“What makes you keep moving your mouth and whiskers?”
“Because I am always planning and worrying. My family always worried. We do not think enough about what might happen out here in the country. Perhaps a great fire might come and burn up all these trees; perhaps the river may come and drown us. The birds make us forget these things. We are too happy.”
The marten shook his head, but he said some grass had touched his nose. He did not want the rabbit to think him different from town people.
The two went out to walk under the trees.
“What makes you hop?” asked the marten. [[263]]
“My family always hop. People in town never step along like country people. See how well I look and how clumsy that moose cow is over there.”
Just then they heard a soft step on the brown pine needles; the marten flattened himself down on the ground, and his brown fur could not be seen. The white rabbit ran away with great jumps. He hid in the bushes.
The two animals met again that day. “Why did you run so fast?” asked the marten.
“I used to run races when I was in town. The boys and the dogs all played with me. Every one goes fast when in town. I forgot how slow the country people are.”
The marten walked and ran by the rabbit’s side.