and enjoy a little quiet and peace, Grandfather Frog did so.

"Chug-a-rum!" he began, as he always does. "The
great-great-ever-so-great grandfather of Old Man Coyote, who lived
long, long ago when the world was young, was very much as Old Man
Coyote is to-day. He was just as smart and just as clever. Indeed, he
was smart enough and clever enough not to let his neighbors know that
he was smart and clever at all. Those were very peaceful times at
first, and everybody was on the best of terms with everybody else, as
you know. There was plenty to eat without the trouble to steal, and
everybody was honest simply because it was easier to be honest than it
was to be dishonest. So Old King Bear ruled in the Green Forest, and
everybody was happy and contented.

"But there came a time when food was scarce, and it was no longer
easy to get plenty to eat. It was then that the stronger began to
steal from the weaker, and by and by even to prey upon those smaller
than themselves. The times grew harder and harder, and because hunger
is a hard and cruel master, it made the larger and stronger people
hard and cruel, too. Some of them it made very sly and cunning, like
old Mr. Fox. Mr. Coyote was another whom it made sly and cunning. He
was smart in the first place, even smarter than Mr. Fox, and he very
early made up his mind that if he would live, it must be by his wits,
for he wasn't big enough or strong enough to fight with his neighbors
such as his big cousin, Mr. Timber Wolf, or Mr. Lynx, or Mr. Panther
or Old King Bear, who was king no longer. And yet he liked the same
things to eat.

"So he used to study and plan how he could outwit them without danger
to himself. 'A whole skin is better than a full stomach, but both a