up now and going down the field to see? It was still too dry and hot--not good mushroom weather. The mushrooms were like the blackberries--both wanted a drop of rain before they'd be any good. Soon there'd be damp mornings and the big spiders would come in the hedges--the ones with a white cross on their backs. Jane Pocock running off to the back of the schoolbus when she brought one in a matchbox to show Miss Tallant.

                Spider, spider on the bus,

                Soppy Jane that made a fuss,

                Spider got th' eleven-plus.

        Now she couldn't catch the reflection in her eyes any more. The sun had moved. What was going to happen today? Thursday--market day in Newbury. Dad would be going in. Doctor was coming to see Mum. Doctor had funny glasses that pinched on his nose. They'd made a mark each side. If he wasn't in a hurry he'd talk to her. Doctor was a bit funny-like when you didn't know him, but when you did he was nice.

        Suddenly there was another sharp sound. It ripped through the still, early morning like something spilled across a clean floor--a squealing--something frightened, something desperate. Lucy jumped out of bed and ran across to the window. Whatever it was, it was only just outside. She leaned well out, with her feet off the floor and the sill pressing breathlessly across her stomach. Tab was down below, right by the kennel. He'd got something: rat it must be, squealing like that.

        "Tab!" called Lucy sharply. "Tab! Wha' you got?"

        At the sound of her voice the cat looked up for a moment and immediately looked back again at its prey. 'T'weren't no rat, though; 't'was a rabbit, layin' on its side by the kennel. It looked proper bad. Kicking out an' all. Then it squealed again.

        Lucy ran down the stairs in her nightdress and opened the door. The gravel made her hobble and she left it and went on up the flower bed. As she reached the kennel the cat looked up and spat at her, keeping one paw pressed down on the rabbit's neck.

        "Git out, Tab!" said Lucy. "Crool thing! Let'n alone!"

        She cuffed the cat, which tried to scratch her, ears laid flat. She raised her hand again and it growled, ran a few feet and stopped, looking back in sulky rage. Lucy picked up the rabbit. It struggled a moment and then held itself tense in her firm grip.

        " 'Old still!" said Lucy. "I ain't goin' 'urtcher!"

        She went back to the house, carrying the rabbit.

        "What you bin up to, eh?" said her father, boots scratch-scratch over the tiles. "Look at yore feet! En I told you--Wha' got there, then?"

        "Rabbit," said Lucy defensively.

        "In yer nightdress an' all, catch yore bloomin' death. Wha' want with 'im, then?"

        "Goner keep 'im."

        "You ain't!"

        "Ah, Dad. 'E's nice."

        " 'E won't be no bloomin' good t'yer. You put 'im in 'utch 'e'll only die. You can't keep woild rabbit. 'N if 'e gets out 'e'll do all manner o' bloomin' 'arm."

        "But 'e's bad, Dad. Cat's bin at 'im."

        "Cat was doin' 'is job, then. Did oughter've let 'im finish be roights."

        "I wanner show 'im to Doctor."

        "Doctor's got summin' better to do than bide about wi' old rabbit. You jus' give 'im 'ere, now."

        Lucy began to cry. She had not lived all her life on a farm for nothing and she knew very well that everything her father had said was right. But she was upset by the idea of killing the rabbit in cold blood. True, she did not really know what she could do with it in the long run. What she wanted was to show it to Doctor. She knew that Doctor thought of her as a proper farm girl--a country girl. When she showed him things she had found--a goldfinch's egg, a Painted Lady fluttering in a jam jar or a fungus that looked exactly like orange peel--he took her seriously and talked to her as he would to a grown-up person. To ask his advice about a damaged rabbit and discuss it with him would be very grown-up. Meanwhile, her father might give way or he might not.

        "I on'y just wanted to show 'im to Doctor, Dad. I won't let 'im do no 'arm, honest. On'y it's nice talking to Doctor."

        Although he never said so, her father was proud of the way Lucy got on with Doctor. She was proper bright kid--very likely goin' to grammar school an' all, so they told him. Doctor had said once or twice she was real sensible with these things she picked up what she showed him. Comin' to somethin', though, bloody rabbits. All same, would'n' 'urt, long's she didn' let 'un go on the place.

        "Why don' you do somethin' sensible," he said, " 'stead o' bidin' there 'ollerin' and carryin' on like you was skimmish? You wants go'n get some cloze on, then you c'n go'n put 'im in that old cage what's in shed. One what you 'ad for they budgies."

        Lucy stopped crying and went upstairs, still carrying the rabbit. She shut it in a drawer, got dressed and went out to get the cage. On the way back she stopped for some straw from behind the kennel. Her father came across from the long barn.

        "Did y'see Bob?"

        "Never," said Lucy. "Where's 'e gone, then?"

        "Bust 'is rope an' off. I know'd that old rope were gett'n on like, but I didn't reckon 'e could bust 'im. Anyways, I go' go in to Newbury s'mornin'. 'F'e turns up agen you'd best tie 'im up proper."

        "I'll look out fer 'im, Dad," said Lucy. "I'll ge' bi' o' breakfast up to Mum now."

        "Ah, that's good girl. I reckon she'll be right's a trivet tomorrer."

        Doctor Adams arrived soon after ten. Lucy, who was making her bed and tidying her room later than she should have been, heard him stop his car under the elms at the top of the lane and went out to meet him, wondering why he had not driven up to the house as usual. He had got out of the car and was standing with his hands behind his back, looking down the lane, but he caught sight of her and called in the rather shy, abrupt way she was used to.

        "Er--Lucy."

        She ran up. He took off his pince-nez and put them in his waistcoat pocket.

        "Is that your dog?"

        The Labrador was coming up the lane, looking decidedly tired and trailing its broken rope. Lucy laid hold of it.

        " 'E's bin off, Doctor. 'Bin ever so worried 'bout 'im."

        The Labrador began to sniff at Doctor Adams' shoes.

        "Something's been fighting with him, I think," said Doctor Adams. "His nose is scratched quite badly, and that looks like some kind of a bite on his leg."

        "What d'you reckon t'was, then, Doctor?"

        "Well, it might have been a big rat, I suppose, or perhaps a stoat. Something he went for that put up a fight."

        "I got a rabbit s'mornin', Doctor. Woild one. 'E's aloive. I took 'un off o' the cat. On'y I reckon e's 'urt. Joo like see 'im?"

        "Well, I'd better go and see Mrs. Cane first, I think." (Not "your mother," thought Lucy.) "And then if I've got time I'll have a look at the chap."

        Twenty minutes later Lucy was holding the rabbit as quiet as she could while Doctor Adams pressed it gently here and there with the balls of two fingers.

        "Well, there doesn't seem to be much the matter with him, as far as I can see," he said at last. "Nothing's broken. There's something funny about his hind leg, but that's been done some time and it's more or less healed--or as much as it ever will. The cat's scratched him across here, you see, but that's nothing much. I should think he'll be all right for a bit."

        "No good to keep 'im, though, Doctor, would it? In 'utch, I mean."

        "Oh, no, he wouldn't live shut up in a box. If he couldn't get out he'd soon die. No, I should let the poor chap go--unless you want to eat him."

        Lucy laughed. "Dad'd be ever s'woild, though, if I was to let 'im go anywheres round 'ere. 'E always says one rabbit means 'undred an' one."

        "Well, I'll tell you what," said Doctor Adams, taking his thin fob watch on the fingers of one hand and looking down at it as he held it at arm's length--for he was longsighted--"I've got to go a few miles up the road to see an old lady at Cole Henley. If you like to come along in the car, you can let him go on the down and I'll bring you back before dinner."

        Lucy skipped. "I'll just go'n ask Mum."

        On the ridge between Hare Warren Down and Watership Down, Doctor Adams stopped the car.

        "I should think this would be as good as anywhere," he said. "There's not a lot of harm he can do here, if you come to think about it."

        They walked a short distance eastward from the road and Lucy set the rabbit down. It sat stupefied for nearly half a minute and then suddenly dashed away over the grass.

        "Yes, he has got something the matter with that leg, you see," said Doctor Adams. "But he could perfectly well live for years, as far as that goes. Born and bred in a briar patch, Brer Fox."

49.    Hazel Comes Home

Well, we've been lucky devils both

And there's no need of pledge or oath

To bind our lovely friendship fast,

   By firmer stuff

   Close bound enough.--

Robert Graves, Two Fusiliers

Although Woundwort had shown himself at the last to be a creature virtually mad, nevertheless what he did proved not altogether futile. There can be little doubt that if he had not done it, more rabbits would have been killed that morning on Watership Down. So swiftly and silently had the dog come up the hill behind Dandelion and Blackberry that one of Campion's sentries, half asleep under a tussock after the long night, was pulled down and killed in the instant that he turned to bolt. Later--after it had left Woundwort--the dog beat up and down the bank and the open grass for some time, barking and dashing at every bush and clump of weeds. But by now the Efrafans had had time to scatter and hide, as best they could. Besides, the dog, unexpectedly scratched and bitten, showed a certain reluctance to come to grips. At last, however, it succeeded in putting up and killing the rabbit who had been wounded by glass the day before, and with this it made off by the way it had come, disappearing over the edge of the escarpment.

        There could be no question now of the Efrafans renewing their attack on the warren. None had any idea beyond saving his own life. Their leader was gone. The dog had been set on them by the rabbits they had come to kill--of this they were sure. It was all one with the mysterious fox and the white bird. Indeed, Ragwort, the most unimaginative rabbit alive, had actually heard it underground. Campion, crouching in a patch of nettles with Vervain and four or five more, met with nothing but shivering agreement when he said that he was sure that they ought to leave at once this dangerous place, where they had already stayed far too long.

        Without Campion, probably not one rabbit would have got back to Efrafa. As it was, all his skill as a patroller could not bring home half of those who had come to Watership. Three or four had run and strayed too far to be found and what became of them no one ever knew. There were probably fourteen or fifteen rabbits--no more--who set off with Campion, some time before ni-Frith, to try to retrace the long journey they had made only the previous day. They were not fit to cover the distance by nightfall: and before long they had worse to face than their own fatigue and low spirits. Bad news travels fast. Down to the Belt and beyond, the rumor spread that the terrible General Woundwort and his Owsla had been cut to pieces on Watership Down and that what was left of them was trailing southward in poor shape, with little heart to keep alert. The Thousand began to close in--stoats, a fox, even a tomcat from some farm or other. At every halt yet another rabbit was not to be found and no one could remember seeing what had happened to him. One of these was Vervain. It had been plain from the start that he had nothing left and, indeed, there was little reason for him to return to Efrafa without the General.

        Through all the fear and hardship Campion remained steady and vigilant, holding the survivors together, thinking ahead and encouraging the exhausted to keep going. During the afternoon of the following day, while the Off Fore Mark were at silflay, he came limping through the sentry line with a straggling handful of six or seven rabbits. He was close to collapse himself and scarcely able to give the Council any account of the disaster.

        Only Groundsel, Thistle and three others had the presence of mind to dart down the opened run when the dog came. Back in the Honeycomb, Groundsel immediately surrendered himself and his fugitives to Fiver, who was still bemused from his long trance, and scarcely restored to his senses sufficiently to grasp what was toward. At length, however, after the five Efrafans had remained crouching for some time in the burrow, listening to the sounds of the dog hunting above, Fiver recovered himself, made his way to the mouth of the run where Bigwig still lay half conscious, and succeeded in making Holly and Silver understand that the siege was ended. There was no lack of helpers to tear open the blocked gaps in the south wall. It so happened that Bluebell was the first through into the Honeycomb; and for many days afterward he was still improving upon his imitation of Captain Fiver at the head of his crowd of Efrafan prisoners--"like a tomtit rounding up a bunch of molting jackdaws," as he put it.

        No one was inclined to pay them much attention at the time, however, for the only thoughts throughout the warren were for Hazel and Bigwig. Bigwig seemed likely to die. Bleeding in half a dozen places, he lay with closed eyes in the run he had defended and made no reply when Hyzenthlay told him that the Efrafans were defeated and the warren was saved. After a time, they dug carefully to broaden the run and as the day wore on the does, each in turn, remained beside him, licking his wounds and listening to his low, unsteady breathing.

        Before this, Blackberry and Dandelion had burrowed their way in from Kehaar's run--it had not been blocked very heavily--and told their story. They could not say what might have happened to Hazel after the dog broke loose, and by the early afternoon everyone feared the worst. At last Pipkin, in great anxiety and distress, insisted on setting out for Nuthanger. Fiver at once said that he would go with him and together they left the wood and set off northward over the down. They had gone only a short distance when Fiver, sitting up on an anthill to look about, saw a rabbit approaching over the high ground to the west. They both ran nearer and recognized Hazel. Fiver went to meet him while Pipkin raced back to the Honeycomb with the news.

        As soon as he had learned all that had happened--including what Groundsel had to tell--Hazel asked Holly to take two or three rabbits and find out for certain whether the Efrafans had really gone. Then he himself went into the run where Bigwig was lying. Hyzenthlay looked up as he came.

        "He was awake a little while ago, Hazel-rah," she said. "He asked where you were; and then he said his ear hurt very much."

        Hazel nuzzled the matted fur cap. The blood had turned hard and set into pointed spikes that pricked his nose.

        "You've done it, Bigwig," he said. "They've all run away."

        For several moments Bigwig did not move. Then he opened his eyes and raised his head, pouching out his cheeks and sniffing at the two rabbits beside him. He said nothing and Hazel wondered whether he had understood. At last he whispered, "Ees finish Meester Voundvort, ya?"

        "Ya," replied Hazel. "I've come to help you to silflay. It'll do you good and we can clean you up a lot better outside. Come on: it's a lovely afternoon, all sun and leaves."

        Bigwig got up and tottered forward into the devastated Honeycomb. There he sank down, rested, got up again and reached the foot of Kehaar's run.

        "I thought he'd killed me," he said. "No more fighting for me--I've had enough. And you--your plan worked, Hazel-rah, did it? Well done. Tell me what it was. And how did you get back from the farm?"

"A man brought me in a hrududu," said Hazel, "nearly all the way."

        "And you flew the rest, I suppose," said Bigwig, "burning a white stick in your mouth? Come on, tell me sensibly. What's the matter, Hyzenthlay?"

        "Oh!" said Hyzenthlay, staring. "Oh!"

        "What is it?"

        "He did!"

        "Did what?"

        "He did ride home in a hrududu. And I saw him as he came--that night in Efrafa, when I was with you in your burrow. Do you remember?"

        "I remember," said Bigwig. "I remember what I said, too. I said you'd better tell it to Fiver. That's a good idea--let's go and do it. And if he'll believe you, Hazel-rah, then I will."

50.    And Last

Professing myself, moreover, convinced that the General's unjust interference, so far from being really injurious to their felicity, was perhaps rather conducive to it, by improving their knowledge of each other, and adding strength to their attachment, I leave it to be settled by whomsoever it may concern. ...

Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey

It was a fine, clear evening in mid-October, about six weeks later. Although leaves remained on the beeches and the sunshine was warm, there was a sense of growing emptiness over the wide space of the down. The flowers were sparser. Here and there a yellow tormentil showed in the grass, a late harebell or a few shreds of purple bloom on a brown, crisping tuft of self-heal. But most of the plants still to be seen were in seed. Along the edge of the wood a sheet of wild clematis showed like a patch of smoke, all its sweet-smelling flowers turned to old man's beard. The songs of the insects were fewer and intermittent. Great stretches of the long grass, once the teeming jungle of summer, were almost deserted, with only a hurrying beetle or a torpid spider left out of all the myriads of August. The gnats still danced in the bright air, but the swifts that had swooped for them were gone and instead of their screaming cries in the sky, the twittering of a robin sounded from the top of a spindle tree. The fields below the hill were all cleared. One had already been plowed and the polished edges of the furrows caught the light with a dull glint, conspicuous from the ridge above. The sky, too, was void, with a thin clarity like that of water. In July the still blue, thick as cream, had seemed close above the green trees, but now the blue was high and rare, the sun slipped sooner to the west and, once there, foretold a touch of frost, sinking slow and big and drowsy, crimson as the rose hips that covered the briar. As the wind freshened from the south, the red and yellow beech leaves rasped together with a brittle sound, harsher than the fluid rustle of earlier days. It was a time of quiet departures, of the sifting away of all that was not staunch against winter.

        Many human beings say that they enjoy the winter, but what they really enjoy is feeling proof against it. For them there is no winter food problem. They have fires and warm clothes. The winter cannot hurt them and therefore increases their sense of cleverness and security. For birds and animals, as for poor men, winter is another matter. Rabbits, like most wild animals, suffer hardship. True, they are luckier than some, for food of a sort is nearly always to be had. But under snow they may stay underground for days at a time, feeding only by chewing pellets. They are more subject to disease in winter and the cold lowers their vitality. Nevertheless, burrows can be snug and warm, especially when crowded. Winter is a more active mating season than the late summer and the autumn, and the time of greatest fertility for the does starts about February. There are fine days when silflay is still enjoyable. For the adventurous, garden-raiding has its charms. And underground there are stories to be told and games to be played--bob-stones and the like. For rabbits, winter remains what it was for men in the middle ages--hard, but bearable by the resourceful and not altogether without compensations.

        On the west side of the beech hanger, in the evening sun, Hazel and Fiver were sitting with Holly, Silver and Groundsel. The Efrafan survivors had been allowed to join the warren and after a shaky start, when they were regarded with dislike and suspicion, were settling down pretty well, largely because Hazel was determined that they should.

        Since the night of the siege, Fiver had spent much time alone and even in the Honeycomb, or at morning and evening silflay, was often silent and preoccupied. No one resented this--"He looks right through you in such a nice, friendly way," as Bluebell put it--for each in his own manner recognized that Fiver was now more than ever governed, whether he would or no, by the pulse of that mysterious world of which he had once spoken to Hazel during the late June days they had spent together at the foot of the down. It was Bigwig who said--one evening when Fiver was absent from the Honeycomb at story time--that Fiver was one who had paid more dearly than even himself for the night's victory over the Efrafans. Yet to his doe, Vilthuril, Fiver was devotedly attached, while she had come to understand him almost as deeply as ever Hazel had.

        Just outside the beech hanger, Hyzenthlay's litter of four young rabbits were playing in the grass. They had first been brought up to graze about seven days before. If Hyzenthlay had had a second litter she would by this time have left them to look after themselves. As it was, however, she was grazing close by, watching their play and every now and then moving in to cuff the strongest and stop him bullying the others.

        "They're a good bunch, you know," said Holly. "I hope we get some more like those."

        "We can't expect many more until toward the end of the winter," said Hazel, "though I dare say there'll be a few."

        "We can expect anything, it seems to me," said Holly.

        "Three litters born in autumn--have you ever heard of such a thing before? Frith didn't mean rabbits to mate in the high summer."

        "I don't know about Clover," said Hazel. "She's a hutch rabbit: it may be natural to her to breed at any time, for all I know. But I'm sure that Hyzenthlay and Vilthuril started their litters in the high summer because they'd had no natural life in Efrafa. For all that, they're the only two who have had litters, as yet."

        "Frith never meant us to go out fighting in the high summer, either, if that comes to that," said Silver. "Everything that's happened is unnatural--the fighting, the breeding--and all on account of Woundwort. If he wasn't unnatural, who was?"

        "Bigwig was right when he said he wasn't like a rabbit at all," said Holly. "He was a fighting animal--fierce as a rat or a dog. He fought because he actually felt safer fighting than running. He was brave, all right. But it wasn't natural; and that's why it was bound to finish him in the end. He was trying to do something that Frith never meant any rabbit to do. I believe he'd have hunted like the elil if he could."

        "He isn't dead, you know," broke in Groundsel.

        The others were silent.

        "He hasn't stopped running," said Groundsel passionately. "Did you see his body? No. Did anyone? No. Nothing could kill him. He made rabbits bigger than they've ever been--braver, more skillful, more cunning. I know we paid for it. Some gave their lives. It was worth it, to feel we were Efrafans. For the first time ever, rabbits didn't go scurrying away. The elil feared us. And that was on account of Woundwort--him and no one but him. We weren't good enough for the General. Depend upon it, he's gone to start another warren somewhere else. But no Efrafan officer will ever forget him."

        "Well, now I'll tell you something," began Silver. But Hazel cut him short.

        "You mustn't say you weren't good enough," he said. "You did everything for him that rabbits could do and a great deal more. And what a lot we learned from you! As for Efrafa, I've heard it's doing well under Campion, even if some things aren't quite the same as they used to be. And listen--by next spring, if I'm right, we shall have too many rabbits here for comfort. I'm going to encourage some of the youngsters to start a new warren between here and Efrafa; and I think you'll find Campion will be ready to send some of his rabbits to join them. You'd be just the right fellow to start that scheme off."

        "Won't it be difficult to arrange?" asked Holly.

        "Not when Kehaar comes," said Hazel, as they began to hop easily back toward the holes at the northeast corner of the hanger. "He'll turn up one of these days, when the storms begin on that Big Water of his. He can take a message to Campion as quickly as you'd run down to the iron tree and back."

        "By Frith in the leaves, and I know someone who'll be glad to see him!" said Silver. "Someone not so very far away."

        They had reached the eastern end of the trees and here, well out in the open where it was still sunny, a little group of three young rabbits--bigger than Hyzenthlay's--were squatting in the long grass, listening to a hulking veteran, lop-eared and scarred from nose to haunch--none other than Bigwig, captain of a very free-and-easy Owsla. These were the bucks of Clover's litter and a likely lot they looked.

        "Oh, no, no, no, no," Bigwig was saying. "Oh, my wings and beak, that won't do! You--what's your name--Scabious--look, I'm a cat and I see you down at the bottom of my garden chewing up the lettuces. Now, what do I do? Do I come walking up the middle of the path waving my tail? Well, do I?"

        "Please, sir, I've never seen a cat," said the young rabbit.

        "No, you haven't yet," admitted the gallant captain. "Well, a cat is a horrible thing with a long tail. It's covered with fur and has bristling whiskers and when it fights it makes fierce, spiteful noises. It's cunning, see?"

        "Oh, yes, sir," answered the young rabbit. After a pause, he said politely, "Er--you lost your tail?"

        "Will you tell us about the fight in the storm, sir?" asked one of the other rabbits, "and the tunnel of water?"

        "Yes, later on," said the relentless trainer. "Now look, I'm a cat, right? I'm asleep in the sun, right? And you're going to get past me, right? Now then--"

        "They pull his leg, you know," said Silver, "but they'd do anything for him." Holly and Groundsel had gone underground and Silver and Hazel moved out once more into the sun.

        "I think we all would," replied Hazel. "If it hadn't been for him that day, the dog would have come too late. Woundwort and his lot wouldn't have been above ground. They'd have been down below, finishing what they'd come to do."

        "He beat Woundwort, you know," said Silver. "He had him beat before the dog came. That was what I was going to say just now, but it was as well I didn't, I suppose."

        "I wonder how they're getting on with that winter burrow down the hill," said Hazel. "We're going to need it when the hard weather comes. That hole in the roof of the Honeycomb doesn't help at all. It'll close up naturally one day, I suppose, but meanwhile it's a confounded nuisance."

        "Here come the burrow-diggers, anyway," said Silver.

        Pipkin and Bluebell came over the crest, together with three or four of the does.

        "Ah ha, ah ha, O Hazel-rah," said Bluebell. "The burrow's snug, it hath been dug, t'is free from beetle, worm and slug. And in the snow, when down we go--"    

        "Then what a lot to you we'll owe," said Hazel. "I mean it, too. The holes are concealed, are they?"

        "Just like Efrafa, I should think," said Bluebell. "As a matter of fact, I brought one up with me to show you. You can't see it, can you? No--well, there you are. I say, just look at old Bigwig with those youngsters over there. You know, if he went back to Efrafa now they couldn't decide which Mark to put him in, could they? He's got them all."

        "Come over to the evening side of the wood with us, Hazel-rah?" said Pipkin. "We came up early on purpose to have a bit of sunshine before it gets dark."

        "All right," answered Hazel good-naturedly. "We've just come back from there, Silver and I, but I don't mind slipping over again for a bit."

        "Let's go out to that little hollow where we found Kehaar that morning," said Silver. "It'll be out of the wind. D'you remember how he cursed at us and tried to peck us?"

        "And the worms we carried?" said Bluebell. "Don't forget them."

        As they came near the hollow they could hear that it was not empty. Evidently some of the other rabbits had had the same idea.

        "Let's see how close we can get before they spot us," said Silver. "Real Campion style--come on."

        They approached very quietly, upwind from the north. Peeping over the edge, they saw Vilthuril and her litter of four lying in the sun. Their mother was telling the young rabbits a story.

        "So after they had swum the river," said Vilthuril, "El-ahrairah led his people on in the dark, through a wild, lonely place. Some of them were afraid, but he knew the way and in the morning he brought them safely to some green fields, very beautiful, with good, sweet grass. And here they found a warren; a warren that was bewitched. All the rabbits in this warren were in the power of a wicked spell. They wore shining collars round their necks and sang like the birds and some of them could fly. But for all they looked so fine, their hearts were dark and tharn. So then El-ahrairah's people said, 'Ah, see, these are the wonderful rabbits of Prince Rainbow. They are like princes themselves. We will live with them and become princes, too.' "

        Vilthuril looked up and saw the newcomers. She paused for a moment and then went on.

        "But Frith came to Rabscuttle in a dream and warned him that that warren was enchanted. And he dug into the ground to find where the spell was buried. Deep he dug, and hard was the search, but at last he found that wicked spell and dragged it out. So they all fled from it, but it turned into a great rat and flew at El-ahrairah. Then El-ahrairah fought the rat, up and down, and at last he held it, pinned under his claws, and it turned into a great white bird which spoke to him and blessed him."

        "I seem to know this story," whispered Hazel, "but I can't remember where I've heard it."

        Bluebell sat up and scratched his neck with his hind leg. The little rabbits turned round at the interruption and in a moment had tumbled up the side of the hollow, squeaking "Hazel-rah! Hazel-rah!" and jumping on Hazel from all sides.

        "Here, wait a minute," said Hazel, cuffing them off. "I didn't come here to get mixed up in a fight with a lot of roughs like you! Let's hear the rest of the story."

        "But there's a man coming on a horse, Hazel-rah," said one of the young rabbits. "Oughtn't we to run into the wood?"

        "How can you tell?" asked Hazel. "I can't hear anything."

        "Neither can I," said Silver, listening with his ears up.

        The little rabbit looked puzzled.

        "I don't know how, Hazel-rah," he answered, "but I'm sure I'm not mistaken."

        They waited for some little time, while the red sun sank lower. At last, just as Vilthuril was about to go on with the story, they heard hooves on the turf and the horseman appeared from the west, cantering easily along the track toward Cannon Heath Down.

        "He won't bother us," said Silver. "No need to run: he'll just go by. You're a funny chap, though, young Threar, to spot him so far off."

        "He's always doing things like that," said Vilthuril. "The other day he told me what a river looked like and said he'd seen it in a dream. It's Fiver's blood, you know. It's only to be expected with Fiver's blood."

        "Fiver's blood?" said Hazel. "Well, as long as we've got some of that I dare say we'll be all right. But, you know, it's turning chilly here, isn't it? Come on, let's go down, and hear the rest of that story in a good, warm burrow. Look, there's Fiver over on the bank now. Who's going to get to him first?"

        A few minutes later there was not a rabbit to be seen on the down. The sun sank below Ladle Hill and the autumn stars began to shine in the darkening east--Perseus and the Pleiades, Cassiopeia, faint Pisces and the great square of Pegasus. The wind freshened, and soon myriads of dry beech leaves were filling the ditches and hollows and blowing in gusts across the dark miles of open grass. Underground, the story continued.

Epilogue

                                        He did look far

Into the service of the time, and was

Discipled of the bravest: he lasted long,

But on us both did haggish age steal on,

And wore us out of act....

Shakespeare, All's Well That Ends Well

He was part of my dream, of course--but then I was part of his dream, too.

Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass

"And what happened in the end?" asks the reader who has followed Hazel and his comrades in all their adventures and returned with them at last to the warren where Fiver brought them from the fields of Sandleford. The wise Mr. Lockley has told us that wild rabbits live for two or three years. He knows everything about rabbits: but all the same, Hazel lived longer than that. He lived a tidy few summers--as they say in that part of the world--and learned to know well the changes of the downs to spring, to winter and to spring again. He saw more young rabbits than he could remember. And sometimes, when they told tales on a sunny evening by the beech trees, he could not clearly recall whether they were about himself or about some other rabbit hero of days gone by.

        The warren prospered and so, in the fullness of time, did the new warren on the Belt, half Watership and half Efrafan--the warren that Hazel had first envisaged on that terrible evening when he set out alone to face General Woundwort and try to save his friends against all odds. Groundsel was the first Chief Rabbit; but he had Strawberry and Buckthorn to give him advice and he had learned better than to mark anyone or to order more than a very occasional Wide Patrol. Campion readily agreed to send some rabbits from Efrafa and the first party was led by none other than Captain Avens, who acted sensibly and made a very good job of it.

        General Woundwort was never seen again. But it was certainly true, as Groundsel said, that no one ever found his body, so it may perhaps be that, after all, that extraordinary rabbit really did wander away to live his fierce life somewhere else and to defy the elil as resourcefully as ever. Kehaar, who was once asked if he would look out for him in his flights over the downs, merely replied, "Dat damn rabbit--I no see 'im, I no vant I see 'im." Before many months had passed, no one on Watership knew or particularly cared to know whether he himself or his mate was descended from one or two Efrafan parents or from none at all. Hazel was glad that it should be so. And yet there endured the legend that somewhere out over the down there lived a great and solitary rabbit, a giant who drove the elil like mice and sometimes went to silflay in the sky. If ever great danger arose, he would come back to fight for those who honored his name. And mother rabbits would tell their kittens that if they did not do as they were told, the General would get them--the General who was first cousin to the Black Rabbit himself. Such was Woundwort's monument: and perhaps it would not have displeased him.

        One chilly, blustery morning in March, I cannot tell exactly how many springs later, Hazel was dozing and waking in his burrow. He had spent a good deal of time there lately, for he felt the cold and could not seem to smell or run so well as in days gone by. He had been dreaming in a confused way--something about rain and elder bloom--when he woke to realize that there was a rabbit lying quietly beside him--no doubt some young buck who had come to ask his advice. The sentry in the run outside should not really have let him in without asking first. Never mind, thought Hazel. He raised his head and said, "Do you want to talk to me?"

        "Yes, that's what I've come for," replied the other. "You know me, don't you?"

        "Yes, of course," said Hazel, hoping he would be able to remember his name in a moment. Then he saw that in the darkness of the burrow the stranger's ears were shining with a faint silver light. "Yes, my lord," he said, "Yes, I know you."

        "You've been feeling tired," said the stranger, "but I can do something about that. I've come to ask whether you'd care to join my Owsla. We shall be glad to have you and you'll enjoy it. If you're ready, we might go along now."

        They went out past the young sentry, who paid the visitor no attention. The sun was shining and in spite of the cold there were a few bucks and does at silflay, keeping out of the wind as they nibbled the shoots of spring grass. It seemed to Hazel that he would not be needing his body any more, so he left it lying on the edge of the ditch, but stopped for a moment to watch his rabbits and to try to get used to the extraordinary feeling that strength and speed were flowing inexhaustibly out of him into their sleek young bodies and healthy senses.

        "You needn't worry about them," said his companion. "They'll be all right--and thousands like them. If you'll come along, I'll show you what I mean."

        He reached the top of the bank in a single, powerful leap. Hazel followed; and together they slipped away, running easily down through the wood, where the first primroses were beginning to bloom.

Lapine Glossary

Bob-stones         A traditional game among rabbits.

Crixa, the           The center of Efrafa, at the crossing point of two bridle paths.

Efrafa                The name of the warren founded by General Woundwort.

El-ahrairah         The rabbit folk hero. The name (Elil-hrair-rah) means "Enemies-Thousand-Prince" = the Prince with a                     Thousand Enemies.

Elil                    Enemies (of rabbits).

Embleer             Stinking, e.g. the smell of a fox.

Flay                   Food, e.g. grass or other green fodder.

Flayrah                      Unusually good food, e.g. lettuce.

Frith                  The sun, personified as a god by rabbits. Frithrah! = the lord Sun--used as an exclamation.

Fu Inlé               After moonrise.

Hlao                  Any dimple or depression in the grass, such as that formed by a daisy plant or thistle, which can hold                     moisture. The name of a rabbit.

Hlao-roo            "Little Hlao." An affectionate diminutive of the name of Hlao, one of the rabbits in the story.

Hlessi                A rabbit living above ground, without a regular hole or warren. A wandering rabbit, living in the open.                      (Plural, hlessil.)

Homba               A fox. (Plural, hombil.)

Hrair                  A great many; an uncountable number; any number over four. U Hrair = The Thousand (enemies).

Hrairoo                      "Little Thousand." The name of Fiver in Lapine.

Hraka                Droppings, excreta.

Hrududu             A tractor, car or any motor vehicle. (Plural, hrududil.)

Hyzenthlay         Literally, "Shine-dew-fur" = Fur shining like dew. The name of a doe.

Inlé                   Literally, the moon; also moonrise. But a second meaning carries the idea of darkness, fear and                            death.

Lendri                A badger.

Marli                  A doe. Also carries the meaning "mother."

M'saion              "We meet them."

Narn                  Nice, pleasant (to eat).

Ni-Frith              Noon.

Nildro-hain         "Blackbird's Song." The name of a doe.

Owsla                The strongest rabbits in a warren, the ruling clique. 

Owslafa             The Council police (a word found only in Efrafa).

Pfeffa                A cat.

Rah                   A prince, leader or chief rabbit. Usually used as a suffix. E.g. Threarah = Lord Threar.

Roo                   Used as a suffix to denote a diminutive. E.g. Hrairoo.

Sayn                  Groundsel.

Silf                    Outside, that is, not underground.

Silflay                To go above ground to feed. Literally, to feed outside. Also used as a noun.

Tharn                Stupefied, distraught, hypnotized with fear. But can also, in certain contexts, mean "looking foolish,"                   or again "heartbroken" or "forlorn."

Thethuthinnang   "Movement of Leaves." The name of a doe.

Thlay                 Fur.

Thlayli               "Fur-head." A nickname.

Threar               A rowan tree, or mountain ash.

Vair                   To excrete, pass droppings.

Yona                 A hedgehog. (Plural, yonil.)

Zorn                  Destroyed, murdered. Denotes a catastrophe.