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Several months ago, over coffee in a Cambridge café, a colleague and I were debating the ethical implications of Father Rabbit’s ‘accident’ in Mr McGregor’s garden. (As you may remember, he was put in a pie by Mrs McGregor.) A palpable silence revealed that our conversation was being monitored by the couple seated nearby. At length, leaning towards us, one of them broke in. It was a greyhaired lady who politely confided that, although
she was not normally in the habit of listening in on other people’s private conversations, she had not been able to resist once she recognised our topic because all the years of her life she had strenuously avoided tasting camomile tea! This, she explained, was due to the fact that she had always supposed Mrs Rabbit had given camomile tea to Peter as a punishment for his disobedience in going into Mr McGregor’s garden. Unlike his better-behaved siblings, he had not received any bread, milk or blackberries. All he got was camomile tea. If, her little girl-self had reasoned, camomile tea was a punishment, it must be a disagreeable substance. Recently, however, she had taken a sip and, to her surprise, found its taste both distinctive and delicious. This discovery had prompted her entry into our conversation. Listening to us, she reflected that the change in her perception of camomile tea might necessitate a full-scale revision of her lifetime reading of The Tale of Peter Rabbit. The good taste of the tea might require a radical change in her understanding of its import and, particularly, a change in her sense of the character of Mother Rabbit. Was, in fact, the camomile tea given Peter by his mother actually a punishment (as she had presumed), or was it a soothing remedy administered to calm him down and settle his stomach after he had been frightened and had consumed so many lettuces, French beans, and radishes? Was Mother Rabbit’s behaviour disciplinary and depriving or kind and r