led?" he demanded.

"It's known," Ferdinand Frog explained, "as 'A Merry Song.'"

And then the whole Frog family began to bellow their loudest:

Come let us sing a merry song!
To you it may sound sad.
And if you think it loud and long
_We_ think that it's not bad.

"We'll sing about a grumpy one
Who snaps and bites all day.
And if you call that "having fun"
We make reply, "Go 'way!"

He has a glittering, wicked eye
And also cruel jaws.
And if you ask the reason why,
We'll answer you, _"Because!"_

He'll stretch his neck and grab you quick--
Don't let him come too near!
And if you poke him with a stick
He'll seize that too--oh, dear!

Now, we'll admit he swims quite well
And that he's slow ashore.
Don't ask us if he wears a shell
Until we tell you more.

Don't ask us if he's fond of fish
Nor seek to learn his age.
And kindly don't express a wish
To see him in a rage!

Don't ask us if his claws are strong
And if he has a tail.
It might be short and blunt, or long
And pointed like a nail.

We do not want to cause you pain.
We would not give offense--
But, sir, you'll not come here again
If you have any sense.

After the last echo of the song had lost itself in the depths of Cedar
Swamp, the singers all turned, smiling, to their listener.

But his face wore no smile. On the contrary, Timothy Turtle frowned
darkly.

"You can't fool me!" he cried. "You don't like me! You don't want me
here!"

Ferdinand Frog swallowed a few times.

"Well," said he, "of course my manners are so elegant that I simply
_couldn't_ dispute one of my elders. And anyhow, Mr. Turtle, you'd find
that our singing sounded twice as well if you were half a mile away."

"It certainly couldn't sound any worse than it does here," Timothy
Turtle declared--a remark which made the Frog family grin broadly.

He said no more, but slipped into the water and struck out towards home.

There was a lively scattering of those who found themselves in Timothy
Turtle's path. And for a time it looked as if the singing party had
broken up in disorder.

But after a while everybody came back again--that is, everybody but
Timothy Turtle. He hurried away and spent most of the whole night buried
in the mud at the bottom of Black Creek. For even until daybreak that
merry song came floating now and then ac