At the tiniest sound he starts
nervously and often darts back into hiding without waiting to find
out if there really is any danger. If he waited to make sure he
might wait too long, and it is better to be safe than sorry. If you
and I had as many real frights in a year, not to mention false frights,
as Whitefoot has in a day, we would, I suspect, lose our minds.
Certainly we would be the most unhappy people in all the Great World.
But Whitefoot isn't unhappy. Not a bit of it. He is a very happy
little fellow. There is a great deal of wisdom in that pretty
little head of his. There is more real sense in it than in some
very big heads. When some of his neighbors make fun of him for
being so very, very timid he doesn't try to pretend that he isn't
afraid. He doesn't get angry. He simply says:
"Of course I'm timid, very timid indeed. I'm afraid of almost
everything. I would be foolish not to be. It is because I am
afraid that I am alive and happy right now. I hope I shall never
be less timid than I am now, for it would mean that sooner or
later I would fail to run in time and would be gobbled up. It
isn't cowardly to be timid when there is danger all around. Nor
is it bravery to take a foolish and needless risk. So I seldom
go far from home. It isn't safe for me, and I know it."
This being the way Whitefoot looked at matters, you can guess how
he felt when Chatterer the Red Squirrel caught sight of him and
gave him Old Mother Nature's message.
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