They stared at him, and the little Rabbit stared back. And all the time their noses twitched.  
"Why don't you get up and play with us?" one of them asked.
 
"I don't feel like it," said the Rabbit, for he didn't want to explain that he had no clockwork.
 
"Ho!" said the furry rabbit. "It's as easy as anything," And he gave a big hop sideways and stood on his hind legs.
 
"I don't believe you can!" he said.
 
"I can!" said the little Rabbit. "I can jump higher than anything!" He meant when the Boy threw him, but of course he didn't want to say so.
 
"Can you hop on your hind legs?" asked the furry rabbit.
 
That was a dreadful question, for the Velveteen Rabbit had no hind legs at all! The back of him was made all in one piece, like a pincushion. He sat still in the bracken, and hoped that the other rabbits wouldn't notice.
 
"I don't want to!" he said again.
 
But the wild rabbits have very sharp eyes. And this one stretched out his neck and looked.
 
"He hasn't got any hind legs!" he called out. "Fancy a rabbit without any hind legs!" And he began to laugh.
 
"I have!" cried the little Rabbit. "I have got hind legs! I am sitting on them!"
 
"Then stretch them out and show me, like this!" said the wild rabbit. And he began to whirl round and dance, till the little Rabbit got quite dizzy.
 
"I don't like dancing," he said. "I'd rather sit still!"
 
But all the while he was longing to dance, for a funny new tickly feeling ran through him, and he felt he would give anything in the world to be able to jump about like these rabbits did.
 
The strange rabbit stopped dancing, and came quite close. He came so close this time that his long whiskers brushed the Velveteen Rabbit's ear, and then he wrinkled his nose suddenly and flattened his ears and jumped backwards.
 
"He doesn't smell right!" he exclaimed. "He isn't a rabbit at all! He isn't real!"
 
"I am Real!" said the little Rabbit. "I am Real! The Boy said so!" And he nearly began to cry.
 
Just then there was a sound of footsteps, and the Boy ran past near them, and with a stamp of feet and a flash of white tails the two strange rabbits disappeared.
 
"Come back and play with me!" called the little Rabbit. "Oh, do come back! I know I am Real!"
 
But there was no answer, only the little ants ran to and fro, and the bracken swayed gently where the two strangers had passed. The Velveteen Rabbit was all alone.
 
"Oh, dear!" he thought. "Why did they run away like that? Why couldn't they stop and talk to me?"
 
For a long time he lay very still, watching the bracken, and hoping that they would come b............