CHAPTER XX. LITTLE MISS FUZZYTAIL WHISPERS “YES”

  Love is a beautiful, wonderful thing.

   There's nothing quite like it on all the

     green earth.

 

 'Tis love in the heart teaches birdies to sing,

   And gives the wide world all its joy and

     its mirth.

                                        Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit was finding this out. Always he had been happy, for happiness had been born in him. But the happiness he had known before was nothing to the happiness that was his when he found that he loved little Miss Fuzzytail and that little Miss Fuzzytail loved him, Peter was sure that she did love him, although she wouldn't say so. But love doesn't need words, and Peter had seen it shining in the two soft, gentle eyes of little Miss Fuzzytail. So Peter was happy in spite of the trouble that Old led Thumper¹, the big, gray Rabbit who was the father of little Miss Fuzzytail, had made for him in the Old Pasture.

 

He had tried very hard, very hard indeed, to get little Miss Fuzzytail to go back with him to the dear Old Briar-patch on the Green Meadows, but in spite of all he could say she couldn't make up her mind to leave the Old Pasture, which, you know, had been her home ever since she was born. And Peter couldn't make up his mind to go back there and leave her, because—why, because he loved her so much that he felt that he could never, never be happy without her. Then, when Old Jed Thumper was hunting Peter so hard that he hardly had a chance to eat or sleep, had come Old Man Coyote the Wolf and given Old Jed Thumper such a fright that for a week he didn't dare poke² so much as his nose out of his bull-briar castle.

 

Now, although Old Man Coyote didn't know it, his terrible voice had frightened little Miss Fuzzytail almost as much as it had Old Jed Thumper. You see, she never had heard it before, She didn't even know what it was, and all that night she had crouched³ in her most secret hiding-place, shivering and shaking with fright. The next morning Peter had found her there. She hadn't slept a wink⁴, and she was still too frightened to even go look for her breakfast.

 

“Oh, Peter Rabbit, did you hear that terrible noise last night?” she cried.

 

“What noise?” asked Peter, just as if he didn't know anything about it.

 

“Why, that terrible voice!” cried little Miss Fuzzytail, and shivered at the thought of it.

 

“What was it like?” asked Peter.

 

“Oh, I can't tell you,” said little Miss Fuzzy tall, “It wasn't like anything I ever had heard before. It was something like the voice of Hooty the Owl⁵ and the voice of Dippy the Loon⁶ and the voice of a little yelping⁷ dog all in one, and it was just terrible!”

 

“Oh?” replied Peter, “you must mean the voice of my friend. Old Man Coyote. He came up here last night just to do me a good turn because I once did him a good turn.”

 

Then he told all about how Old Man Coyote had come to the Green Meadows to live, and how he was smarter than even old Granny Fox, but he didn't tell her how he himself had once been frightened almost out of a year's growth by that terrible voice, or that it was because he hadn't really believed that Old Man Coyote was his friend that had led him to leave the Old Briar-patch and come up to the Old Pasture.

 

“Is—is he fond of Rabbits?” asked little Miss Fuzzytail.

 

Peter was quite sure that he was.

 

“And do you think he'll come up here hunting again?” she asked.

 

Peter didn't know, but he suspected that he would.

 

“Oh, dear,” wailed⁸ little Miss Fuzzytail. “Now, I never, never will feel safe again!”

 

Then Peter had a happy thought. “I tell you what,” said he, “the safest place in the world for you and me is my dear Old Briar-patch, Won't you go there now?”

 

Little Miss Fuzzytail sighed and dropped a tear or two. Then she nestled up close to Peter. “Yes,” she whispered.

 

1 thumper   

n.击键声检测器；轰鸣器

参考例句：

2 poke   

n.刺，戳，袋；vt.拨开，刺，戳；vi.戳，刺，捅，搜索，伸出，行动散慢

参考例句：

• We never thought she would poke her nose into this.想不到她会插上一手。
• Don't poke fun at me.别拿我凑趣儿。

3 crouched   

v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He crouched down beside her. 他在她的旁边蹲了下来。
• The lion crouched ready to pounce. 狮子蹲下身，准备猛扑。

4 wink   

n.眨眼，使眼色，瞬间；v.眨眼，使眼色，闪烁

参考例句：

• He tipped me the wink not to buy at that price.他眨眼暗示我按那个价格就不要买。
• The satellite disappeared in a wink.瞬息之间，那颗卫星就消失了。

5 owl   

n.猫头鹰，枭

参考例句：

• Her new glasses make her look like an owl.她的新眼镜让她看上去像只猫头鹰。
• I'm a night owl and seldom go to bed until after midnight.我睡得很晚，经常半夜后才睡觉。

6 loon   

n.狂人

参考例句：

• That guy's a real loon.那个人是个真正的疯子。
• Everyone thought he was a loon.每个人都骂他神经。

7 yelping   

v.发出短而尖的叫声( yelp的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• In the middle of the table sat a little dog, shaking its paw and yelping. 在桌子中间有一只小狗坐在那儿，抖着它的爪子，汪汪地叫。 来自辞典例句
• He saved men from drowning and you shake at a cur's yelping. 他搭救了快要溺死的人们，你呢，听到一条野狗叫唤也瑟瑟发抖。 来自互联网

8 wailed   

v.哭叫，哀号( wail的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• She wailed over her father's remains. 她对着父亲的遗体嚎啕大哭。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• The women of the town wailed over the war victims. 城里的妇女为战争的死难者们痛哭。 来自辞典例句