“Not more than me,” the young trout broke in. He flung his nose jauntily against the surface, and the surface swung from it in widening eddies, circle after circle. “I can be up to the weir and down again before you are halfway across the stream. When humans build their destroyers, they model them on me. I know that, because I have seen their clumsy models, trout-shaped, save the mark!”
“That is enough from any one of your years,” said the hedgehog. “Little river-fishes run away from big river-fishes, and big river-fishes run away from bigger river-fishes, and they all run away from the otter.”
The jack that lived in the deep below the pollard grinned, but said nothing. The jack knew better, but he never says anything. But the gudgeon and the troutling were terrified at the notion of bigger fishes, and made straight for the weeds.
but the gudgeon and troutling made straight for the weeds.
“What think the caterpillars?” said the hedgehog.
it was the lobster-moth-to-be that spoke first.
most of them fling their heads back, arch their necks, and play at being snakes.