It may have been Mr. Frog's words that dismayed Long Bill Wren, or it may have been his manner—or perhaps both. Anyhow, Long Bill looked frightened.

"Where can I get a fresh skin if I pull off the one I'm wearing?" he wanted to know.

"Why, there's another skin just beneath your old one," Mr. Frog informed him glibly. "Just pull hard and you'll see that I know what I'm talking about."

But Long Bill was puzzled.

"I—I don't know where to begin," he stammered.

"Maybe you need help," Mr. Frog suggested.

And Long Bill agreed that he did need help—and a good deal of it, too.

"Well," Mr. Frog said with a giggle, "I'll get old Mr. Turtle to assist me. And between us we'll have your old skin off before you know it."

He began to bellow Mr. Turtle's name at the top of his lungs. And soon the old gentleman's black head popped out of the water. And presently Mr. Turtle waddled up the bank of Black Creek and listened to Ferdinand Frog's directions.

"You take hold of Long Bill's tail," Mr. Frog ordered him, while to the frightened owner of the tail he said cheerfully, "Anything Mr. Turtle takes hold of just has to come. He never lets go until it does."

Now, Long Bill Wren had suddenly made up his mind that he wouldn't take a mud bath, after all. He didn't like the prospect of having his skin pulled off. Suppose Mr. Frog should be mistaken about that second skin, which the tailor claimed lay underneath the old one?

Long Bill believed that with no skin at all he would find his rheumatism much worse than before. And he would certainly be a queer-looking object.

So as old Mr. Turtle crawled slowly towards him, he drew away.

"I'm going to wait——" Long Bill announced.

"Why?" Mr. Frog demanded.

"Going to wait till the weather is warmer," Long Bill faltered.

Of course Mr. Frog was disappointed by having his plans so upset.

And Mr. Turtle was disappointed too.

"My mouth is open," he told Mr. Frog. "I must grab something. And it might as well be you."

But Mr. Frog jumped nimbly out of Mr. Turtle's reach. And a moment later he thrust the free end of a tree-root between Mr. Turtle's jaws.

They closed with a snap. And Mr. Turtle began to pull.

"Come on!" Mr. Frog urged Long Bill Wren. "The tree may fall at any moment. It's safer elsewhere." And without waiting to see what happened, he leaped into Black Creek and swam away.

As for Long Bill Wren, he hurried home. He knew his wife would be wondering where he was, for he had been away from the house in the reeds much longer than his usual ten minutes.

Arriving there, he was not surprised that she asked him a few questions. And he explained to her that he had been on the bank of the creek, watching old Mr. Turtle pulling at the root of a willow.

"And I can tell you that I'm well pleased that it wasn't my tail Mr. Turtle had in his jaws," he said solemnly.

Mrs. Wren shuddered at the mere mention of such an unlucky accident. And then she said: "I hope that dangerous Mr. Frog was not with you."

"I believe he was there for a time," her husband replied. "But he left before I did."

"I wish you would keep away from him," she remarked.

"I'm going to," Long Bill Wren promised. "Although Mr. Frog is our newest neighbor, I shall have nothing more to do with him."

THE END

A new and unique series about the furred and feathered little people of the wood and meadow.

Children will eagerly follow the doings of little Jack Rabbit, and the clever way in which he escapes from his three enemies, Danny Fox, Mr. Wicked Wolf and Hungry Hawk will delight the youngsters.