The morning sun peeped in on Flop Ear as he lay in the hollow tree. The white rabbit opened his eyes, and for a moment he could not think where he was.
“Oh, now I remember!” he said to himself as he looked over toward the road along which the circus had passed. “I remember about last night, and how Tum Tum saved me. I’ll have lots to tell Pink Nose and Snuggle if ever I get back to them. I wonder if I’ll ever find my home again?”
Flop Ear was hungry when he awoke, and he began to look for his breakfast. He did not do as you have to do, wait for a table to be set, and for something to be cooked. All Flop Ear had to do was to hop out of bed, down in among the clover and eat as much as he liked. He could gnaw bark from a tree, too.
But before he ate he took a nice drink of water from a little brook in the field, and washed his face and paws, just as you take a little bath before you have breakfast.
“Well, I wonder what will happen to me to-day?” thought Flop Ear, when he had eaten as much as he needed. “I don’t know whether I am hopping toward my home, or away from it. But still I must keep on. And I am not going near any more houses, for I do not want to be caught by a boy, and made to do tricks—though I will say that Jimmie was very good to me.”
Flop Ear saw a stump in the clover field, and he thought if he could hop up on that he could look around him and see which was the best way to go.
“It will raise me up higher, that stump will,” said Flop Ear. “Not as high as a bird, it is true, but still higher than if I were on the ground. I’ll see what I can look at up on the stump.”
With a big hop up went Flop Ear. Then he looked all around. On one side was woods, on the other a field, on another a running brook and on the last side was a road.
“I’ll see if I can cross the brook,” thought Flop Ear. “Then if there are any dogs around here they can’t so well follow me, at least for a while. Yes, I shall go over on the other side of the brook.”
The brook was not very deep, and Flop Ear could easily wade across it. On the other side he found some sweet roots to eat, and going on a little farther, he came to a field of cabbages.