"Well--maybe it is," Mr. Crow replied--"the way you count. But I call
it only one because I said it all in one breath, without a single
pause."

"I hope you won't tell me the news as fast as that," said Brownie
Beaver, "for if you did I should never be able to remember one-half of
it."

But Mr. Crow promised that he would talk very slowly.

"You'll be perfectly satisfied," he told Brownie. "And now I must go
home at once, to begin gathering news."




VII

A NEWFANGLED NEWSPAPER


After Mr. Crow flew back to Pleasant Valley to gather news for him,
Brownie Beaver carefully counted each day that passed. Since Mr. Crow
had agreed to be his newspaper, and come each Saturday afternoon to
tell him everything that had happened during the week, Brownie was in
a great hurry for Saturday to arrive.

In order to make no mistake, he put aside a stick in which he gnawed a
notch each day. And in that way he knew exactly when Saturday came.