Tales from Watership Down (6 page)

*

As we all know (Bluebell continued), rabbits never really go to war; and certainly El-ahrairah had no need to, living his happy life on the downs, until one day, as he was basking in the sun, he got a sudden shock. Rabscuttle came tearing over the grass, and it was plain that he was bringing important news.

“Master!” panted Rabscuttle. “There are thousands of rabbits—stranger rabbits—coming. Enough to eat up the whole Down and turn us out of burrow and home. There’s only one thing for it. We must run while there’s still time.”

“I never run,” answered El-ahrairah lazily. “I must see these stranger rabbits for myself. Let them come.”

In a few moments he saw them, all right, coming up the Down in hordes. El-ahrairah had never seen so many rabbits in his life. They covered all the grass. In the middle was a huge rabbit, as big as a here, who came up to El-ahrairah and bared his teeth.

“You’re El-ahrairah, aren’t you?” said the gigantic rabbit. “You’d better get out of here while you can. This is my Down now, and my rabbits are going to live here.”

El-ahrairah looked the rabbit over. “Who are you,” he asked, “and what’s your name?”

“I’m King Fur-Rocious,” replied the rabbit, “and I’m not only lord of rabbits but of rats and weasels and stoats as well. You must hand over all your rabbits to me.”

El-ahrairah could see that if he tried to fight King Fur-Rocious he would have no hope at all, so he simply turned
round and went away, to give himself a chance to think what was best to be done. But he hadn’t gone very far when there was a pattering noise, and Rabscuttle came rushing after him.

“Oh, master!” cried Rabscuttle. “That wretched King Fur-Rocious! He’s taken your favorite doe, Nur-Rama, and says he means to keep her for himself.”

“What?” cried El-ahrairah. “Nur-Rama? I’ll take him to pieces, you see if I don’t!”

“I can’t imagine how,” replied Rabscuttle. “His rabbits are all over the Down, and he’s even got rats and weasels that he’s holding as prisoners. I’m afraid it’s a bad lookout for us, El-ahrairah.”

At this, El-ahrairah’s heart sank, for it was not at all like Rabscuttle to talk like this. He decided that the best thing he could do was to go and petition Prince Rainbow, who had told him a long time ago that he and his people were free to live on the Down and keep it for their own.

He reached Prince Rainbow soon after ni-Frith, and told him his sorry story.

“I cannot help you, El-ahrairah, I am afraid,” said Prince Rainbow, when he had heard all he had to say. “You will have to defeat this King Fur-Rocious yourself. There’s no other way.”

“But how?” asked El-ahrairah. “He has more rabbits than there are daisies on the Down, and in fact I believe they’ll soon have eaten all the grass.”

“I’ll give you a word of advice, El-ahrairah,” said Prince Rainbow. “A tyrant is usually hated by many
different kinds of people. This Fur-Rocious no doubt has other enemies, not merely rabbits. You will need friends and allies.”

On hearing this, El-ahrairah didn’t feel much confidence, but he was so angry about his beautiful doe Nur-Rama that he felt ready to do his best to beat King Fur-Rocious to pieces or die in the attempt. So off he set to make his way back to the Down.

Now, as he was marching along, he met a cat lying in the sun. The cat seemed quite harmless for a change, and El-ahrairah was just passing it by when the cat said, “Where are you going, El-ahrairah?”

“I’m going to beat the daylights out of that rotten King Fur-Rocious,” said El-ahrairah, “and make him give me back my doe.”

“Well, I’ll come with you,” said the cat. “I’ve heard of King Fur-Rocious that he often drowns kittens.”

“Jump into my ear, then,” said El-ahrairah. And the cat jumped into El-ahrairah’s ear and went to sleep, while he still went marching along.

A little further on, he met some ants.

“Where are you going, El-ahrairah?” asked the ants.

“I’m going to beat the guts out of that dirty King Fur-Rocious,” answered El-ahrairah, “and make him give me back my doe.”

“We’ll come with you,” said the ants. “That King Fur-Rocious isn’t fit to live. His rabbits dig up ants’ nests for no reason at all.”

“Well, then, jump into my ear,” said El-ahrairah. “On we go!”

So the ants jumped into El-ahrairah’s ear.

After a while, he met a couple of big, black crows.

“Where are you going, El-ahrairah?” asked the crows.

“I’m going to tackle that disgusting King Fur-Rocious,” said El-ahrairah, “and make him give me back my doe.”

“We’ll come with you,” said the crows. “We’ve heard nothing but ill of King Fur-Rocious. He’s a bully and a tyrant.”

“Well, jump into my ear,” said El-ahrairah. “I can do with the likes of you.”

Then, further on, El-ahrairah came to a stream.

“Hullo, El-ahrairah!” said the stream. “Where are you going? You do look fierce.”

“No fiercer than I feel,” said El-ahrairah. “I’m going to knock the blazes out of that stinking King Fur-Rocious and make him give me back my doe Nur-Rama.”

“I’ll come with you,” said the stream. “I’ve heard of King Fur-Rocious, and I don’t like the sound of him at all. He thinks too much of himself.”

“Well, jump into my ear,” said El-ahrairah. “No, the other one. I’m sure I’ll be glad of you.”

Soon after this, El-ahrairah got back to the Down, and there was King Fur-Rocious, surrounded by his heavy rabbits and eating El-ahrairah’s grass for all he was worth.

“Ah, El-ahrairah!” said King Fur-Rocious, with his mouth full. “I saw you off this morning, didn’t I? What brings you here again?”

“You contemptible, stinking rabbit,” said El-ahrairah. “Give me back my doe Nur-Rama and get off my Down!”

“Seize this insolent animal!” cried the King. “Seize him, and shut him up for the night with the Rabid Rats! And we shall see what’s left of him in the morning!”

So they shut El-ahrairah up with the Rabid Rats.

As soon as it was dark, El-ahrairah sang:

Out came the pussycat in a moment. The rats ran in all directions, but she was among them in a flash and chewed them up in hundreds until there wasn’t one left alive. Then she went back into El-ahrairah’s ear, and El-ahrairah went to sleep.

When morning came, King Fur-Rocious said to his rabbits, “Go and fetch the carcass of that insolent El-ahrairah and throw it out on the grass.”

But when they went in, they found El-ahrairah sitting among the dead rats, singing. “Where’s that loathsome King?” said El-ahrairah. “Tell him to give me back my doe.”

“You shan’t have her,” said the King. “Take him and shut him up with the Wildcat Weasels! Then we shall see what becomes of his insolent demands.”

So El-ahrairah was shut up with the Wildcat Weasels.

In the middle of the night, El-ahrairah sang:

Out came the crows from El-ahrairah’s ear and pecked the Wildcat Weasels all to pieces. Then they went back into his ear, and El-ahrairah went to sleep.

In the morning, the King said, “Well, those Wildcat Weasels will have finished El-ahrairah good and proper by now. You had better go and chuck out his body.”

But the tough rabbits found El-ahrairah dancing all over dead weasels and demanding his beautiful doe.

“I will not tolerate this insolence!” cried King Fur-Rocious. “We’ll make sure of that rabbit tonight. Take him and shut him up with the Savage Stoats!”

They shut El-ahrairah up with the Savage Stoats, and in the middle of the night, he sang:

Out came the swarm of ants from El-ahrairah’s ear. They crawled all over the Savage Stoats; they burrowed into their brains and stung them so fiercely that they all fell down and died.

Next morning, as before, King Fur-Rocious sent for El-ahrairah’s body. But El-ahrairah came himself and said, “You sniveling ruin of a grimy King, give me back my doe!”

“I can’t think how this wretched El-ahrairah manages all this,” thought the King. “I must find out at all costs.”

“You’re to tie that rabbit up beside my sleeping place tonight,” he said to his followers. “Then I’ll see what he’s up to and put an end to his tricks for good and all.”

So that night El-ahrairah was tied up beside King Fur-Rocious’s sleeping place. In the middle of the night, he sang:

Out came the stream, pouring out of El-ahrairah’s ear. It flooded the whole place. It flooded the King up to his neck. The King became terrified.

“Take her; take your doe!” he cried. “Go away, El-ahrairah! Only leave me in peace!”

“No,
you
go!” commanded El-ahrairah. “Release my doe. Then take your disgusting followers and leave my Down forever!”

That morning El-ahrairah was reunited with Nur-Rama, and on the Down was left neither hide nor hair of
King Fur-Rocious and his followers. That was the only war that El-ahrairah ever fought, and that is how he won it.

There was a scuffle from up one of the runs, and in a moment Buckthorn came down, his fur glistening with raindrops.

“Hazel-rah, it’s cleared up beautifully!” he said. “The rain’s stopped, and it’s going to be a fine evening.”

A few moments later there was no one left in the Honeycomb except for Bluebell, washing his back and recovering his breath after telling his story.

“Foxes,” said Dandelion, moving a little further into the evening sunshine and nibbling a sprig of burnet, “foxes are bad, I’ve always understood, if they take to living near you. We’ve never been troubled by a fox while we’ve been here thank Frith, and I hope it stays that way.”

“But they’ve got such a strong smell,” said Bigwig, “and besides, you can very often catch a glimpse of them, however cunning they are, because of the color.”

“I know. But if a fox happens to take up near a warren, that
is
bad, because it’s very difficult for the rabbits to be on the alert always, all the time.”

They say (Dandelion went on), El-ahrairah and his warren were once troubled by a fox that made an earth near them. Actually, there was a pair of foxes and they raised a litter, and as both were continually hunting for food, the
warren had no peace. It wasn’t that they actually lost many rabbits—although they did lose some—but the continual tension and fear began to get the warren down. Everyone was looking to El-ahrairah for some answer to the problem, but he seemed as much at a loss as everyone else. He said little or nothing and everyone supposed that he must be turning the matter over in his mind. But the days went by, and nothing changed for the better. The anxiety was beginning to upset the does.

And then, one morning, El-ahrairah was nowhere to be found. He had disappeared. Even Rabscuttle, his captain of Owsla, could not tell where he might have gone. When he didn’t return the next day or the next, there were rabbits who said to one another that he must have deserted them and gone to find a new warren. They felt very low about it, especially when later that day the fox killed another rabbit.

El-ahrairah had wandered away almost in a trance. He felt that he needed time and solitude to think; but even more he felt the need to find, to discover, something that would give him an answer to the warren’s terrible problem.

He spent two days on the outskirts of a village. Nothing molested him, but his mind grew no clearer. One evening, as he was lying half asleep in a ditch outside a garden, he was startled by rustling and movement nearby. It proved to be no enemy, however, but only Yona the hedgehog, hunting for food. El-ahrairah greeted him as a friend, and they talked for a while.

“It’s so hard to find the slugs, El-ahrairah,” said the hedgehog. “They seem to be fewer and fewer, especially in the autumn. I don’t know where they get to.”

“I can tell you,” said El-ahrairah. “They are in all the gardens round here, in this village. The gardens are full of vegetables and flowers and all manner of greenstuff, and that is what attracts the slugs. If you want slugs, Yona, go into the gardens of the human beings.”

“But they will kill me,” said Yona.

“No, they will not,” said El-ahrairah. “It has been made clear to me. They will welcome you, because they will know you have come to eat the slugs. They will do everything they can to encourage you to stay. You will find that I’m right.”

So Yona went into the gardens of the human beings, and there he thrived, just as El-ahrairah had said. And from that day to this, hedgehogs have frequented human gardens and been welcome.

El-ahrairah wandered on, his mind still heavy with perplexity. He left the village and soon he came to farmland, where all kinds of crops were being grown. Here, on the outskirts, he found rabbits. They were strangers to him, but they knew who he was and asked his advice.

“Look, El-ahrairah,” said their Chief Rabbit, “here’s a fine field of greenstuff, as fit to eat as ever was. But the farmer knows how clever we are. He’s surrounded it with wire and he’s buried the wire so deep in the ground that we can’t burrow under it. Look how deep our best diggers have
gone. But they haven’t been able to get under the wire. What’s to be done?”

“There’s no use in trying further,” said El-ahrairah. “You’d simply be wasting your time. Give it up.”

Just at that moment, down flew a flock of rooks. The Chief Rook alighted beside El-ahrairah and spoke to him.