hunting is something I cannot
understand at all. And yet that is what men seem to do it for.
I guess the trouble is they never have been hunted themselves and
don't know how it feels. Sometimes I think I'll hunt one some day
just to teach him a lesson. What are you laughing at, Peter?"

"At the idea of you hunting a man," replied Peter. "Your heart
is all right, Lightfoot, but you are too timid and gentle to
frighten any one. Big as you are I wouldn't fear you."

With a single swift bound Lightfoot sprang out in front of
Peter. He stamped his sharp hoofs, lowered his handsome head
until the sharp points of his antlers, which people call horns,
pointed straight at Peter, lifted the hair along the back of
his neck, and made a motion as if to plunge at him. His eyes,
which Peter had always thought so soft and gentle, seemed to
flash fire.

"Oh!" cried Peter in a faint, frightened-sounding voice and
leaped to one side before it entered his foolish little head that
Lightfoot was just pretending.

Lightfoot chuckled. "Did you say I couldn't frighten any one?"
he demanded.

"I--I didn't know you could look so terribly fierce," stammered
Peter. "Those antlers look really dangerous when you point them
that way. Why--why--what is that hanging to them? It looks
like bits of old fur. Have you been tearing somebody's coat,
Lightfoot?" Peter's eyes were wide with wonder and suspicion.

CHAPTER II: Lightfoot's New Antlers

Peter Rabbit was puzzled. He stared at Lightfoot the Deer a wee
bit suspiciously. "Have you been tearing somebody's coat?" he
asked again. He didn't like to think it of Lightfoot, whom he
always had believed quite as gentle, harmless, and timid as
himself. But what else could he think?

Lightfoot slowly shook his head. "No," said he, "I haven't torn
anybody's coat."

"Then what are those rags hanging on your antlers?" demanded
Peter.

Lightfoot chuckled. "They are what is left of the coverings of my
new antlers," he explained.

"What's that? What do you mean by new antlers?" Peter was sitting
up very straight, with his eyes fixed on Lightfoot's antlers as
though he never had seen them before.

"Just what I said," retorted Lightfoot. "What do you think of
them? I think they are the finest antlers I've ever had. When I
get the rest of those rags off, they will be as handsome a set as
ever was grown in the Green Forest."

Lightfoot rubbed his antlers against the trun