just below the Story Teller's smoke, and looks deep
into a great cavern of glowing embers between the big old andirons,
where, in her fancy, she can picture the Hollow Tree people and their
friends.

Why, yes, let me see--says the Story Teller.

"Mr. Dog had just told about being at the menagerie, you know, and Mr.
'Coon was just going to tell how he came very near getting into a
menagerie himself."

Oh, yes, of course--well, then, all the Hollow Tree people, the 'Coon
and 'Possum and the Old Black Crow, and their friends who were visiting
them--Mr. Dog and Mr. Robin and Jack Rabbit and Mr. Turtle and Mr.
Squirrel--knocked the ashes out of their pipes and filled them up
fresh--

"No, they had just done that."

That's so, I forgot. Well, anyway, as soon as they got to smoking and
settled back around the fire again Mr. 'Coon told them his story, and I
guess we'll call it

MR. 'COON'S EARLY ADVENTURE

[Illustration: ALL AT ONCE HE HEARD A FIERCE BARK CLOSE BEHIND HIM]

Mr. 'Coon said he was quite young when it happened, and was taking a
pleasant walk one evening, to think over things a little, and perhaps to
pick out a handy tree where Mr. Man's chickens roosted, when all at once
he heard a fierce bark close behind him, and he barely had time to get
up a tree himself when a strange and very noisy Mr. Dog was leaping
about at the foot of the tree, making a great fuss, and calling every
moment for Mr. Man to hurry, for he had a young 'coon treed.

"Of course I laid pretty low when I heard that," Mr. 'Coon said, "for I
knew that Mr. Man would most likely have a gun, so I got into a bunch of
leaves and brush that must have been some kind of an old nest, and
scrooched down so that none of me would show.

"Then by and by I heard some big creature come running through the
brush, and I peeked over a little, and there, sure enough, was Mr. Man
with a long gun, and I noticed that he wore a thing on his head--a sort
of hat, I suppose--made of what looked to be the skin of some relative
of mine.

"Of course that made me mad. I hadn't cared so much until I saw that;
but I said right then to myself that any one who would do such a thing
as that never could be a friend of mine, no matter how much he tried.
So I scrooched down and laid low in that old nest, and didn't move or
let on in any way that I was there.

"Then I heard Mr. Man walking around the tree and talking to his dog and
telling him that there wasn't anythin