To the most beautiful of our four-footed friends in the green forest with the hope that this little volume may in some degree aid in the protection of the innocent and helpless...

Peter Rabbit was on his way back from the pond of Paddy the Beaver deep in the Green Forest. He had just seen Mr. and Mrs. Quack start toward the Big River for a brief visit before leaving on their lo...

Peter Rabbit was on his way back from the pond of Paddy the Beaver deep in the Green Forest. He had just seen Mr. and Mrs. Quack start toward the Big River for a brief visit before leaving on their lo...

Peter Rabbit was puzzled. He stared at Lightfoot the Deer a wee bit suspiciously. “Have you been tearing somebody’s coat?” he asked again. He didn’t like to think it of Lightfoot, whom he always had b...

It is hard to believe what seems impossible. And yet what seems impossible to you may be a very commonplace matter to someone else. So it does not do to say that a thing cannot be possible just becaus...

It is sad but true. Autumn is often called the sad time of the year, and it is the sad time. But it shouldn’t be. Old Mother Nature never intended that it should be. She meant it to be the glad time. ...

Sammy Jay is one of those who believe in the wisdom of the old saying, “Early to bed and early to rise.” Sammy needs no alarm clock to get up early in the morning. He is awake as soon as it is light e...

There was a game of hide and seek that Danny Meadow Mouse once played with Buster Bear. It was a very dreadful game for Danny. But hard as it was for Danny, it didn’t begin to be as hard as the game L...

Could you have seen the hunter with the terrible gun and Lightfoot the Deer that morning on which the hunting season opened you might have thought that Lightfoot was hunting the hunter instead of the ...

It was a dreadful game the hunter with the terrible gun and Lightfoot the Deer were playing in the Green Forest. It was a matching of wit against wit, the hunter seeking to take Lightfoot’s life, and ...

Lightfoot the Deer traveled on through the Green Forest, straight ahead in the direction from which the Merry Little Breezes were blowing. Every few steps he would raise his delicate nose and test all...

Lightfoot the Deer is smart. Yes, sir, Lightfoot the Deer is smart. He has to be, especially in the hunting season, to save his life. If he were not smart he would have been killed long ago. He never ...

It was so quiet and peaceful and altogether lovely there in the Green Forest, where Lightfoot the Deer lay resting behind a pile of brush near the top of a little hill, that it didn’t seem possible su...

Deep in the Green Forest is the pond where lives Paddy the Beaver. It is Paddy’s own pond, for he made it himself. He made it by building a dam across the Laughing Brook. When Lightfoot bounded away t...

The instant Lightfoot saw Paddy the Beaver he knew that for the time being, at least, there was no danger. He knew that Paddy is one of the shyest of all the little people of the Green Forest and that...

It was a queer partnership, that partnership between Lightfoot and Paddy, but it was a good partnership. They had been the best of friends for a long time. Paddy had always been glad to have Lightfoot...

When Paddy the Beaver slapped the water with his broad tail, making a noise like a pistol shot, Lightfoot understood that this was meant as a warning of danger. He was on his feet instantly, with eyes...

That hunter was a man of patience. Also he was a man who understood the little people of the Green Forest and the Green Meadows. He knew that if he would not be seen he must not move. So he didn’t mov...

When Reddy Fox arrived at the pond of Paddy the Beaver, the hunter who was hiding there saw him instantly. So did Lightfoot. But no one else did. He approached in that cautious, careful way that he al...

The hunter, hidden near the pond of Paddy the Beaver, chuckled silently. That is to say, he laughed without making any sound. The hunter thought the warning of Mr. and Mrs. Quack by Sammy Jay was a gr...

As soon as the angry hunter with the terrible gun had disappeared among the trees of the Green Forest, and Lightfoot was sure that he had gone for good, Lightfoot came out from his hiding-place on top...

Day after day, Lightfoot the Deer played hide and seek for his life with the hunters who were seeking to kill him. He saw them many times, though not one of them saw him. More than once a hunter passe...

Poor Lightfoot! It seemed to him that there were no such things as justice and fair play. Had it been just one hunter at a time against whom he had to match his wits it would not have been so bad. But...

The Big River was very wide. It would have been a long swim for Lightfoot had he been fresh and at his best. Strange as it may seem, Lightfoot is a splendid swimmer, despite his small, delicate feet. ...

As Lightfoot rested, trying to recover his breath, out there on the little sand bar in the Big River, his great, soft, beautiful eyes watched first one bank and then the other. On the bank he had left...

How he knew he was safe, Lightfoot the Deer couldn’t have told you. He just knew it, that was all. He couldn’t understand a word said by the man in whose yard he found himself when he climbed the bank...

If ever there was an angry hunter, it was the one who had followed Lightfoot the Deer across the Big River. When he was ordered to get off the land where Lightfoot had climbed out, he got back into hi...

All the rest of that day the hunter with the terrible gun lay hidden in the bushes of the pasture where he could watch for Lightfoot the Deer to leave the place of safety he had found. It required a l...

It isn’t often Sammy Jay worries about anybody but himself. Truth to tell, he doesn’t worry about himself very often. You see, Sammy is smart, and he knows he is smart. Under that pointed cap of his a...

The very worst things come to an end at last. No matter how bad a thing is, it cannot last forever. So it was with the hunting season for Lightfoot the Deer. There came a day when the law protected al...

It was the evening of the day after the closing of the hunting season for Lightfoot the Deer. Jolly, round, red Mr. Sun had gone to bed behind the Purple Hills, and the Black Shadows had crept out acr...

It was very mysterious. Yes, sir, it was very mysterious. Mr. Quack thought so. Mrs. Quack thought so. There, out in the Big River, in the midst of the Black Shadows, was something which looked like t...

Probably there was no happier Thanksgiving in all the Great World than the Thanksgiving of Lightfoot the Deer, when the dreadful hunting season ended and he was once more back in his beloved Green For...

Lightfoot the Deer was unhappy. It was a strange unhappiness, an unhappiness such as he had never known before. You see, he had discovered that there was a stranger in the Green Forest, a stranger of ...

Once more Lightfoot the Deer was playing hide and seek in the Green Forest. But it was a very different game from the one he had played just a short time before. You remember that then it had been for...

The game of hide and seek between Lightfoot the Deer and the beautiful stranger whose dainty footprints had first started Lightfoot to seeking her had been going on for several days and nights when Li...

In his search for the new stranger who had come to the Green Forest, Lightfoot the Deer was wholly reckless. He no longer stole like a gray shadow from thicket to thicket as he had done when searching...

Sammy Jay was bubbling over with excitement as he flew about through the Green Forest, following Lightfoot the Deer. He was so excited he wanted to scream. But he didn’t. He kept his tongue still. You...

Down from the top of the ridge back of the pond of Paddy the Beaver plunged Lightfoot the Deer, his eyes blazing with rage. He had understood the screaming of Sammy Jay. He knew that somewhere down th...

As Lightfoot the Deer and the big stranger from the Great Mountain fought in the little opening near the pond of Paddy the Beaver, neither knew or cared who saw them. Each was filled fully with rage a...

Wonderfully handsome was Lightfoot the Deer as he stood in the little opening by the pond of Paddy the Beaver, his head thrown back proudly, as he received the congratulations of his neighbors of the ...

These were happy days in the Green Forest. At least, they were happy for Lightfoot the Deer. They were the happiest days he had ever known. You see, he had won beautiful, slender, young Miss Daintyfoo...

Blacky the Crow is always watching for things not intended for his sharp eyes. The result is that he gets into no end of trouble which he could avoid. In this respect he is just like his cousin, Sammy...

Blacky the Crow is always watching for things not intended for his sharp eyes. The result is that he gets into no end of trouble which he could avoid. In this respect he is just like his cousin, Sammy...

“What are you talking about?” demanded Sammy Jay, coming up just in time to hear the last part of what Blacky the Crow was mumbling to himself. “Oh nothing, Cousin, nothing at all,” replied Blacky. “I...

Two big white eggs in a tumbledown nest, and snow and ice everywhere! Did ever anybody hear of such a thing before? “Wouldn’t believe it, if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes,” muttered Blacky the Cro...

Now when Blacky the Crow discovered that the eggs in the old tumbledown nest of Redtail the Hawk in a lonesome corner of the Green Forest belonged to Hooty the Owl, he straightway made the best of res...

They know that there is mischief afoot, and the Crow family is always ready for mischief. So on this particular morning when they heard Blacky cawing at the top of his lungs from the tallest pine-tree...

If Blacky the Crow didn’t say this to himself, he thought it. He knew that he had made a very cunning plan to get the eggs of Hooty the Owl, a plan so shrewd and cunning that no one else in the Green ...

People who succeed are those who do not give up because they fail the first time they try. They are the ones who, as soon as one plan fails, get busy right away and think of another plan and try that....

No one can live just for self alone. A lot of people think they can, but they are very much mistaken. They are making one of the greatest mistakes in the world. Every teeny, weeny act, no matter what ...

“Such luck!” grumbled Blacky, as he flew over to his favorite tree to do a little thinking. “Such luck! Now all my neighbors know about the nest of Hooty the Owl, and sooner or later one of them will ...

Farmer Brown’s boy had taken it into his head to visit the Green Forest. It was partly because he hadn’t anything else to do, and it was partly because now that it was very near the end of winter he w...

When a bird is found sitting on a nest, it is a pretty sure sign that that nest holds something worth while. It is a sign that that bird has set up housekeeping. So when Farmer Brown’s boy discovered ...

There isn’t any halfway about it. A thing is wrong or it is right, and that is all there is to it. But most people have hard work to see this when they want very much to do a thing that the still smal...

Blacky The Crow isn’t all black. No, indeed. His coat is black, and sometimes it seems as if his heart is all black, but this isn’t so. It certainly seemed as if his heart was all black when he tried ...

“Caw, caw, caw, caw.” There was no need of looking to see who that was. Peter Rabbit knew without looking. Mrs. Quack knew without looking. Just the same, both looked up. Just alighting in the top of ...

Blacky the Crow is a shrewd fellow. He is one of the smartest and shrewdest of all the little people in the Green Forest and on the Green Meadows. Everybody knows it. And because of this, all his neig...

After his discovery that Old Mother Nature had wrapped all the ears of corn in extra thick husks, Blacky had no doubt in his own mind that Johnny Chuck and Jerry Muskrat and Paddy the Beaver and the Q...

Blacky the Crow may be right. Again he may not be. If he is right, it will account for a lot of the queer people in the world. They are not understood, and so they are queer. At least, that is what ot...

That is one of Blacky’s wise sayings, and he lives up to it. It is one reason why he has come to be regarded by all his neighbors as one of the smartest of all who live in the Green Forest and on the ...

One of the secrets of Blacky’s success in life is the fact that he never fails to take note of little things. Long ago he learned that little things which in themselves seem harmless and not worth not...

Every day for a week a man came in a boat to scatter corn in the rushes at a certain point along the bank of the Big River, and every day Blacky the Crow watched him and shook his black head and talke...

It was late in the afternoon, and Blacky the Crow was on his way to the Green Forest. As usual, he went around by the Big River to see if that man was scattering corn for the Ducks. He wasn’t there. N...

Blacky sat in the top of a tree near the bank of the Big River and couldn’t make up his mind what to do. He wanted to get home to the big, thick hemlock-tree in the Green Forest before dusk, for Black...

Blacky awoke in the best of spirits. Late the afternoon before he had saved Dusky the Black Duck and his flock from a hunter with a terrible gun. He wasn’t quite sure whether he was most happy in havi...

Farmer Brown’s boy sat on the bank of the Big River in a brown study. That means that he was thinking very hard. Blacky the Crow sat in the top of a tall tree a short distance away and watched him. Bl...

Blacky the Crow was in the top of his favorite tree over near the Big River early this afternoon. He didn’t know what was going to happen, but he felt in his bones that something was, and he meant to ...

The hunter who had come down the Big River in a boat and landed near the place where Dusky the Black Duck and his flock had found nice yellow corn scattered in the rushes night after night saw Blacky ...

Blacky The Crow didn’t know what to think. He couldn’t make himself believe that Farmer Brown’s boy had really turned hunter, yet what else could he believe? Hadn’t he with his own eyes seen Farmer Br...

Every morning Blacky the Crow visited the rushes along the shore of the Big River, hoping to find Dusky the Black Duck. He was anxious, was Blacky. He feared that Dusky or some of his flock had been k...

Blacky is fond of eggs, as you know. In this he is a great deal like other people, Farmer Brown’s boy for instance. But as Blacky cannot keep hens, as Farmer Brown’s boy does, he is obliged to steal e...

If out of sight, then out of mind. This is a saying which you often hear. It may be true sometimes, but it is very far from true at other times. Take the case of Blacky. He had had only a glance into ...

All of which is pure nonsense. Of course. Who ever heard of an egg either behaving or misbehaving? Nobody. That is, nobody that I know, unless it be Blacky. It is best not to mention eggs in Blacky’s ...

Blacky was puzzled. He didn’t know what to make of that egg he had stolen from Farmer Brown’s henhouse. It wasn’t like any egg he ever had seen or even heard of. It was a beautiful-looking egg, and he...

In all his short life Whitefoot the Wood Mouse never had spent such a happy winter. Whitefoot is one of those wise little people who never allow unpleasant things of the past to spoil their present ha...

In all his short life Whitefoot the Wood Mouse never had spent such a happy winter. Whitefoot is one of those wise little people who never allow unpleasant things of the past to spoil their present ha...

Whitefoot had spent the winter undisturbed in Farmer Brown’s sugar-house. He had almost forgotten the meaning of fear. He had come to look on that sugar-house as belonging to him. It wasn’t until Farm...

It didn’t take Farmer Brown’s boy long to discover that Whitefoot the Wood Mouse was living in the little sugar-house. He caught glimpses of Whitefoot peeping out at him. Now Farmer Brown’s boy is wis...

I know of nothing that is more sad than to feel that a friend is no longer to be trusted. There came a time when Whitefoot the Wood Mouse almost had this feeling. It was a very, very anxious time for ...

The next time you meet him just ask Whitefoot if this isn’t so. Things had been going very wrong for Whitefoot. It had begun to look to Whitefoot as if he would no longer have a snug, hidden little ho...

Whitefoot once more was happy. When he found his snug little nest and his store of food under that old box in the darkest corner of Farmer Brown’s sugar-house, he knew that Farmer Brown’s boy must hav...

Whitefoot had been in many tight places. Yes, indeed, Whitefoot had been in many tight places. He had had narrow escapes of all kinds. But never had he felt so utterly hopeless as now. The moment he l...

When Whitefoot made the heedless jump that landed him in a pail half filled with sap, no one else was in the little sugar-house. Whitefoot was quite alone. You see, Farmer Brown and Farmer Brown’s boy...

Jumper the Hare sat crouched at the foot of a tree in the Green Forest. Had you happened along there, you would not have seen him. At least, I doubt if you would. If you had seen him, you probably wou...

Jumper the Hare crouched at the foot of a tree in the Green Forest, and a little way from him on a stump sat Whitey the Snowy Owl. Had you been there to see them, both would have appeared as white as ...

Jumper the Hare was beginning to feel easier in his mind. He was no longer shaking inside. In fact, he was beginning to feel quite safe. There he was in plain sight of Whitey the Snowy Owl, sitting mo...

Was ever anyone in a worse position than Jumper the Hare? To move would be to give himself away to Whitey the Snowy Owl. If he remained where he was very likely Shadow the Weasel would find him, and t...

When Whitefoot had discovered Whitey the Snowy Owl, he had dodged down in the little hole in the snow beside which he had been sitting. He had not been badly frightened. But he was somewhat upset. Yes...

Shadow the Weasel believes in persistence. When he sets out to do a thing, he keeps at it until it is done or he knows for a certainty it cannot be done. He is not easily discouraged. This is one reas...

Whitefoot the Wood Mouse was terribly frightened. Yes, sir, he was terribly frightened. It was a long, long time since he had been as frightened as he now was. He is used to frights, is Whitefoot. He ...

Whitefoot kept on going and going. Every time he thought that he was so tired he must stop, he would think of Shadow the Weasel and then go on again. By and by he became so tired that not even the tho...

Whitefoot, halfway up that dead tree, flattened himself against the trunk and, with his heart going pit-a-pat, pit-a-pat with fright, peered around the tree at an enemy he had not seen for so long tha...

If ever anybody in the Great World felt relief and thankfulness, it was Whitefoot when he dodged into that hole in the dead tree just as Butcher the Shrike all but caught him. For a few minutes he did...

Curled up in his splendid warm bed, Timmy the Flying Squirrel slept peacefully. He didn’t know he had a visitor. He didn’t know that on top of that same bed lay Whitefoot the Wood Mouse. Whitefoot was...

Whitefoot didn’t wait to be told twice of that empty house. He thanked Timmy and then scampered over to that stub as fast as his legs would take him. Up the stub he climbed, and near the top he found ...

Whitefoot was beginning to feel quite at home. He would have been wholly contented but for one thing⁠—he had no well-filled storehouse. This meant that each day he must hunt for his food. It wasn’t th...

Occasionally Timmy the Flying Squirrel came over to visit Whitefoot. If Whitefoot was in his house he always knew when Timmy arrived. He would hear a soft thump down near the bottom of the tall stub. ...

One night of his life Whitefoot will never forget so long as he lives. Even now it makes him shiver just to think of it. Yes, sir, he shivers even now whenever he thinks of that night. The Black Shado...

Whitefoot the Wood Mouse should have been happy, but he wasn’t. Winter had gone and sweet Mistress Spring had brought joy to all the Green Forest. Everyone was happy, Whitefoot no less so than his nei...

Of all the little people of the Green Forest Whitefoot seemed to be the only one who was unhappy. And because he didn’t know why he felt so he became day by day more unhappy. Perhaps I should say that...

It was a wonderful game of hide-and-seek that Whitefoot the Wood Mouse was playing in the dusk of early evening. Whitefoot was “it” all the time. That is, he was the one who had to do all the hunting....

Little Miss Dainty, the most beautiful and wonderful Wood Mouse in all the Great World, according to Whitefoot, was very shy and very timid. It took Whitefoot a long time to make her believe that he r...

Whitefoot the Wood Mouse was very proud of his home. He showed it as he led Mrs. Whitefoot there. He felt sure that she would say at once that that would be the place for them to live. You remember th...

Whitefoot climbed up to the old nest of Melody the Wood Thrush over the edge of which little Mrs. Whitefoot was looking down at him. It took Whitefoot hardly a moment to get up there, for the nest was...

“There,” said Mrs. Whitefoot, as she worked a strip of white birch bark into the roof of the new home she and Whitefoot had been building out of the old home of Melody the Wood Thrush, “this finishes ...

Whitefoot was hurt. Yes, sir, Whitefoot was hurt. He was very much hurt. It wasn’t a bodily hurt; it was an inside hurt. It was a hurt that made his heart ache. And to make it worse, he couldn’t under...

One never-to-be forgotten evening Whitefoot met Mrs. Whitefoot and she invited him to come back to their home. Of course Whitefoot was delighted. “Sh-h-h,” said little Mrs. Whitefoot, as Whitefoot ent...

Have you ever wanted to be in a number of places at the same time? Then you know exactly how Peter Rabbit felt in the beautiful springtime. You see, there was so much going on everywhere all the time ...

Have you ever wanted to be in a number of places at the same time? Then you know exactly how Peter Rabbit felt in the beautiful springtime. You see, there was so much going on everywhere all the time ...

It isn’t often that Peter Rabbit has a chance to scare anyone. You know he is such a timid fellow himself that he is the one who usually gets the fright. So when he does happen to scare someone it alw...

As two frightened little cubs ran, whimpering and tumbling over each other, for the safety of the bedroom under the great windfall, Peter Rabbit thumped twice more just by way of adding to their frigh...

Not in all the Green Forest could two livelier or more mischievous little folks be found than Boxer and Woof-Woof. Boxer was just a wee bit bigger than his sister, but he was no smarter, nor was he th...

Not in all the Green Forest is there a wiser or better mother than Mrs. Bear. No one knows better than she the dangers of the Great World, or the importance of learning early in life all those things ...

When Mother Bear reached the place where grew the roots of which she was so fond, she led the twins, Boxer and Woof-Woof, over to a big tree, stood up and dug her great claws into the bark above her h...

Chatterer the Red Squirrel was indignant. He was very indignant. In fact Chatterer was angry. You know he is short-tempered and it doesn’t take a great deal to make him lose his temper. He had watched...

The best laid plans, even those of the smartest of Red Squirrels, sometimes go wrong. Chatterer’s plan had gone wrong, just about as wrong as it could go. Those provoking twins, instead of being scare...

Boxer and Woof-Woof were having the best time of their short lives. Climbing was great fun. Although this was the first time they had climbed a tree, they already felt quite at home up there where the...

This is sad but true. It is so everywhere in the Great World, and the Great World would be a much better place in which to live if it were not so. It is the desire to get even that makes much of the t...

Boxer and Woof-Woof were having no end of fun. Having chased Peter Rabbit under a pile of brush, they were now trying to catch him. It was even more fun than it had been to try to catch Chatterer the ...

Those twin cubs were very much like some boys and girls. They were like them in that they were wholly thoughtless. They were having a splendid time as they tried to catch Peter Rabbit. They hadn’t had...

When Peter darted out under the very nose of Boxer, the little Bear was so surprised that for a couple of seconds he didn’t do a thing. This was what Peter had counted on. It gave him a fair start. Th...

If ever there were two foolish-feeling little Bears, the twins of Buster Bear were those two. And they looked just as foolish as they felt. While they had been fighting, Peter Rabbit had made the most...

Boxer and Woof-Woof had begun to wonder if they and their mother were the only Bears in the Green Forest. So far they had seen no other. Then one day as they were playing about near the Laughing Brook...

Mother Bear is a very wise mother. One of the first things she taught the twins was that safety is the first and most important thing. Then she taught them that it is better to run away from possible ...

The love of a mother is wonderful beyond all things. There is nothing to compare with it. There is nothing it will not attempt to do. There is no danger it will not face. There is no sacrifice it will...

The instant they saw Mother Bear, the twins stopped bawling. Nothing could harm them now. They knew it. Mother would take care of them. Of that there wasn’t a shadow of a doubt in the minds of Boxer a...

That is why people so often cannot agree. Each sees a thing from a different point of view and so it looks different. Just take the case of Buster Bear and the twins. When Boxer and Woof-Woof looked d...

Wonderful days were these for the twins, Boxer and Woof-Woof. Every day there was something new to see or hear or taste or smell or feel. And then there had to be tucked away in each funny little head...

It wouldn’t be quite truthful to say that the twins enjoyed that first bath and swim. They didn’t. In the first place, they had gone in all over without the least intention of doing so. In fact, they ...

Wherever Mother Bear went the twins went. In the first place they were so full of life and mischief that Mother Bear didn’t dare leave them for any length of time. Then, too, it was good for them to b...

Sulky folks are not pleasant to have around. They should be put away by themselves and kept there until they are through being sulky. Now ordinarily little Bears are not sulky. It isn’t their nature t...

Boxer lay curled up in a corner of the bedroom under the great windfall, and there he sulked and sulked and sulked and tried to make himself believe he was the worst treated little Bear in all the Gre...

That is Chatterer all over. In all the Green Forest there is no one who appears to enjoy mischief so thoroughly as does Chatterer the Red Squirrel. And there is no one more ready to take a chance when...

Somehow it is easier to be brave when there are others about to see how brave you are. It is a great deal easier. To be brave when you are all alone is quite another matter. That is real bravery. And ...

More and more Black Shadows crept through the Green Forest and all around Boxer, the lone, lost little Bear, as he sat crying and wishing with all his might that he never, never had thought of running...

It seemed to Boxer, the lost little Bear, that that dreadful night would last forever; that it never would end. Of course, it didn’t last any longer than a night at that season of the year usually doe...

Having succeeded in getting his own breakfast, and a very good one at that, Boxer felt quite set up, as the saying is. He felt chesty. That is to say, he felt big, self-important, independent. For a l...

Sammy Jay happened along in the Green Forest just in time to see the meeting between Boxer and Prickly Porky the Porcupine. He saw at once that this was the first time Boxer had seen Prickly Porky, an...

The memories of little folks are short, so far as their troubles are concerned. Hardly was Boxer, the runaway little Bear, out of sight of Prickly Porky the Porcupine than his eyes, ears and nose were...

Sammy Jay had followed Boxer, for he felt sure that things were bound to happen wherever that little Bear was. So Sammy saw his meeting with Jimmy Skunk. He saw how polite Jimmy was and how very impol...

Now all the time that Boxer had been losing himself more and more and getting into more and more trouble, Mother Bear had been worrying about him, and she and his twin sister, Woof-Woof, had been ever...

Mrs. Bear is one of those mothers who believe in punishment. She believes that the cub who is never punished for wrongdoing is almost sure to grow up to be of little or no use in the Great World, prov...