14 Carrot Rabbit

The basic plot of 14 Carrot Rabbit takes place during the Klondike Gold Rush (1896-1899), ("where men were men and women were women....a darn good arrangement"), and centers on Yosemite Sam (here as Chilkoot Sam) who steals other people's gold. The story begins with an old man named Louie slouching over by a river to clean the gold he found in a pan. Sam suddenly appears, uses his gun and reputation to scare him away, and claims the gold. When he sees how little he has stolen from old Louie, he says "Picking's mighty slim around here, hardly no reward for a day's work," even though he did not work for it. Sam later takes the gold to a shop called "Next to Last Chance Saloon" to trade them for money. After the weigh-up, Sam is furious to find out that Pierre can offer only $10 for the gold.

While Sam complains about the result ("It's getting so a man can't earn a dishonest living!"), Bugs Bunny wobbles into the shop with another gigantic piece of gold to trade in. (Being a rabbit, he welcomes carrots in lieu of cash.) When Bugs leaves, Sam asks Pierre for the secret of Bugs' success. Pierre tells Sam that Bugs always gets a "funny feeling" when he's near gold.

With this information, Sam goes to find Bugs...whom he indeed observes get the "funny feeling". Bugs digs up a lost collar button. Sam then decides to ask Bugs to be his partner; if Bugs can locate the gold, Sam will dig it up and split it with the rabbit in a 50/50 deal. Bugs stares back at the camera and wiggles his eyebrows with a smirk, knowing that Sam cannot be trusted. Despite this, Bugs plays along...asking if he can actually afford to take Sam up on his offer. The claim-jumper advertises himself as "Square-deal Sam". They stroll along together when Bugs indicates he's found gold. Bugs points out the spot to Sam, who proceeds to dig...and abruptly dissolves his partnership with Bugs. The double-crossed Bugs notices that Sam is about to dig right through a cliff and into a lake hundreds of feet down. Sam ignores Bugs' warning (thus clearing the rabbit's conscience), digs through the cliff and plummets into the lake.

Soon afterwards, Bugs goes downhill and proceeds to dig when Sam shows up again. Sam accuses Bugs of trying to get the gold for himself (talk about calling the kettle black!); he grabs Bugs' shovel, hypocritically complaining "That's what I get for trusting a rabbit". As the thief digs ever deeper, it turns out he's in a loaded dump truck driven by Bugs! The rabbit drives his truck to a cliff and empties its load over the edge. Sam keeps digging until he finds himself on the bottom of a falling soil pile ("Great horny toads! I must've dug clean through to Chinee!"). The thief's fall is broken by hard ground.

Enraged, Sam vows to chase Bugs through every state in the Union...and literally does, until the rabbit suddenly has another "funny" moment. Sam's efforts to resist the gold-digging infatuation are in vain; he digs and indeed finds tons of gold. ("I'm a zillionaire!" he gloats.) Tragically, it turns out that Sam has been digging up the United States Gold Reserve in Fort Knox, Kentucky. He is hauled off to the stockade by a couple of Military Policemen, while Bugs bids him farewell ("See you in 20 years, Sam!"). Then a third Military Policeman asks Bugs what HE'S doing here; Bugs nervously explains that he's waiting for a streetcar. At that moment, inexplicably, an ocean liner appears on the scene (despite there being no water in the vicinity). Bugs isn't stymied, however: "In a spot like this, a boat will do!" With that, he rushes aboard to make his getaway.

• List of Bugs Bunny cartoons
• List of Yosemite Sam cartoons

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• 14 Carrot Rabbit at The Big Cartoon DataBase
• 14 Carrot Rabbit on IMDb