"Say good-by to him then," said Mr. Crow, "for you'll never see him
again."

"What do you mean?" Grandaddy Beaver asked. And as for Brownie--he was
so frightened that he dropped his basket right in the water.

"I mean----" said Mr. Crow--"I mean that it's a very dangerous errand.
You don't seem to have understood that sign. In the first place, it
was not Farmer Green, but his son Johnnie, who nailed It to the tree."

"Ah!" Brownie Beaver cried. "_That_ is why one of the words was
misspelled!"

"No doubt!" Mr. Crow remarked. As a matter of fact, not being able to
read he hadn't known about the word that was spelled wrong. "In the
second place," he continued, "the sign doesn't mean that hunting and
fishing are to be stopped. It means that no one but Johnnie Green is
going to hunt and fish in this neighborhood. He wants all the hunting
and fishing for himself. That's why he put up that sign. And instead
of hunting and fishing being stopped, I should say that they were
going to begin to be more dangerous than ever.... They tell me," he
added, "that Johnnie Green had a new gun on this birthday."

Brownie Beaver said at once that he was not going on the errand of
thanks.

"I resign," he said, "and anyone that wants to go in my place is
welcome to do so."

But nobody cared to go. And the whole village seemed greatly