“There is no greatest danger while you are young,” replied Thunderer, shaking out his feathers. “Every danger is greatest while it exists. Never forget that. Never treat any danger lightly. Skunks and foxes and weasels and minks and coons and hawks and owls are equally dangerous to youngsters like you, and one is as much to be feared as another. It is only when you have become full-grown, like me, and then only in the fall of the year, that you will know the greatest danger.”
“And what is that?” asked Tommy timidly.
“A man with a gun,” replied Thunderer.
“And what is that?” asked Tommy again, eager for knowledge.
“A great creature who walks on two legs and points a stick which spits fire and smoke, and makes a great noise, and kills while it is yet a long distance off.”
“Oh!” gasped Tommy. “How is one ever to learn to avoid such a dreadful danger as that?”
“I’ll teach you when the time comes,” replied Thunderer. “Now run along and take your dust-bath. You must first learn to avoid other dangers before you will be fitted to meet the greatest danger.”
All that long bright summer Tommy thought of that greatest danger, and, by learning how to meet other dangers, tried to prepare himself for it. Sometimes he wondered if there really could be any greater danger than those about him every day. It seemed sometimes as if all the world sought to kill him, who was so harmless himself. Not only were there dangers from hungry animals, and robbers of the air, but also from the very creatures that furnished him much of his living—the tribe of insects. An ugly-looking insect, called a tick, with wicked blood-sucking jaws, killed one of the brood while they were yet small, and an equally ugly worm called a bot-worm caused the death of another.
Shadow the Weasel surprised one foolish bird who insisted on sleeping on the ground when he was big enough to know better, and Reddy Fox dined on another whose curiosity led him to move when he had been warned to lie perfectly still, and who paid for his disobedience with his life. Tommy, not three feet away, saw it all and profited by the lesson.
He was big enough now to act for himself and no longer depended wholly for safety on the wisdom of Mother Grouse and Thunderer. But while he trusted to his own senses and judgment, he was ever heedful of their example and still ready to learn. Especially did he take pains to keep near Thunderer and study him and his ways, for he was wise and cunning with the cunning of experience and knowledge. Tommy was filled with great admiration for him and tried to copy him in everything.