In this passage, Hazel, having discovered that the Efrafans have come to Watership Down to start a battle, approaches Woundwort before the fighting begins and tries to create a peace between their warrens. Woundwort, not realizing that the small, lame Hazel is the warren’s Chief, dismisses his request out of hand. Woundwort, having already lost to the Watership Down rabbits once, is desperate to show his people that he can beat them once and for all as a way of regaining clout and power over them. The only way he knows how is to enact violence upon another tribe—and he…