oing?" Johnnie Green asked his father one
evening. He pointed to a long line of big black birds that straggled
across the sky. They came from across the valley. And they were
travelling fast toward the pine woods near the foot of Blue Mountain.
"They seem to be in a hurry," said Johnnie Green.

His father took one look at the procession and laughed.

"They're going to a crow caucus, I guess," he answered.

And then Johnnie wanted to know what a caucus was. He asked so many other
questions, too, that Farmer Green didn't succeed in answering them all
until they had almost finished their supper.

Now, it was the custom of old Mr. Crow and many of his dusky friends to
gather at sunset in the pine woods and hold a _meeting_. That was what
Farmer Green meant when he said they were going to a _caucus_. And if he
could have been there himself he would have been astonished at the things
he would have heard.

But for some reason he was never invited to attend one of those twilight
meetings. Perhaps it was because disagreeable remarks were sometimes made
about Farmer Green!

On that evening when Johnnie noticed the flight of Mr. Crow's cronies
toward the woods something happened at the meeting that displeased that
old gentleman. Being the biggest--as well as the oldest--crow in the
neighborhood, for years past he had called every such meeting to order.
And he had always done most of the talking, too.

But old Mr. Crow was late that night. When he reached the pine woods he
found that a stranger had taken his accustomed seat in a great tree and
was already addressing the gathering in a loud and commanding voice.

And nobody paid any attention to old Mr. Crow. Nobody made room for him.
He had to take a back seat on a limb that was crowded with boisterous
young fellows, who kept pushing and poking one another. It was most
annoying.

"Who's that person that's so fond of hearing himself talk?" Mr. Crow
asked someone in the next tree. He spoke in such a loud voice that
everybody could hear him. And the stranger cried out sharply:

"Silence!"

Thereupon everyone looked around at Mr. Crow and frowned.

He felt both angry and uncomfortable. And for a little while he sat as
still as he could and listened to the stranger's remarks.

Now, the newcomer was talking about the hard times. He said that there
weren't as many grasshoppers as usual that year, and that Farmer Green
had put tar on his corn before he planted it and that th