When the fathers came the mothers all flew at them. You see it isn't any joke to lose fifty children all at once.
The fathers thought of the Lion the first thing, but the mothers had tried not to think of him because they couldn't bear it.
But at last the fathers got all the guns and all the pistols and all the iron spikes and clubs and scythes and carving knives and old swords, and they armed themselves with them and began to march all together toward the Huge Green Hill. The mothers would go too and they took scissors and big needles and long hat pins and one took a big pepper–pot, full of red pepper, to throw into the Lion's eyes.
They had so much to do before they were ready that when they reached the Huge Green Hill the sun was going down and what do you think they heard?
They heard this——
"Ro–o–a–a–arh! Ro–o–a–a–rh! Ro–o–a–a–arrh!" almost as loud as thunder. And at the same time they heard the shouts and shrieks of the entire picnic.
But they did not know that the picnic was shouting and screaming for joy.
So they ran and ran and ran—and stumbled and scrambled and hurried and scurried and flurried faster and faster till they had scrambled up the Huge Green Hill to where the Lion's Cave was and then they gathered behind a big clump of bushes and the fathers began to cock their guns and the mothers to sharpen their scissors and hat pins.
But the mother with the pepper–pot had nothing to sharpen, so she peeped from behind the bushes, and suddenly she cried out, "Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Look! Look! And don't fire a single gun, on any account."