“Bosh!” cried the Donkey. “Why, it would take you a week.”
“I expect to be gone a week,” said the Rabbit, coldly.
“But what’s the use of spending a week on a journey you can do in an hour?” said the Donkey. “Come, be reasonable.”
“Perhaps, if you are so clever, you can show me the way,” said the Rabbit, who believed the Donkey was talking simply to hear himself talk.
“I certainly can,” replied the other, amiably. “But we’ll talk about this later. Here we are at the Club now, and it’s about time for the fun to begin.”
CHAPTER XVI
A FROLIC IN THE FOREST
The grounds of the Greenwood Club were situated in and about a natural clearing on the edge of a grove of pine-trees. Here, once a week, as the Rabbit had said, the wood people gathered for a session of play and talk, their minds free from the cares of every-day life.
“We have the games and races first, and the literary exercises afterward,” the Rabbit informed Buddie. “Not many go to the lecture. Doctor Goose is rather dry.”
Now they had entered the amphitheater which formed what might be called the main club-room, and, glancing around, Buddie saw nearly all her wood friends and many she had yet to know.
“I declare, there’s Colonel!” she exclaimed. “I suppose the Laziest Beaver was too lazy to come; I don’t see him anywhere. And I’m glad Colonel has finished that tiresome old song; and I hope he isn’t put out because I didn’t stay to listen to it. It wasn’t my fault.”