m the birch tassels. No
one bird seemed to be first. It was quite like a drill, or as if each
had thought of the same thing at the same instant. Peter chuckled over
it all the way home. And somehow he felt better for having made the
acquaintance of the Redpolls. It was the feeling that everybody so
fortunate as to meet them on a gold winter's day is sure to have.

CHAPTER XLV. Peter Sees Two Terrible Feathered Hunters.

While it is true that Peter Rabbit likes winter, it is also true that
life is anything but easy for him that season. In the first place he has
to travel about a great deal to get sufficient food, and that means that
he must run more risks. There isn't a minute of day or night that he is
outside of the dear Old Briar-patch when he can afford not to watch and
listen for danger. You see, at this season of the year, Reddy Fox often
finds it difficult to get a good meal. He is hungry most of the time,
and he is forever hunting for Peter Rabbit. With snow on the ground and
no leaves on the bushes and young trees, it is not easy for Peter to
hide. So, as he travels about, the thought of Reddy Fox is always in his
mind.

But there are others whom Peter fears even more, and these wear feathers
instead of fur coats. One of these is Terror the Goshawk. Peter is
not alone in his fear of Terror. There is not one among his feathered
friends who will not shiver at the mention of Terror's name. Peter will
not soon forget the day he discovered that Terror had come down from the
Far North, and was likely to stay for the rest of the winter. Peter went
hungry all the rest of that day.

You see it was this way: Peter had gone over to the Green Forest very
early that morning in the hope of getting breakfast in a certain swamp.
He was hopping along, lipperty-lipperty-lip, with his thoughts chiefly
on that breakfast he hoped to get, but at the same time with ears and
eyes alert for possible danger, when a strange feeling swept over him.
It was a feeling that great danger was very near, though he saw nothing
and heard nothing to indicate it. It was just a feeling, that was all.

Now Peter has learned that the wise thing to do when one has such a
feeling as that is to seek safety first and investigate afterwards.
At the instant he felt that strange feeling of fear he was passing a
certain big, hollow log. Without really knowing why he did it, because,
you know, he didn't stop to do any thinking, he dived into that hollow