The Velveteen Rabbit
"I don't like dancing," he said. "I'd rather sit still!"
But all the while he was longing to dance, for a funny new tickly
feeling ran through him, and he felt he would give anything in the
world to be able to jump about like these rabbits did.
The strange rabbit stopped dancing, and came quite close. He came so
close this time that his long whiskers brushed the Velveteen Rabbit's
ear, and then he wrinkled his nose suddenly and flattened his ears and
jumped backwards.
"He doesn't smell right!" he exclaimed. "He isn't a rabbit at all! He
isn't real!"
"I am Real!" said the little Rabbit. "I am Real! The Boy said so!" And
he nearly began to cry.
Just then there was a sound of footsteps, and the Boy ran past near
them, and with a stamp of feet and a flash of white tails the two
strange rabbits disappeared.
"Come back and play with me!" called the little Rabbit. "Oh, do come
back! I know I am Real!"
But there was no answer, only the little ants ran to and fro, and the
bracken swayed gently where the two strangers had passed. The
Velveteen Rabbit was all alone.
"Oh, dear!" he thought. "Why did they run away like that? Why couldn't
they stop and talk to me?"
For a long time he lay very still, watching the bracken, and hoping
that they would come back. But they never returned, and presently the
sun sank lower and the little white moths fluttered out, and the Boy
came and carried him home.
Weeks passed, and the little Rabbit grew very old and shabby, but the
Boy loved him just as much. He loved him so hard that he loved all his
whiskers off, and the pink lining to his ears turned grey, and his
brown spots faded. He even began to lose his shape, and he scarcely
looked like a rabbit any more, except to the Boy. To him he was always
beautiful, and that was all that the little Rabbit cared about. He
didn't mind how he looked to other people, because the nursery magic
had made him Real, and when you are Real shabbiness doesn't matter.
And then, one day, the Boy was ill.
His face grew very flushed, and he talked in his sleep, and his little
body was so hot that it burned the Rabbit when he held him close.
Strange people came and went in the nursery, and a light burned all
night and through it all the little Velveteen Rabbit lay there, hidden
from sight under the bedclothes, and he never stirred, for he was
afraid that if they found him some one might take him away, and he
knew that the Boy needed him.
It was a long weary time, for the Boy was too ill to play, and the
little Rabbit found it rather dull with nothing to do all day long.
But he snuggled down patiently, and looked forward to the time when
the Boy should be well again, and they would go out in the garden
amongst the flowers and the butterflies and play splendid games in the
raspberry thicket like they used to. All sorts of delightful things he
planned, and while the Boy lay half asleep he crept up close to the
pillow and whispered them in his ear. And presently the fever turned,
and the Boy got better. He was able to sit up in bed and look at
picture-books, while the little Rabbit cuddled close at his side. And
one day, they let him get up and dress.
It was a bright, sunny morning, and the windows stood wide open. They
had carried the Boy out on to the balcony, wrapped in a shawl, and the
little Rabbit lay tangled up among the bedclothes, thinking.
The Boy was going to the seaside to-morrow. Everything was arranged,
and now it only remained to carry out the doctor's orders. They talked
about it all, while the little Rabbit lay under the bedclothes, with
just his head peeping out, and listened. The room was to be
disinfected, and all the books and toys that the Boy had played with
in bed must be burnt.
"Hurrah!" thought the little Rabbit. "To-morrow we shall go to the
seaside!" For the boy had often talked of the seaside, and he wanted
very much to see the big waves coming in, and the tiny crabs, and the
sand castles.
Just then Nana caught sight of him.
"How about his old Bunny?" she asked.
"That?" said the doctor. "Why, it's a mass of scarlet fever
germs!-Burn it at once. What? Nonsense! Get him a new one. He mustn't
have that any more!"
Anxious Times
And so the little Rabbit was put into a sack with the old
picture-books and a lot of rubbish, and carried out to the end of the
garden behind the fowl-house. That was a fine place to make a bonfire,
only the gardener was too busy just then to attend to it. He had the
potatoes to dig and the green peas to gather, but next morning he
promised to come quite early and burn the whole lot.
That night the Boy slept in a different bedroom, and he had a new
bunny to sleep with him. It was a splendid bunny, all white plush with
real glass eyes, but the Boy was too excited to care very much about
it. For to-morrow he was going to the seaside, and that in itself was
such a wonderful thing that he could think of nothing else.
And while the Boy was asleep, dreaming of the seaside, the little
Rabbit lay among the old picture-books in the corner behind the
fowl-house, and he felt very lonely. The sack had been left untied,
and so by wriggling a bit he was able to get his head through the
opening and look out. He was shivering a little, for he had always
been used to sleeping in a proper bed, and by this time his coat had
worn so thin and threadbare from hugging that it was no longer any
protection to him. Near by he could see the thicket of raspberry
canes, growing tall and close like a tropical jungle, in whose shadow
he had played with the Boy on bygone mornings. He thought of those
long sunlit hours in the garden-how happy they were-and a great
sadness came over him. He seemed to see them all pass before him, each
more beautiful than the other, the fairy huts in the flower-bed, the
quiet evenings in the wood when he lay in the bracken and the little
ants ran over his paws; the wonderful day when he first knew that he
was Real. He thought of the Skin Horse, so wise and gentle, and all
that he had told him. Of what use was it to be loved and lose one's
beauty and become Real if it all ended like this? And a tear, a real
tear, trickled down his little shabby velvet nose and fell to the
ground.
And then a strange thing happened. For where the tear had fallen a
flower grew out of the ground, a mysterious flower, not at all like
any that grew in the garden. It had slender green leaves the colour of
emeralds, and in the centre of the leaves a blossom like a golden cup.
It was so beautiful that the little Rabbit forgot to cry, and just lay
there watching it. And presently the blossom opened, and out of it
there stepped a fairy.
She was quite the loveliest fairy in the whole world. Her dress was of
pearl and dew-drops, and there were flowers round her neck and in her
hair, and her face was like the most perfect flower of all. And she
came close to the little Rabbit and gathered him up in her arms and
kissed him on his velveteen nose that was all damp from crying.
"Little Rabbit," she said, "don't you know who I am?"
The Rabbit looked up at her, and it seemed to him that he had seen her
face before, but he couldn't think where.
"I am the nursery magic Fairy," she said. "I take care of all the
playthings that the children have loved. When they are old and worn
out and the children don't need them any more, then I come and take
them away with me and turn them into Real."
"Wasn't I Real before?" asked the little Rabbit.
"You were Real to the Boy," the Fairy said, "because he loved you. Now
you shall be Real to every one."
The Fairy Flower
And she held the little Rabbit close in her arms and flew with him
into the wood.
It was light now, for the moon had risen. All the forest was
beautiful, and the fronds of the bracken shone like frosted silver. In
the open glade between the tree-trunks the wild rabbits danced with
their shadows on the velvet grass, but when they saw the Fairy they
all stopped dancing and stood round in a ring to stare at her.
"I've brought you a new playfellow," the Fairy said. "You must be very
kind to him and teach him all he needs to know in Rabbit-land, for he
is going to live with you for ever and ever!"
And she kissed the little Rabbit again and put him down on the grass.
"Run and play, little Rabbit!" she said.
But the little Rabbit sat quite still for a moment and never moved.
For when he saw all the wild rabbits dancing around him he suddenly
remembered about his hind legs, and he didn't want them to see that he
was made all in one piece. He did not know that when the Fairy kissed
him that last time she had changed him altogether. And he might have
sat there a long time, too shy to move, if just then something hadn't
tickled his nose, and before he thought what he was doing he lifted
his hind toe to scratch it.
And he found that he actually had hind legs! Instead of dingy
velveteen he had brown fur, soft and shiny, his ears twitched by
themselves, and his whiskers were so long that they brushed the grass.
He gave one leap and the joy of using those hind legs was so great
that he went springing about the turf on them, jumping sideways and
whirling round as the others did, and he grew so excited that when at
last he did stop to look for the Fairy she had gone.
He was a Real Rabbit at last, at home with the other rabbits.
At Last! At Last!
Autumn passed and Winter, and in the Spring, when the days grew warm
and sunny, the Boy went out to play in the wood behind the house. And
while he was playing, two rabbits crept out from the bracken and
peeped at him. One of them was brown all over, but the other had
strange markings under his fur, as though long ago he had been
spotted, and the spots still showed through. And about his little soft
nose and his round black eyes there was something familiar, so that
the Boy thought to himself:
"Why, he looks just like my old Bunny that was lost when I had scarlet
fever!"
But he never knew that it really was his own Bunny, come back to look
at the child who had first helped him to be Real.