Why we have Chocolate Easter Eggs

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Early one morning, just as the sun was rising, Peter the rabbit was hopping down the lane with a basket of clean white eggs. Peter, concerned that his friends and neighbours would have reduced muscle mass and a compromised immune system after a long, dark winter, had taken to delivering fresh nutritious eggs to them at Easter time. A modest bunny, Peter wanted no credit for his charitable act, so to avoid embarrassing displays of gratitude he hid the eggs in and around their cottages.

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Normally Peter was a recluse, who seldom left his home on the hill. This suited the other meadow inhabitants just fine, because they thought that Peter was a little strange. For one thing, Peter, whose eyes and nose were pink and whose fur was white as the eggs he delivered, always wore a bright blue jacket when he ventured forth, but nothing else. The adults dreaded having to explain the pant-less Peter to their young. They were poor folk, however, and they did not begrudge the gift of a few free eggs each spring.

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Peter had been delivering eggs for many years and the annual search for the gleaming white ‘Easter Eggs’ had become a local tradition. Often spotted by early risers, it was an open secret that Peter was the one responsible for the annual gift, but the adults complied with his wish to remain anonymous and attributed the mysterious deliveries to ‘the Easter Bunny’.

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It was getting late on this occasion, and Peter had only a half dozen eggs left to deliver, as he made his carefree way down the lane. Heading into the rising sun, he did not see the figure that waited by the roadside, leaning against the fence, until it was too late to turn back. It was the fox!

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Now, Peter did not give eggs to everyone in the meadow. Some creatures had no problem staying fit and healthy though the long winter, the fox was one of these. Coincidentally enough, the young, old and infirm that lived within walking distance of these same citizens tended to disappear at regular intervals; and many of the fox’s neighbours had woken to find fresh tracks outside and one less mouth to feed inside. While they had their suspicions, the few that dared speak out against him tended to go the way of their snack-sized relatives … suddenly.

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Peter slowed to a halt several feet away from the fox. Despite his lack of social interaction, he had picked up on the meadow’s fear of its largest, and toothiest, member. Being several carrots short of a patch however, he just stood there in the lane, blinking in the morning sun.

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â€What ya got in the basket?â€Â The fox asked, as he struck a match on the zipper of his jeans and lit a cigarette.

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â€Eggs.â€Â Peter answered with a smile, holding it out to show him. â€Delicious, nutritious eggs.â€

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The fox glanced into the basket and grunted in acknowledgement. They certainly looked delicious, and he would take the rabbit’s word as to their nutritional value.

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â€Okay.â€Â He said indifferently. â€Hand em over.â€

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Peter just shuffled his feet indecisively.

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â€Common.â€Â The fox said impatiently. â€Give them to me.â€

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To help Peter with his decision, the fox pulled a .44 magnum Smith & Wesson Model 29 long-barrelled revolver out from under his scruffy leather jacket and pointed it between the rabbit’s eyes.

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â€Oh! You want some eggs!â€Â The rabbit’s face lit up as somewhere deep in his brain two clues rubbed together. â€You can have some, but I can’t just give them to you.â€

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Angry, but reluctant to waste an expensive bullet that might miss a vital organ if fired into the bunny’s head, the fox swiped his arm across, knocking the basket of eggs out of Peter’s paws. The eggs flew everywhere. Deftly, he plucked one of them out of the air and held it up.

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â€There, you stupid rabbit, I got one.â€

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â€But you can’t just take them.â€Â Peter said with a tolerant smile. â€You have to hide them first, silly.â€Â Fortunately, the rest of the eggs had fallen onto the soft spring grass beside the lane, and Peter started to gather them up.

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Confused by the jovial air-headed rabbit's attitude to being robbed, the fox looked around the open meadow, but it was bereft of hiding places. Just then, then, the bumbling bunny stepped in front of him and bent down to pick up one of the errant eggs. His pant-less bottom loomed just below the fox’s nose. The fox stared at Peter’s corn-hole, glanced at the tapered egg, and looked back as a smile spread across his face. He placed the muzzle of the magnum against Peter’s skull between his fuzzy ears, forcing the rabbit's head against the ground but leaving his butt elevated.

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"Don't move rabbit. I've got an idea."

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* * * * * * * *

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In the end, the fox lost his appetite for eggs. Peter cleaned them off as best he could with some wet grass and continued on to the last cottage on his route. When they were collected and assembled in the poor family’s kitchen later that morning, the parents explained the unusual colour by claiming that the eggs were chocolate; and hoped that the flavour would not be affected.

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The next year, sensing a trend, the candy maker was ready to welcome harassed parents with freshly stocked shelves some weeks before Easter. Peter, no longer trusted, was prevented from making his annual excursion by the meadow constable. The following winter, someone noticed that there was no smoke coming from his chimney after several days of freezing weather. On investigation, all they found was a house full of rotten eggs, and a few fox tracks in the snow outside.

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Peter was never seen again, except by some sharp-eyed youngsters early on Easter mornings, or so they claimed.