“My gravest fear for my people is,” he said, “that they will never learn to be fearless and self-possessed. A very little thing frightens them and makes them panicky.”
Bumper stored this bit of information away in a corner of his mind. “I must not get panicky even if the others do,” he said to himself.
“And another weakness of theirs is that they always do the same thing over and over again,” continued the Old Blind Rabbit, “and our enemies know it, and thereby trap them.”
“I must never do the same thing twice alike,” Bumper reflected. “That’s dangerous in the woods.”
Many other bits of wisdom fell from the lips of the Old Blind Rabbit, and Bumper remembered all of them.
Of course, he couldn’t stay in the burrow forever. Sooner or later he had to hunt with the pack. They went out every day to get their food, and to enjoy the sunshine. So on the fourth day of his coming, when Spotted Tail asked him if he was going to accompany them, he said yes, and prepared to lead the way.
And on that first day he applied some of the Old Blind Rabbit’s wisdom, which greatly increased the respect of his cousins for him. They were feeding on birch leaves and bark in a clearing a long, long distance from the burrow when they were startled by the baying of hounds.
“The dogs and hunters are coming,” Spotted Tail exclaimed in fright. “When they appear we must run to the left.”
“Why to the left?” asked Bumper curiously.
“Because rabbits always run that way, making a wide circle to throw the hounds off their track.”