CHAPTER IX: Reddy Fox Hears About Granny Fox

Though you may think another wrong
And be quite positive you're right,
Don't let your temper get away;
And try at least to be polite.
- Old Granny Fox.

Sammy Jay hurried through the Green Forest, chuckling as he flew.
Sammy was brimming over with the news he had to tell, -- how
Old Granny Fox had been caught napping by Farmer Brown's boy.
Sammy wouldn't have believed it if any one had told him. No, Sir,
he wouldn't. But he had seen it with his own eyes, and it tickled
him almost to pieces to think that Old Granny Fox, whom everybody
thought so sly and clever and smart, had been caught actually asleep
by the very one of whom she was most afraid, but at whom she always
had turned up her nose.

Presently Sammy spied Reddy Fox trotting along the Lone Little Path.
Reddy was forever boasting of how smart Granny Fox was. He had
boasted of it so much that everybody was sick of hearing him.
When he saw Reddy trotting along the Lone Little Path, Sammy
chuckled harder than ever. He hid in a thick hemlock-tree and as
Reddy passed he shouted:

"Had I such a stupid old Granny
As some folks who think they are smart,
I never would boast of my Granny,
But live by myself quite apart!"