“Just then out sprang Mr. Wolf with all his long, sharp teeth showing.  Mr. Gobbler gave a yelp of fright.  He lost his swelled-up appearance as suddenly as a bubble flattens out when it is pricked.  With a frantic beating of his wings he took to the air.  Being in such a fright, he didn’t see where he was going, and struck his head against a sharp twig, which tore the skin, for there were no feathers to protect it, and made it bleed.  The blood ran all over his head and down his neck, though he really was hardly hurt at all.  From the top of a tall tree he looked down.  There stood Old Mother Nature, looking up at him.

“‘Mr. Gobbler,’ said she, ’you have acquired a bad habit, a very bad habit.  Hereafter, whenever you become vain and strut, your head and neck shall become as red as they now are, as a reminder to you and all who see you of how silly it is to be vain and boastful.’

“And so it was.  And so it is with Big Tom Gobbler to this day.  There is nothing in the world more foolish than vanity,” concluded Grandfather Frog.

[Illustration:  “Don’t call me Striped Chipmunk, and don’t call me Gopher!” said he. Page 172.]

XII

WHERE SEEK-SEEK GOT HIS PRETTY COAT

Peter Rabbit never will forget the first time he saw Seek-Seek the Ground Squirrel, often wrongly called Gopher or Gopher Squirrel, but whose real name is Spermophile, which means seed eater.  Peter won’t forget that meeting, because of the funny mistake he made and the foolish feeling he had as a result of it.  You see, Peter didn’t know that there was such a person as Seek-Seek.  He was hopping along across the Green Meadows in his usual happy-go-lucky way when, right in front of him, he saw what at first he took to be a stake, a small stake, driven in the ground.  But as he drew nearer, it suddenly moved.  It wasn’t a stake at all, but a very lively small person in a striped coat who had been sitting up very straight and motionless.

“Hello, Striped Chipmunk!  What are you doing way out here so far from the old stone wall?” exclaimed Peter.

The small person in the striped coat whirled and faced Peter with snapping eyes.  “Don’t call me Striped Chipmunk, and don’t call me Gopher!” said he very fiercely for so small a person.  “I am neither one.  I am Seek-Seek the Ground Squirrel, and I’ll thank you to call me by my own name.  I am getting everlastingly tired of being called the names of other people.”

Peter looked very foolish.  “I beg your pardon,” said he.  “I do indeed.  I’m sorry.  Perhaps you don’t know it, but you look very much like Striped Chipmunk, who is one of my best friends.  You look so much like him that I thought you must be him.  I wonder if you are related to him.”

“Certainly I’m related to him, or he is related to me, whichever way you please to put it,” snapped Seek-Seek.  “We are cousins.  But he is a Rock Squirrel, and I am a Ground Squirrel which is altogether different.  You don’t find me where there are rocks and stones in the way if I know it.  Besides, if you used your eyes, you would see that we are not dressed alike either.  Just because we both happen to wear stripes is no reason why we should be mistaken for each other.”