hen she went away as fast as she could, and the
Lion found his way home.

When Lion got home he told his wife and children all that happened to
him, and how Miss Nancy had saved his life, so they said they would have
a great dinner, and ask Miss Nancy. Now when Ananzi heard of it, he
wanted to go to the dinner, so he went to Miss Nancy, and said she must
take him with her as her child, but she said, "No." Then he said, "I can
turn myself into quite a little child and then you can take me," and at
last she said, "Yes;" and he told her, when she was asked what pap her
baby ate, she must be sure to tell them it did not eat pap, but the same
food as every one else; and so they went, and had a very good dinner,
and set off home again--but somehow one of the Lion's sons fancied that
all was not right, and he told his father he was sure it was Ananzi, and
the Lion set out after him.

Now as they were going along, before the Lion got up to them, Ananzi
begged Miss Nancy to put him down, that he might run, which he did, and
he got away and ran along the wood, and the Lion ran after him. When he
found the Lion was overtaking him, he turned himself into an old man
with a bundle of wood on his head--and when the Lion got up to him, he
said, "Good morning, Mr. Lion," and the Lion said, "Good morning, old
gentleman."

Then the old man said, "What are you after now?" and the Lion asked if
he had seen Ananzi pass that way, but the old man said, "No, that fellow
Ananzi is always meddling with some one; what mischief has he been up to
now?"

Then the Lion told him, but the old man said it was no use to follow him
any more, for he would never catch him, and so the Lion wished him
good-day, and turned and went home again.

VI

THE GRATEFUL FOXES

One fine spring day two friends went out to a moor to gather fern,
attended by a boy with a bottle of wine and a box of provisions. As they
were straying about, they saw at the foot of a hill two foxes that had
brought out their cub to play; and whilst they looked on, struck by the
strangeness of the sight, three children came up from a neighbouring
village with baskets in their hands, on the same errand as themselves.
As soon as the children saw the foxes, they picked up a bamboo stick and
took the creatures stealthily in the rear; and when the old foxes took
to flight, they surrounded them and beat them with the stick, so that
they ran away as fast as their legs could carry them