I became very much fonder of them than of my rabbits. They were very much better behaved, though I must acknowledge, that as far as my experience with children goes, rabbits seem to have more power than the gentle pigs of inspiring a warm affection.
The most enthusiastic rabbit-lovers I have ever known were two little girls, who came to me one day with a pair of tiny white rabbits. Would I give these little creatures a home? I was very glad to do so, for I thought that my gray Rab, who was now a big handsome rabbit, would not despise these creatures of her own kind, as she had despised the guineapig. I put the little white fellows in with her, and to my surprise she darted at them, and tried to injure them in such an unmistakable way that I promptly pounced on her and took her out in the furnace-room. She did not like this, and gazed angrily through the wire door at the white rabbits that were careering around with the guineapigs. She had been naughty, but still I was sorry for her. On remembering her first friend, the spotted rabbit, I bought another to play with her. She got on very well with this new friend, but the little white rabbits fell into misfortune.
On going into the aviary one morning, I found one of them cold in death. What had happened to him? There was nothing there that could injure him. After some hard thinking and Sherlock Holmes examination of tracks and signs, I discovered that during the night the poor little rabbit had started to eat hay on the edge of the long, steep bank of earth, had fallen down, and could not find the path leading to his little brother above. He had died of fright, and I soon had the bank low enough for guineapigs and rabbits to run up and down. The surviving rabbit became ill, so I put him out in the warmer furnace-room, and drove Rab and Spotty to the aviary.
This made fresh trouble. Rab had been quite upset when I took her from the aviary, and now she was more upset because I had put her back. She had become accustomed to the furnace-room, and she shook the wire door, and gnawed the woodwork, and at last, seeing the rage she was in, I allowed her to return to the furnace-room. She was so ill that she lay down as if she were going to die. I slipped a hot-water bag under her, and advised her to keep on it. She gazed about her in a peculiar way with laid-back ears, looking as if she did not think much of my opinion. However, she kept on the bag, only occasionally getting up to take a long drink of cold water, and in a day or two was quite well.
While she was ill she did not molest the rabbit, nor did her companion, Spotty, interfere with him. He was a pretty good rabbit, and not bad-tempered, as Rab was. As soon as she recovered she sought the young rabbit’s life, and I was obliged to have a stout enclosure made for him, as I still wished to keep him in the warm furnace-room. I knew there were rats in this room. We saw them running about with Rab and Spotty, eating their grain with them, drinking from their water dishes, nestling in their bundle of hay, and sitting by the furnace to keep warm. I have always had a liking for rats, and it did not occur to me that these well-fed creatures, with the peculiarly bright, intelligent eyes, could or would kill my baby rabbit.
However, they did do so; and one January afternoon when I went to the basement to feed my downstairs family, I was shocked to discover his little blood-stained body in my path. The cruel rats had entered the wire pen of the little fellow, had dragged out his body, and had eaten his brains.
I ran for my father, who was always most sympathetic. He said he did not see how the rats had pried up the heavy supports of the rabbit’s cage. However, they had done it; and I wrapped poor Bunny up and put him in the furnace—cremation being my preferred mode of disposing of my pets’ bodies.
Then we spent the evening in making a trap for the rats, but I fancy they watched us while we were doing it, and we, of course, caught none of them. We did catch some young ones, however, and the five tiny things looked so innocent as they sat in their trap that I could not make up my mind to have them killed, and took the cage up to my father’s study.
“Suppose we keep them,” I suggested, “and train them—make them friendly with the young rabbits and pigs and birds.”
“Suppose we do,” he said; and leaving his books, he descended to the aviary with me, and together we rigged a big cage against one of the brick walls. There the rat babies could look at my pets, and get acquainted with them.