Long ago, Frith made the world. He made all the stars,
too, and the world is one of the stars. He made them by
scattering his droppings over the sky and this is why
the grass and the trees grow so thick on the world.
Frith makes the rivers flow.


They follow him as he goes through the sky,
and when he leaves the sky they look for him for
all night.


Frith made all the animals and birds, but when
he first made them they were all the same. The
sparrow and the kestrel were friends and they both
ate seeds and flies.


And the fox and the rabbit were friends and they
both ate grass. And there was plenty of grass and
plenty of flies, because the world was new and
Frith shone down bright and warm all day.


Then Frith said to El-ahrairah, 'Prince Rabbit,
if you cannot control your people, I shall find ways
to control them. So mark what I say.'


But El-ahrairah would not listen and he said to
Frith, 'My people are the strongest in the world,
for they breed faster and eat more than any of the
other people.


And this shows how much they love Lord
Frith, for of all the animals they are the most
responsive to his warmth and brightness. 'You must
realize, my lord, how important they are
and not hinder them in their beautiful lives.'


Frith could have killed El-ahrairah at once, but
he had a mind to keep him in the world, because he
needed him to sport and jest and play tricks.


So he determined to get the better of him, not by
means of his own great power but by means of a
trick. He gave out that he would hold a great
meeting and that at that meeting he wouid give a
present to every animal and bird, to make each one
different from the rest.


And all the creatures set out to go to the meeting
place. But they all arrived at different times,
because Frith made sure that it would happen so.


And when the blackbird came, he gave him his
beautiful song, and when the cow came, he gave her
sharp horns and the strength to be afraid of no other
creature. And so in their turn came the fox and the
stoat and the weasel.


And to each of them Frith gave the cunning and the
fierceness and the desire to hunt and slay and eat
the children of El-ahrairah. And so they went
away from Frith full of nothing but hunger to kill
the rabbits.


All the rabbits had heard the story before: on
winter nights, when the cold draft moved down the
warren passages and the icy wet lay in the pits of the
runs below their burrows; and on summer evenings, in
the grass under the red may and the sweet, carrion-scented
elder bloom.


Dandelion was telling it well, and even Pipkin forgot
his weariness and danger and remembered instead the great
indestructibility of the rabbits. Each one of them saw
himself as El-ahrairah, who could be impudent to Frith
and get away with it.