that you may crawl up the chink."

"Will you," said the toad, excited at the hope of liberty, "will you
really do that?"

"Yes, that I will," said the fox; "wait an instant, and I will fetch
another flint."

So he brought another flint which split the tree so much that the toad
felt the fresh air come down to him. "And you really will do it?" he
said.

"Yes," repeated the fox, "I will certainly let you out."

"Then," said the toad, "the saying I have heard underground is this:
'When the hare hunts the hunter in the dead day, the hours of King
Kapchack are numbered'. It is a curious and a difficult saying, for I
cannot myself understand how the day could be dead, nor how the hare
could chase the sportsman; but you, who have so high a reputation for
sagacity, can no doubt in time interpret it. Now put in some more wedges
and help me out."

But the fox, having learnt all that the toad could tell him, went away,
and finding the osiers, curled himself up to sleep.

The same night, the weasel, having had a very pleasant nap upon his
divan in the elm in the squirrel's copse, woke up soon after midnight,
and started for the farm, in order to enjoy the pleasure of seeing the
rat in the gin, which he had instructed Bevis how to set up. Had it not
been for this he would not have faced so terrible a tempest, but to see
the rat in torture he would have gone through anything. As he crept
along a furrow, not far outside the copse, choosing that route that he
might be somewhat sheltered in the hollow from the wind, he saw a wire
which a poacher had set up, and stayed to consider how he could turn it
to his advantage.

"There is Ulu, the hare," he said to himself, "who lives in the
wheat-field; I had her son, he was very sweet and tender, and also her
nephew, who was not so juicy, and I have noticed that she has got very
plump of late. She is up on the hill to-night I have no doubt,
notwithstanding the tempest, dancing and flirting with her disreputable
companions, for vice has such an attraction for some minds that they
cannot forego its pleasures, even at the utmost personal inconvenience.
Such revels, at such a time of tempest, while the wrath of heaven is
wreaked upon the trees, are nothing short of sacrilege, and I for one
have always set my mind against irreverence. I shall do the world a
service if I rid it of such an abandoned creature." So he called to a
moor-hen, who was flying over from the Long Pond at a tremendou