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"
I've often thought," said Dorothy, who was busily eating, "that it would
be fun to be a rabbit."
"
It IS fun--when you're the genuine article," agreed his Majesty. "But
look at me now! I live in a marble palace instead of a hole in the ground.
I have all I want to eat, without the joy of hunting for it. Every day I must
dress in fine clothes and wear that horrible crown till it makes my head
ache. Rabbits come to me with all sorts of troubles, when my own
troubles are the only ones I care about. When I walk out I can't hop and
run; I must strut on my rear legs and wear an ermine robe! And the
soldiers salute me and the band plays and the other rabbits laugh and
clap their paws and cry out: 'Hail to the King!' Now let me ask you, as a
friend and a young lady of good judgment: isn't all this pomp and
foolishness enough to make a decent rabbit miserable?"
"
Once," said Dorothy, reflectively, "men were wild and unclothed and
lived in caves and hunted for food as wild beasts do. But they got
civ'lized, in time, and now they'd hate to go back to the old days."
"
That is an entirely different case," replied the King. "None of you
Humans were civilized in one lifetime. It came to you by degrees. But I
have known the forest and the free life, and that is why I resent being
civilized all at once, against my will, and being made a King with a crown
and an ermine robe. Pah!"
"
If you don't like it, why don't you resign?" she asked.
"
Impossible!" wailed the Rabbit, wiping his eyes again with his
handkerchief. "There's a beastly law in this town that forbids it. When
one is elected a King, there's no getting out of it."
"
Who made the laws?" inquired Dorothy.
"
The same Sorceress who made the town--Glinda the Good. She built
the wall, and fixed up the City, and gave us several valuable
enchantments, and made the laws. Then she invited all the pink-eyed
white rabbits of the forest to come here, after which she left us to our
fate."
"
What made you 'cept the invitation, and come here?" asked the child.
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