babies for their cousins I cannot understand. Now mine are beautiful,
while--"

"Chug-arum!" interrupted the great deep voice of Grandfather Frog. "What
are you talking about? Why, your babies are no more to be compared with my
babies for real beauty than nothing at all! I'll leave it to Peter if they
are."

But Peter wisely held his tongue. To tell the truth, he couldn't see beauty
in any of them. To him they were all just wriggling pollywogs. They were
more interesting now, because he had found out that some of them were Toads
and some were Frogs, and he hadn't known before that baby Toads begin life
as tadpoles, but he had no intention of being drawn into the dispute now
waxing furious between Grandfather Frog and Old Mr. Toad.




IX


THE SMILING POOL KINDERGARTEN

Play a little, learn a little, grow a little too;
That's what every pollywoggy tries his best to do.

Of course. That's what a kindergarten is for. And you may be sure that the
babies of Grandfather Frog and Old Mr. Toad and Stickytoes the Tree Toad
did all of these things in the kindergarten of the Smiling Pool. They
looked considerably alike, did these little cousins, for they were all