Ducks are hidden and feeding there, and then when we go to join
them, we are shot at! You ought to be mighty thankful, Peter Rabbit,
that you are not a Duck."

"I am," replied Peter. He knew that not one of the meadow and forest
people who were always trying to catch him would do a thing like
that.

"It's all true," said Mrs. Quack, "and those hunters do other things
just as unfair. Sometimes awful storms will come up, and we just
have to find places where we can rest. Those hunters will hide
near those places and shoot at us when we are so tired that we can
hardly move a wing. It wouldn't be so bad if a hunter would be
satisfied to kill just one Duck, just as Reddy Fox is, but he seems
to want to kill EVERY Duck. Foxes and Hawks and Owls catch a good
many young Ducks, just as they do young Rabbits, but you know how
we feel about that. They only hunt when they are hungry, and they
hunt fairly. When, they have got enough to make a dinner, they stop.
They keep our wits sharp. If we do not keep out of their way, it
is our own fault. It is a kind of game--the game of life. I guess
it is Old Mother Nature's way of keeping us wide-awake and sharpening
our wits, and so making us better fitted to live.

"With these two-legged creatures with terrible guns, it is all
different. We don't have any chance at all. If they hunted us as
Reddy Fox does, tried to catch us themselves, it would be different.
But their terrible guns kill when we are a long way off, and there
isn't any way for us to know of the danger. And then, when one of
them does kill a Duck, he isn't satisfied, but keeps on killing
and killing and killing. I'm sure one would make him a dinner, if