The Velveteen Rabbit

Illustrated By: Sarah Frank

A soft and fluffy Velveteen Rabbit lived in a toybox in a Boy's room. Each day, the Boy opened
the toybox and picked up Velveteen Rabbit. And Velveteen Rabbit was happy.

Each night the Boy would hold Velveteen Rabbit close in his arms. In the morning, the Boy
would show Velveteen Rabbit how to make rabbit holes under the sheets. If the Boy went
outside to a picnic, or to the park, Velveteen Rabbit would come with him, too.

After awhile, with the hugging and holding, much of Velveteen Rabbit’s fur got matted down. Its
pink nose grew less pink with all the Boy’s kisses. But Velveteen Rabbit did not care. It was
happy.

One day the Boy became sick. His forehead got very hot. The doctor came and went. His
Nanny called Nana walked back and forth in fear. Day after day, the Boy stayed in bed. There
was nothing for Velveteen Rabbit to do but to stay in bed, too, day after day.

Then at last, the Boy got better. Such joy in the house! The doctor said the Boy must go to the
shore. How wonderful! thought Velveteen Rabbit. Many times the Boy had talked happily about
the shore, and told of its white sands and big blue ocean.

“What about this old bunny?” Nana asked the doctor.

“That old thing?” said the doctor. “It’s full of scarlet fever germs. Burn it at once! Get him a new
bunny.”

So Velveteen Rabbit was thrown into a sack along with the Boy's bed sheets and old clothes
and a lot of junk. The sack was carried to the backyard. The gardener was told to burn the
whole thing.

The next day when a gardener picked up the sack to take it away to be burned, Velveteen
Rabbit was not in it. Then it started to rain. Velveteen Rabbit was sad. So far away from the Boy,
never again to be nice and cozy together, and now soaking wet! A tear fell from Velveteen
Rabbit’s eye, over his cheek. It plopped onto the grass.

All at once, at the spot where the tear fell, a flower grew up. Then the bud of the flower opened.
A tiny Fairy!

“Little Rabbit,” said the Fairy. “Do you know who I am?”
“I wish I did,” said Velveteen Rabbit.
“I am the Fairy that takes care of toys that are well loved,” said the Fairy.
By then, Velveteen Rabbit was shabby and gray. The boy had loved all of its whiskers. The
pink lining in the ears had long turned gray. Its brown spots, once fresh and bright, were now
faded and hard to see.

“It is time now for me to make you Real,” said the Fairy. “When you are Real, you can move
when you want to move. If you are loved, you can love back.”

With one touch of the Fairy’s wand, Velveteen Rabbit felt different. Tickly. All of a sudden, each
one of its two legs sewn together tight, could move! A fly landed on Velveteen Rabbit’s head and
it was itchy. As quick as a wink, that foot was up at the Velveteen Rabbit’s head to scratch it off.

“So this is being Real"! “I can move when I want to move!”

“I will show you some new friends,” said the Fairy. And the Fairy took Velveteen Rabbit where
several rabbits ran and hopped about. Soon they were all great friends.

Time went by. The Boy was back from the shore. He was all better now.

One day, the Boy went to the backyard to play. From the trees nearby, a few rabbits hopped
out. One rabbit was brown all over, and another one was all white. A third rabbit had brown
spots, most of them faded. That one hopped the closest to the Boy.

The Boy thought, "Why, this rabbit looks just like my old Bunny that was lost when I was sick. I
loved that Bunny!" What he didn't know was that it was his very own Bunny, who came back to
see the boy. For he was the reason the Velveteen Rabbit had become Real.
The Mice and the Elephants
Illustrated By: Sarah Fran

Long ago in India there was an old deserted village. Empty were the old houses, streets and
shops. The windows were open, the stairs broken. Making it one very fine place for mice to run
around, you can be sure!

In fact, the mice had been happily living in this area for hundreds of years, even before the
people had come in the first place to build a village and then left. But now was the best time yet
for the mice. They made tunnels all through those fine old homes and buildings, forming great
mazes. What good times they had, with their many dinner parties and festivals, weddings and
feasts. And so time passed.

One day, a herd of elephants, numbering in the thousands, stamped through the village on their
way to a big lake in the west. All the elephants were thinking about as they marched was how
good it would be to jump in that lake for a cool swim. They did not know that as they marched
through the village, those big elephant feet were stamping down on the web of mazes and
tunnels the mice had made. What a mess the elephants left behind!

The mice quickly held a meeting.

“If the herd comes back this way again, our community is doomed!” cried one mouse.
“We won’t stand a chance!” cried another.

There was only one thing to do. A group of brave mice followed those elephant footprints all the
way to the lake. There they found the King of the Elephants. Bowing before the King, one
mouse spoke for the others and said, “O King, not far from here is our mice community. It’s in
that old deserted village you passed through. You may remember it?”

“Of course I remember it,” said the Elephant King. “We are elephants. But we did not know a
mice community was there.”

“How could you?” said this mouse. “But your herd stamped out many of the homes where we
have lived for hundreds of years. If you were to return the same way, that would surely be the
end of us! We are small and you are big. We must ask you, please. Won’t you find another way
to go home? Who knows, maybe someday we, mice, can help you, too.”

The Elephant King smiled. Imagine – how could tiny mice ever help an elephant?! But he felt
sorry his herd had crushed the village of the mice, without even knowing it. He said, “There is
no need for you to worry. I will lead the herd home in another way.”

It so happens that nearby lived a certain man who ordered his hunters to trap as many
elephants as they could. Knowing that the elephants came from far and wide to jump in the big
lake to swim, the king's hunters made a water trap there. As soon as the Elephant King and his
herd jumped into that lake they were caught in the trap, one and all.
Two days later the hunters dragged the Elephant King and his herd out of the lake with large
ropes and tied the elephants to big trees in the forest.

When the hunters had gone, the Elephant King tried to think. What could they do? They were all
tied to the trees but one elephant. She was free because she did not jump in the lake. The
Elephant King called to her. He told her that she must go back to the old deserted village and
bring back the mice who lived there.

When the mice found out the trouble that the Elephant King and his herd were in, they raced
over to the lake. Seeing the King and his herd tied up, they quickly ran over to the ropes and
began chewing.

They chewed and chewed as quickly as they could. Soon, the ropes were chewed all the way
through and the mice set their large friends free. The elephant herd found a new way home and
the mice community lived on for many years to come.