HARE:  How dare you speak to me?

HEDGEHOG:  Oh, just to be neighborly.

HARE:  I shall ask you not to speak to me hereafter.  I think myself too good to notice hedgehogs.

HEDGEHOG:  Now, that is strange.

HARE:  What is strange?

HEDGEHOG:  Why, I have just said to my wife that we wouldn’t notice you.

HARE:  Wouldn’t notice me, indeed, you silly, short-legged, duck-legged thing!

HEDGEHOG:  Well, my legs are quite as good as yours, sir.

HARE:  As good as mine!  Who ever heard of such a thing?  Why, you can do little more than crawl.

HEDGEHOG:  That may be as you say, but I’ll run a race with you any day.

HARE:  Ha, ha, ha!  Ho, ho, ho!  A race with a hedgehog!  Well, well, well!

HEDGEHOG:  Are you afraid to run with me?

HARE:  Of course not.  It will be no race at all, but I’ll run just to show you how silly you are.

HEDGEHOG:  Good!  You run in that furrow; I will run in this.  We shall see who gets to the fence first.  Let’s start from the far end of the furrow.

HARE:  I will run to the brook and back while you are getting there.  Go ahead.

HEDGEHOG:  I wouldn’t stay too long if I were you.

HARE:  Oh, I’ll be back before you reach the end of the furrow.

(The hare runs off to the brook.)

II

HEDGEHOG:  Wife, wife, did you hear what I said to the hare?

WIFE:  Did I hear?  I should say I did.  What are you thinking of?  Have you lost your senses?

HEDGEHOG:  You shouldn’t speak that way to me.  What do you know about a man’s business?  Come here and let me whisper something to you.

(He whispers and then walks to far end of the furrow.  His wife laughs.)

WIFE:  Ha, ha!  I see.  I see.  Nothing wrong with your brains.

  “Short legs, long wit,
  Long legs, not a bit,”

as my grandmother used to say.  The hare will find that out today.

(She stoops down in the near end of the furrow.  The hare returns and takes his place.)

HARE:  Well, are you ready?

HEDGEHOG:  Of course I am,—­ready and waiting.

  HARE:  One for the money,
  Two for the show,
  Three to make ready,
  And here we go!

(The hare runs as swiftly as the wind.  The hedgehog starts with him, but stops and stoops low in the furrow.  When the hare reaches the other end, the hedgehog’s wife puts up her head.)

WIFE:  Well, here I am.

HARE:  What does this mean?

WIFE:  It means what it means.

HARE:  We’ll try again.  Are you ready?

WIFE:  Of course I am.

  HARE:  One for the money,
  Two for the show,
  Three to make ready,
  And here we go!

(The hare runs swiftly back again.  Wife starts, but stops and stoops low.  The hare reaches the other end.  The hedgehog puts up his head.)