“Well, good-by,” said Flop Ear, after a bit, having finished his breakfast, “I think I had better be going on. I want to find my home.”
“And I hope you do find it,” said Mr. Mouse, for the white rabbit had told how the hunter had chased him, and how he had become lost.
“Well, good-by,” repeated the white rabbit, “I’ll be getting on now. It will be winter in a few more weeks I fear, and I do not want to be lost out in the woods and fields then. I want to get back to my own home before cold weather.”
“I should think you would,” said Mrs. Mouse. “But if you can not find your place come back to us. You could dig with your feet and make our house bigger, and then you could live with us.”
“Thank you, very much,” replied the white rabbit. “Perhaps I shall come back.”
So he hopped on again, going through the woods and over the fields, hoping soon to come to his own burrow. And on his travels Flop Ear had many adventures. There is not room enough in this book to tell you all of them, but I can mention a few.
Once he was crossing a deep brook on a fallen log, and he slipped off and fell into the water. Flop Ear was not a very good swimmer, but he did get out after a while, all wet. He had to lie down in the sun to dry.
Another time, as he was eating some clover in a field, a bee came along, and, by mistake, stung Flop Ear on the nose.
“Ouch!” cried the white rabbit. “Ouch!”
“Oh, excuse me,” said the bee. “I did not mean to do that.”