from the mist, and in a field dogs with their tails as stiff as cables
were busy trying to disentangle the loops so skillfully described by
the charming couple amid the mint and blades of grass.

* * * * *

Rabbit took refuge in a marl-pit over which mulberries arched, and
there he stayed crouching with his eyes wide-open until evening. Here
he sat like a king beneath the ogive of the branches; a shower of rain
had adorned them with pale-blue pearls. There he finally fell asleep.
But his dream was unquiet, not like that which should come from the
calm sleep of the sultry summer's afternoon. His was not the profound
sleep of the lizard which hardly stirs when dreaming the dream of
ancient walls; his was not the comfortable noonday sleep of the badger
who sits in his dark earthen burrow and enjoys the coolness.

The slightest sound spoke to him of danger, the danger that lies
in all things whether they move or fall or strike. A shadow moved
unexpectedly. Was it an enemy approaching? He knew that happiness can
be found in a place of refuge only when everything remains exactly the
same this moment, as it was the moment before. Hence came his love of
order, that is to say his immobility.

Why should a leaf stir on the eglantine in the blue calm of an idle
day? When the shadows of a copse move so slowly, that it seems they
are trying to stop the passage of the hours, why should they suddenly
stir? Why was there this crowd of men who, not far from his retreat,
were gathering the ears of maize in which the sun threaded pale
beads of light? His eyelids had no lashes, and so could not bear
the palpitating and dazzling light of noondays. And this alone was