As for the latter, he was too badly frightened to move. He growled feebly in a very frightened way as Farmer Brown’s boy picked him up.
“You poor little thing,” said Farmer Brown’s boy gently. “I wouldn’t hurt you for the world.”
But the little Otter couldn’t understand a word and just shivered with fear. At first Farmer Brown’s boy thought that he would take the little fellow home for a pet. Then he looked down into the little pool straight into the eyes of Mrs. Joe, and he saw there such a look of anxious love and longing that he marched straight down to the edge of the water and gently put his little captive in it. Then he laughed and the laugh was good to hear as the little fellow dived and swam out to join his parents as fast as ever he could, and all three promptly disappeared. When he got back to where he had left his rod something was tugging at the line. It was the biggest trout he ever had caught.
CHAPTER XII
PETER RABBIT FINDS A QUEER TRAIL
Who seeks shall learn
And knowledge earn.
Little Joe Otter.
Summer had passed and winter had brought the first snow. Peter Rabbit likes snow. That is, he likes it if there isn’t too much of it. Sometimes, when it is very deep, Peter has a hard time getting enough to eat. But when it isn’t too deep he likes it. You see, Peter is full of curiosity, and when there is snow on the ground and it isn’t crusted over, he is able to learn many things about his neighbors. All he has to do is to follow their tracks to find out where they have been and what they have been doing.
So with the coming of the first snow Peter hurried over to the Green Forest, and as soon as he got there he began to look for tracks. The first he found were the dainty little footprints of Whitefoot the Wood Mouse. They were almost as dainty as the tracks of birds. He followed them until they were joined by bigger tracks. Then Peter stopped. He suddenly lost interest. You see, those bigger tracks he recognized right away. They were the footprints of Reddy Fox. Peter decided that this was no place for him, for he knew that those footprints were made only a very short time before.
So away went Peter in quite another direction. Presently he found footprints very like his own, only very much bigger. They were the footprints of his cousin, Jumper the Hare. “I haven’t seen Cousin Jumper for a long time, so I guess I’ll see if I can catch up with him,” thought Peter.