She had to slap them herself.
Standing before the little girl in a skilful attitude of defence, as the hippopotamus came on, Sammy chucked it under the chin, as it were, with all the strength of his arm, and down it went with a dull bump that shook the ground, the most surprised hippopotamus you ever saw. No second blow was needed; the beast rolled itself on to its feet, and muttering dreadful threats—quite indistinctly, for it had bitten its tongue in a painful way—rushed away across the desert towards the Black Mountains.
Sammy chucked it under the chin, as it were.
'You are a brave boy,' said Baby Jane softly, looking up at Sammy.
'Oh, it's nothing,' he said, but he turned very red with pride.
When the creatures came to hear of this deed they were all mad to learn how to box, so, at the halt for dinner, Sammy produced a set of boxing gloves and gave them lessons. After they were taught they practised among themselves. Then, as Baby Jane had feared, there was a squabble. No gloves could temper the hardness of Mary Carmichael's hoofs, and when, with an irritating sadness of expression, she hit the lion in the eye, that creature could stand it no longer. So they had to be forbidden to use their skill except against an enemy. Of course they all longed to do so, but the Rabbit was very wrong to do as he did. It was the act of a bully.
Searching about among the sandhills, he came upon a little duck squatting beside a pool, and without any reason whatever, for the duck was perfectly inoffensive, he made the most insulting remark, and, when the duck mildly retorted, he set upon it and pummelled it cruelly.
Luckily Baby Jane caught him in the act, and, picking him up by the scruff of his neck, gave him such slaps that his fat little ribs sounded like a drum.
When she set him down he rushed in a bad, sulky mood to his friends.