hat was the beginning of the change of
habits with the Flickers. Ever since we have spent more and more time on
the ground, so that now we feel quite at home there. We still get some
of our food in the trees by way of variety, and we make our homes there,
but a good big part of our food we get just as I am doing now."

With this Yellow-Wing once more plunged his bill into the ant hill and
licked up a dozen ants who had come rushing out to see what was going
on. And so once more the curiosity of Peter Rabbit was satisfied, and he
had learned something.

V

WHERE LITTLE CHIEF LEARNED TO MAKE HAY

No one in all the Great World thinks more of the present and less of the
future than does careless, happy-go-lucky Peter Rabbit. Everybody who
knows Peter at all knows that Peter doesn't waste any time worrying over
what may happen in a day that may never be. So Peter isn't thrifty as
are Happy Jack Squirrel and Chatterer the Red Squirrel and Whitefoot the
Wood Mouse and Paddy the Beaver and Striped Chipmunk.

"I've got enough to eat today, and enough is enough, so what is the use
of working when I don't have to?" says Peter. "I don't believe in
working today so that I won't have to work tomorrow, because when
tomorrow comes there may be no need of working, and then I would feel
that I had wasted all this good time today." No, Peter isn't the least
bit thrifty.

It is the same way with Peter's big cousin, Jumper the Hare. The truth
is the whole family is happy-go-lucky. Happy Jack Squirrel says that
every blessed one of them is shiftless. It does look that way. It is a
pity that Peter and Jumper never have learned a lesson from Little Chief
Hare, who is commonly supposed to be a relative of theirs, although, as
a matter of fact, he is neither a Hare nor a Rabbit, but is a Pika,
which is another family altogether. He is also called a Coney and
sometimes the Calling Hare. But if you want sure-enough proof that he
is neither a Rabbit nor a Hare, just watch him, if you are lucky enough
to have a chance, cut and dry and store away a great pile of hay for
winter use. No true member of Peter's family ever would think of doing
such a thing as that, more is the pity.

Peter never has seen Little Chief, because Little Chief lives high up on
a mountain of the Far West among the rocks where Peter would never go,
even if he could, but he has heard all about him. Old Man Coyote told
him all about him, and he got the story from