ay it was a
great secret, when everybody knew it?"

"It was a great secret," said the squirrel, "till Prince Tchack-tchack
came down here (he is the heir, you know) in a dreadful fit of temper,
and told the tomtit whom he met in the fir-tree, and the tomtit told the
woodpecker, and the woodpecker told the starling, who told his lady-love
on the chimney, and the fly heard him, and when you opened the window
the fly went out and buzzed it to everybody while you were at breakfast.
By this time it is all over the world; and I daresay even the sea-gulls,
though they live such a long way off, have heard it. Kapchack is beside
himself with rage that it should be known, and Tchack-tchack is afraid
to go near him. He made a great peck at Tchack-tchack just now."

"But why should there be so much trouble about it?" said Bevis.

"Oh," said the squirrel, "it is a very serious business, let me tell
you. It is not an ordinary falling in love, it is nothing less than a
complete revolution of everything, and it will upset all the rules and
laws that have been handed down ever since the world began."

"Dear me!" said Bevis. "And who is it Kapchack is in love with? I have
asked twenty people, but no one will tell me."

"Why, I am telling you," said the squirrel. "Don't you see, if it had
been an ordinary affair--only a young magpie--it would not have mattered
much, though I daresay the queen would have been jealous, but this----"

"Who is it?" said Bevis, in a rage. "Why don't you tell me who it is?"

"I am telling you," said the squirrel, sharply.

"No, you're not. You're telling me a lot of things, but not what I want
to know."

"Oh, well," said the squirrel, tossing his head and swishing his tail,
"of course, if you know more about it than I do it is no use my
staying." So off he went in a pet.

Up jumped Bevis. "You're a stupid donkey," he shouted, and ran across to
the other side, and threw a piece of stick up into an elm-tree after the
squirrel. But the squirrel was so quick he could not see which way he
had gone, and in half-a-minute he heard the squirrel say very softly:
"Bevis dear," behind him, and looked back, and there he was sitting on
the oak bough again.

The squirrel, as the toad had said, was really a very good fellow; he
was very quick to take offence, but his temper only lasted a minute.
"Bevis dear," he said, "come back and sit down again on the moss, and I
will tell you."

"I sha'n't come back," said Be