Peter Rabbit and Sammy Squirrel

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Peter Rabbit

and

Sammy Squirrel

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Saalfield Pubushing Company
Chicago Akron. Ohio New York,
pkintkd in u. s. a.

COPYRIGHT, 1918

BY

THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANY

Peter Rabbit and
Sammy Squirrel

0

NE fine, warm morning,
Peter Rabbit and his friend,
Sammy Squirrel, started out

f^^^O spend the day
% '^k in the woods.
^^^ They thought
it would be very nice to
have a picnic and to
have
it
all
to

themselves.
For

their little brothers and sisters were
usually a nuisance

when they
wanted to
have a good time.

So they made their
preparations as secretly
/ as they could

and finally
managed to
\^ get away

t

Mrs. Squirrel was cleaning house,
and Sammy was very much afraid
that he would be pressed into
service. For house-cleaning meant

a general clearing out of all

the leaves and grass and moss

ITH which their house
had been furnished dur-
ing the winter, and also
a carrying in of a great quantity

of fresh
stuff.
There-
fore
the
dread
of
this
much
hated
work
lent wings to Sammy Squirrel's feet

mine where he had agreed to meet
Peter Rabbit. And it was some
time before that cheerful little fellow

made his appearance.

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Peter was in an unusually angelic
frame of mind, and had helped his
mother with all the chores.

And she had put up a nice lunch
for him, with a lot of things that
Sammy Squirrel liked.

She kissed Peter good-bye

and told him to have a good time
and not stay too late. For Mrs.
Rabbit had a wholesome fear of

traps,

remembering
the

untimely

disappearance

of

her

own
husband.

b

HEREFORE Peter Rabbit
hopped gaily along without

a care in the world to trouble him

KE would gladly
have stopped for
Sammy as he was
obliged to pass
his house, but as Sammy
had left on the sly, Peter
said nothing at all to old
Mrs. Squirrel, whom he
saw busy at her house-
cleaning, enveloped in
a very large, stiff apron,
\ with a big white dusting
cap perched on top of
her round ears.

HE cap was adorned
with a big red bow

that flopped back and forth as she
moved about. She nodded to
Peter Rabbit as he trotted by

and

the

bow

flopped

more

than

ever.

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ETER imagined that she
looked rather suspiciously at
his basket, so he hurried on

with only a gay good-morning.

E did not care
to be asked
any ques-

It did not take the
light-footed bunny
very long to reach
his destination, and
there he found

Sammy Squirrel chewing an acorn,

h

HE first thing to be done
was to make out their plans
for the day.

Of course nobody ever went to a
picnic and sat down in one place all
day long!

^ '^^ O after dis-

I ^ cussing sev-
•^ eral places

that were not too far
off, they finally
agreed that the very
prettiest one was Sil-
ver Lake, a beautiful
little pond within easy
walking distance.

An old beaver had built a dam
there, and both Peter Rabbit and
Sammy Squirrel had gone to school
with the young beavers.

CCORDINGLY, the two
friends trotted gaily
along,

swinging the lunch basket between
them and chatting merrily.

rETER RABBIT
told how two blue-
jays that came
from the South
every spring had nested
in the big tulip tree near
his burrow and that
their eggs were al-
ready half hatched.

Sammy Squirrel
had met the old
mud turtle that lived
in a little pond
near his house
who had told
him all sorts
of news.

So the two exchanged gossip

NTIL, before very long
they saw the waters of the
lake gleaming in the sun-
shine not very far ahead of them.

OON they be-
held the
homes of
the beaver colony,
the
dome-shaped
lodges
rising

up

close

to
the
water.

<ifc

While not
very far off,
they spied Mr. Ben
Beaver and his
whole family busily
at work re-
pairing a weak
place in the
dam.

\

ETER RABBIT and

Sammy Squirrel did not
like to interrupt while

their friends were busy, but as
soon as their task was finished

they sprang out from behind the trees

D were greeted with great
delight by the whole
beaver family, who looked
rather damp,
but very hos-
pitable.

come

But as the family entrance was
about a foot under water, which
was all right for beavers, but
rather inaccessible for their guests

who

could

neither

dive

nor

swim,

it was

decided that they remain outside,
much to the disappointment of the
whole beaver family,

Mrs. Bess Beaver now announced
that it was high time for luncheon.
Accordingly she spread on the grass

a tempting meal of fresh and
tender bark

stripped from
young saplings,
and a dainty

dessert of
water-lily roots.
To this was
added the
luncheon that
Peter Rabbit had
brought along.

ND a good thing it was
that the tempting food
prepared by Mrs. Rufus
Rabbit was in evidence, for there

was not

a thing
that

beavers
consider
delicious

in which Peter Rabbit could have
set one of his little blunt teeth. Al-
though for the sake of politeness

E did his best to chew
the leathery bark and
sodden little roots.

The meal was spread on
the little pebbly beach, and
the water lapped lazily against
the shore with a pleasant,
sleepy noise.

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BIG, blue dragon-
flies skimmed
about on the
surface of the water. A
cloud of yellow butter-
flies drifted by. The
soft wind rustled
among the leaves. It
was charming, even
though old Ben
Beaver, who had
eaten a great deal too
much, and was sure
/ to have dys-
pepsia later
on, had fallen
asleep and
was snoring
loudly.

^^^'^k OBODY paid any attention
1 JP to him, however, as the
^^^^ family was well used to
his habits. And of course
their guests were too polite to notice
anything at all out of the way.

Presently there was a great splash*
ing in the water, and a great pickerel
poked his shining snout out of the
pond. He was very old — so old
that he remembered when everybody
else was born. So the beavers
quickly introduced Peter Rabbit and
Sammy Squirrel. They were both
rather inclined to be afraid of him,
he had such teeth.

They simply bowed and did not
offer to shake hands.

RS. BESS BEAVER,

however, was delighted
to see him, and re-

quested him to ask his wife to have
afternoon tea with her at an early

L

date, and to
bring her knit-
ting, all of
whichMr. Pick-
er e 1 gladly
promised to do.
In the mean-
time one of the
young beavers
plunged into
the water and
called out to
Peter Rabbit

that if he would sit on his back he
would give him a ride.

And Peter, quite delighted, quick-

ly sprang astride of his friend's wet
and slippery back.

For a few minutes all went well.
But suddenly the little beaver felt
himself grabbed by the hind foot in

such a vicious nip that he cried out
with pain, at the same time lashing
out with his free foot.

Alas for poor
Peter Rabbit!
Although he
hung on with
might and main, /M
in about one sec-
ond he found
himself strug-
gling in the cold water, half drowned
and three-quarters scared to death.

IN a second all the
rest of the bea-
vers flew to the
rescue. Some of them
hauled out their
broLher,while the rest at-
tended to Peter Rabbit.
A small but energetic
crab, who was quickly
disposed of, was found
to be the cause of all
the trouble.

OOR Peter Rabbit, having
been shaken and rolled and
stood upon his head, was

way

under the care of the badly scared
Sammy Squirrel, and

KE took a very
polite and
I p r o f u sely
thankful leave of his
friends, although the
thanks almost choked
him.

FOR he distinctly felt that he
never wanted to see either
a beaver or a lake again, not
to mention crabs.

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