against
the foot of the tree, crossed his legs, looked this way and that way
to make sure that no one was about, and then in a dreadfully cracked
voice he began to sing:

"Ol' Bill Possum, he's gone before!
Ol' Bill Possum, he is no more!
Bill was a scamp, Sir;
Bill was a thief!
Bill stole an egg, Sir;
Bill came to grief.
Ol' Bill Possum, it served him right;
And he is no more, for he died last night."

"Very good, Sah, very good. Ah cert'nly am obliged to yo'all for yo'
serenade," said a voice that seemed to come out of the tree at Reddy's
back.

Reddy Fox sprang up as if some one had stuck a pin into him. Every
hair stood on end, as he looked up at Unc' Billy's doorway. Then his
teeth began to chatter with fright. Looking out of Unc' Billy's
doorway and grinning down at him was something that looked for all the
world like Unc' Billy himself.

"It must be his ghost!" said Reddy, and tucking his tail between his
legs, he started up the Crooked Little Path as fast as his legs could
take him.

Reddy never once looked back. If he had, he might have seen Unc' Billy
Possum climb down from the hollow tree and shake hands with Jimmy
Skunk, who had just come along.

"How did Ah do it? Why, Ah just pretended Ah was daid, when Farmer
Brown's boy caught me," explained Unc' Billy. "Of course he' wouldn't
kill a daid Possum. So when he tossed me down on the chopping-block
and turned his back, Ah just naturally came to life again, and here
Ah am."

Unc' Billy Possum grinned broader than ever, and Jimmy Skunk grinned,
too.

III

UNC' BILLY POSSUM SENDS FOR HIS FAMILY

The news that Unc' Billy Possum wasn't dead at all but was back in his
hollow tree in the Green Forest soon spread through all the Green
Forest and over the Green Meadows. Everybody hastened to pay their
respects, that is everybody but Reddy Fox. Unc' Billy and his partner,
Jimmy Skunk, told every one who called how Reddy Fox had thought that
Unc' Billy was a ghost and had been frightened almost to death, so
that he ran away as fast as his legs could take him. Unc' Billy
grinned as he told how Reddy had sat under the hollow tree and tried
to sing because he was so glad that Unc' Billy was dead, and all the
little people of the Green Forest and the Green Meadows laughed until
their sides ached when in a funny, cracked voice Unc' Billy sang the
song for them.

Thereafter whenever one of the