Bambi by Felix Salten

Author:Felix Salten
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Aladdin

Chapter Eleven

AT LAST THE WILLOWS SHED their catkins. Everything was turning green, but the young leaves on the trees and bushes were still tiny. Glowing with the soft, early morning light they looked fresh and smiling like children who have just awakened from sleep.

Bambi was standing in front of a hazel bush, beating his new antlers against the wood. It was very pleasant to do that. And an absolute necessity besides, since skin and hide still covered his splendid antlers. The skin had to come off, of course, and no sensible creature would ever wait until it split of its own accord. Bambi pounded his antlers till the skin split and long strips of it dangled about his ears. As he pounded on the hazel stems again and again, he felt how much stronger his antlers were than the wood. This feeling shot through him in a rush of power and pride. He beat more fiercely on the hazel bush and tore its bark into long pieces. The white body of the tree showed naked and quickly turned a rusty red in the open air. But Bambi paid no attention to that. He saw the bright wood of the tree flash under his strokes and it heartened him. A whole row of hazel bushes bore traces of his work.

“Well, you are nearly grown now,” said a cheerful voice close by.

Bambi tossed his head and looked around him. There sat the squirrel observing him in a friendly way. From overhead came a short, shrill laugh, “Ha! Ha!”

Bambi and the squirrel were both half frightened. But the woodpecker who was clinging to an oak trunk called down, “Excuse me, but I always have to laugh when I see you deer acting like that.”

“What is there to laugh at?” asked Bambi politely.

“Oh!” said the woodpecker, “you go at things in such a wrongheaded way. In the first place, you ought to try big trees, for you can’t get anything out of those little wisps of hazel stalks.”

“What should I get out of them?” Bambi asked.

“Bugs,” said the woodpecker with a laugh. “Bugs and grubs. Look, do like this.” He drummed on the oak trunk, tack! tack! tack! tack!

The squirrel rushed up and scolded him. “What are you talking about?” he said. “The Prince isn’t looking for bugs and grubs.”

“Why not?” said the woodpecker in high glee. “They taste fine.” He bit a bug in half, swallowed it and began drumming again.

“You don’t understand,” the squirrel went on scolding. “A noble lord like that has far other, far higher aims. You’re only casting reflection on yourself by such talk.”

“It’s all the same to me,” answered the woodpecker. “A fig for higher aims,” he cried cheerfully and fluttered away. The squirrel bustled down again.

“Don’t you remember me?” he said, putting on a pleased expression.

“Very well,” answered Bambi in a friendly way. “Do you live up there?” he asked, pointing to the oak.

The squirrel looked at him good-humoredly.

“You’re mixing me up with my grandmother,” he said. “I knew you were mixing me up with her.

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