new antlers. And I had to be very careful not to hit
them against anything. In the first place it would have hurt, and in the
second place it might have spoiled the shape of them.

"When they had grown to the length you now see, they began to shrink and
grow hard. The knobs on the ends shrank until they became pointed. As
soon as they stopped growing the blood stopped flowing up in them, and
as they became hard they were no longer tender. The skin which had
covered them grew dry and split, and I rubbed it off on trees and
bushes. The little rags you see are what is left, but I will soon be rid
of those. Then I shall be ready to fight if need be and will fear no one
save man, and will fear him only when he has a terrible gun with him."

Lightfoot tossed his head proudly and rattled his wonderful antlers
against the nearest tree. "Isn't he handsome," whispered Peter to Jumper
the Hare; "and did you ever hear of anything so wonderful as the growing
of those new antlers in such a short time? It is hard to believe, but I
suppose it must be true."

"It is," replied Jumper, "and I tell you, Peter, I would hate to have
Lightfoot try those antlers on me, even though I were big as a man.
You've always thought of Lightfoot as timid and afraid, but you should
see him when he is angry. Few people care to face him then."

CHAPTER IV

THE SPIRIT OF FEAR

When the days grow cold and the nights are clear,
There stalks abroad the spirit of fear.

_Lightfoot the Deer._

It is sad but true. Autumn is often called the sad time of the year, and
it _is_ the sad time. But it shouldn't be. Old Mother Nature never
intended that it should be. She meant it to be the _glad_ time. It is
the time when all the little people of the Green Forest and the Green
Meadows have got over the cares and worries of bringing up families and
teaching their children how to look out for themselves. It is the
season when food is plentiful, and every one is fat and is, or ought to
be, care free. It is the season when Old Mother Nature intended all her
little people to be happy, to have nothing to worry them for the little
time before the coming of cold weather and the hard times which cold
weather always brings.

But instead of this, a grim, dark figure goes stalking over the Green
Meadows and through the Green Forest, and it is called the Spirit of
Fear. It peers into every hiding-place and wherever it finds one of