“But while he tried to make light of his misfortunes, and to laugh at his distress, night came, and found him unprovided with food and lodging. The disobedient child, who could treat with contempt the tears of his mother, was not able to put aside, so easily, the cravings of his stomach; and Bob, like many naughty boys, began to think how convenient it would be to have parents, if he could only neglect them always, except when he wanted to eat or to sleep. He turned his steps toward a neighbouring forest, and was fortunate enough to encounter there a kind old lady in Dame Rabbit.
Bob entertained by the Rabbit.
“She saw that he was a runaway, by his looks; but, good and obliging creature that she was, she knew that even a runaway must eat. So Captain Robert, with all his pride and dignity, was glad to accept the hospitality and bounty of the poor old dame; just as I have known some other children to run away from home, where they had plenty to eat, and a nice bed to sleep in, and to trespass upon the charity of those who have enough to do to provide for their own.”
“Has black Jane any children?” asked little Mary.
“Ask Frank,” said his mother, “I believe he has spent a night there.”
Poor Frank! He made no answer to this teasing, and Mr. Goodman again resumed the narrative.
Bob dines with the Rabbit.
“Dame Rabbit gave him a nice supper, and a comfortable lodging, and in the morning Bob took leave of his kind hostess, and determined upon climbing a high hill which he saw at a distance. Now browsing a little on the grass, as boys pick apples or berries by the way; now smoothing his fur a little, which had suffered some in the shipwreck, as runaways scrape off a little mud at a time; and now staring about him, as truants generally do, to divert their conscience from its reproaches, Bob found the sun already set, when he reached the top of the hill. There he was, without any supper, too late to go back, and not a tree in sight in which he could make his bed for the night.