ery large ears and very small feet.

STORY XVI.

BILLY BUNNY AND THE MARBLE DEER.

In the story before this I told you how the beautiful peacock sang a
song which was dreadful, so very dreadful that little Billy Bunny had
to hold his ears and run away from the lovely fountain.

Well, after he had hopped along for maybe a million hops or less, he
came to a little deer on a smooth lawn. So he stopped and spoke to
him, but the pretty little animal never said a word. He didn't even
look at the little rabbit, so Billy Bunny touched him on the nose,
but, oh, dear me! It was cold and hard, not at all like the nose of a
real little deer.

But the little bunny didn't know it was a marble deer. He just thought
it was alive, you see, and he was puzzled and didn't know what to do
And then a lovely white dove flew down and said:

"He can't speak. He's only a statue."

"What is that?" asked the little rabbit, for he had never seen one
before.

"Why, a statue is a figure carved out of marble or stone," answered
the dove, and then she began to coo and comb her feathers with her
bill.

"Well, I'll just hop along then," said Billy Bunny, and he said good-by.
And after a while he came to a little house all covered with red
rambler roses, so he looked inside to see who lived there, for he
thought perhaps it might be a fairy who owned this beautiful garden
with the lovely fountain and the wonderful peacock.

But there was no one inside, so he hopped in and sat down on a small
wicker chair and rocked back and forth. For it was a rocking chair,
you know. And, by and by, he fell asleep and dreamed that the
beautiful peacock was flying around the fountain and scattering the
water drops all about with his mag-nif-i-cent tail. And then, all of a
sudden, the little rabbit woke up, for somebody was saying:

"Isn't this a dear little bunny?" And Billy Bunny opened his eyes and
saw a little girl with yellow curls leaning over him.

"Give him to me," said a boy's voice. And there stood a small boy
dressed in a sailor suit and a big sailor hat on which was written,
"Battleship Uncle Sam."

And then Billy Bunny knew it was time to be going. So he gave one big
hop and maybe two million and a half little skips and jumps, and soon
he was far away, and if he hadn't maybe that little boy would have put
him in a cage or a big box and kept him shut up for a long time.

"Goodness!" said the little rabbit, "I must be more careful next