Tales From Watership Down (Watership Down 2)

They set off from the courtyard into the fields beyond. These were full of hundreds of animals, all different, and birds were flying overhead. To El-ahrairah it seemed a bleak, melancholy place, but naturally he said nothing of this to the King. He stopped to admire a bird with a black-spotted body and bright-red wings, tail and cheeks--a kind of woodpecker, as it seemed--which was at work on a nearby tree trunk. He asked its name.

"It's a Guadalupe Flicker," said the King. "We have only too many woodpeckers here; I wish we had not."

As they went on, more and more animals and birds appeared, many of whom spoke to the King and inquired about El-ahrairah. He saw species of lions and of tigers, and a kind of jaguar which rubbed its head against the King's leg and walked beside them for some time.

"Have you any rabbits?" asked El-ahrairah.

"Not one," replied the King. "Not yet."

At this, El-ahrairah felt deeply gratified and even triumphant, for he recalled Lord Frith's promise to him of long ago, that although he and his people should have a thousand enemies, yet they should never be destroyed. He told the King all about it.

"It is entirely by human beings that every one of my subjects has been destroyed," the King told him, as they stopped to admire and talk to a splendid grizzly bear, whose coat of light-brown fur was tipped with silver. "Some, like my Mexican friend here, the men quite deliberately shot, trapped and poisoned out of existence; but many others vanished because men destroyed their natural habitats and they couldn't adapt themselves to live elsewhere."

They were coming to a forest, whose tall trees, tangled together with creeper, actually shut out a large part of the sky. El-ahrairah felt nervous. He had had quite enough of forests for the time being. But the King, it seemed, was concerned only to watch the birds among the outer precincts. Most splendid they were, finches, honeycreepers, dark-plumaged molokai, macaws and many more, all living at peace and acknowledging their allegiance to the king.

"This forest," said the King, "is vast and grows daily. If you went in, you would soon be lost and never find your way out again. It consists of all the forest destroyed by human beings. Of late years it has grown so fast that Lord Frith has told me that he is thinking of appointing a second king to rule it." He smiled. "A king who might well be a tree himself, El-ahrairah. What would you think of that?"

"I would think that Lord Frith, in his wisdom, is justified in all his ways, Your Majesty."

The King laughed. "A very good reply. Come, we'll stroll back now. There is an assembly at sunset, and you'll be able to ask me the favor you are seeking for your people. I promise to help if I can."

They walked back by way of the river, in which the King showed El-ahrairah several fishes--New Zealand Grayling, Thicktail Chub, Blackfin Cisco and others--all of which had become extinct. Back at the courtyard, they found animals and birds already assembling, and as the sun set, the King announced that he would start the meeting.

He began by introducing El-ahrairah, telling them that he had come to the Court of Yesterday to beg for a favor which would greatly benefit the rabbits of whom he was the Chief. Then he asked El-ahrairah to take his place in the middle of all the creatures present and tell them what he had come to ask for.

El-ahrairah spoke to them about his people, of their strength and speed and cunning, and of how they lacked only one faculty to make them rivals of all other animals--namely, the Sense of Smell. When he had finished speaking, he could tell that all the birds and animals felt themselves on his side and eager to help him.

Then the King spoke. "My good friend," he said, "most brave and worthy rabbit, how gladly would I grant your request. But alas! we in this kingdom are no longer the guardians of the Sense of Smell. It is true that the Ilips gave it to us to keep many years ago, but here, in the Land of Yesterday, we were never able to put it to any use. Then one day an emissary, a gazelle, came to us from the King of Tomorrow, requesting us to lend them the Sense of Smell. They would return it soon, the gazelle promised. So we gave it to him to take back to their King. But you know how it often is with things that are lent: they don't get returned. Having no use for it here, we forgot all about it; and so, I dare say, have they. It must still be at the court of the King of Tomorrow, and I can only advise you, friend rabbit, to seek it there. I am very sorry to disappoint you."

"Is it far?" asked El-ahrairah. He was thinking that if anyone else referred him elsewhere he would explode with frustration; yet what could he do?

"I fear it certainly is far," replied the King. "It must be many days' journey for a rabbit. Dangerous too."

"Your Majesty," cried a brindled, heavy-muzzled gray wolf. "I will carry him there on my back. It will be no distance for me."

El-ahrairah gladly accepted the offer, and that very night they set out together, for the Kenai wolf told him that he preferred traveling by night and sleeping by day.

They traveled for three nights; a long way, but El-ahrairah saw little of the countries through which they passed, because of the all-surrounding darkness. The wolf told him that his people had once been among the largest of all wolves. They had inhabited a place called the Kenai Peninsula, in a bitterly cold country far away, where they had lived by hunting a huge kind of deer called "moose." "But the human beings killed us all," he said.

As dawn was about to break at the end of their third night together, the wolf put El-ahrairah gently down and said, "I can take you no further, friend rabbit. I'm extinct, you see, so I can't go into the Land of Tomorrow. You'll have to ask your way to the King's court from here. Good luck! I hope all goes well and that they give you what you are seeking so bravely."

So El-ahrairah entered the Land of Tomorrow and began asking the way to the King's court. He asked raccoons, chipmunks, groundhogs and many more. All were friendly and helpful, and his journey was easy enough. At length, one morning, he heard in the distance an alarming clamor, as though all the animals in the world were fighting together.

"Whatever is all that noise?" he asked a koala bear perched in a nearby tree.

"That, cobber? Oh, that's only a meeting at the King's court," answered the koala. "Noisy lot, aren't they? You soon get used to it, though. Some are a bit ocker, but they're nearly all quite harmless."

El-ahrairah went on until he came to two great ornamental gates, all of gold, set in a hedge of copper-leaved prunus in white bloom. As he was looking through the gates at the garden beyond, a peacock, its tail fully spread, came up and asked him what he wanted. El-ahrairah replied that he had made a long and dangerous journey to seek an audience of the King.

"I'll let you in with pleasure," said the peacock, "but you'll find it hard to get near the King and talk to him. There are thousands of creatures all trying to do that. The King holds a meeting every day. Today's will be starting quite soon now. You'd better go in and try your luck." And he swung open one of the gates.

Going into the gardens, El-ahrairah found himself pressed among a crowd of animals, birds and reptiles, all chattering together and all determined to speak with the King if they could. He felt dispirited, for he could not imagine how he could possibly manage to get to the King in competition with a throng like this. As well as he could, he made his way through them to the further side.

Here he found a long, grassy field, which sloped

smoothly down to a flat lawn at the bottom. A few animals were already gathering together on the slope, and El-ahrairah asked a passing bobcat what was going to happen.

"Why, the King will be coming soon," answered the bobcat, "to hear the requests of animals who petition him."