it wouldn't be so
bad," he muttered. "It's those terrible guns. I know what it is to have
to watch out for them. Farmer Brown's boy used to hunt me with one of
them, but he doesn't any more. But even when he did hunt me it wasn't
anything like what the Ducks have to go through. If I kept my eyes and
ears open, I could tell when a hunter was coming and could hide in a
hole if I wanted to. I never had to worry about my meals. But with the
Ducks it is a thousand times worse. They've got to eat while making that
long journey, and they can eat only where there is the right kind of
food. Hunters with terrible guns know where those places are and hide
there until the Ducks come, and the Ducks have no way of knowing
whether the hunters are waiting for them or not. That isn't hunting.
It's--it's--"

"Well, what is it? What are you talking to yourself about, Peter
Rabbit?"

Peter looked up with a start to find the soft, beautiful eyes of
Lightfoot the Deer gazing down at him over the top of a little hemlock
tree.

"It's awful," declared Peter. "It's worse than unfair. It doesn't give
them any chance at all."

"I suppose it must be so if you say so," replied Lightfoot, "but you
might tell me what all this awfulness is about."

Peter grinned. Then he began at the beginning and told Lightfoot all
about Mr. and Mrs. Quack and the many dangers they must face on their
long journey to the far-away Southland and back again in the spring, all
because of the heartless hunters with terrible guns. Lightfoot listened
and his great soft eyes were filled with pity for the Quack family.

"I hope they will get through all right," said he, "and I hope they will
get back in the spring. It is bad enough to be hunted by men at one time
of the year, as no one knows better than I do, but to be hunted in the
spring as well as in the fall is more than twice as bad. Men are strange
creatures. I do not understand them at all. None of the people of the
Green Forest would think of doing such terrible things. I suppose it is
quite right to hunt others in order to get enough to eat, though I am
thankful to say that I never have had to do that, but to hunt others
just for the fun of hunting is something I cannot understand at all. And
yet that is what men seem to do it for. I guess the trouble is they
never have been hunted themselves and don't know how it feels. Sometimes
I think I'll hunt one some day just to teach him a lesson. What are you
laughing