d
over on the bank, laughing until their sides ached. Even Spotty the
Turtle smiled, which is very unusual for Spotty.

Now Peter does not like the water, and though he can swim, he doesn't
feel at all at home in it. He paddled for the shore as fast as he could,
and in his heart was something very like anger. No one likes to be
laughed at. Peter intended to start for home the very minute he reached
the shore. But just before his feet touched bottom, he heard the great,
deep voice of Grandfather Frog.

"That is just the way Lightfoot the Deer learned to jump--trying to do
what he couldn't do and keeping at it until he could. It all happened a
great while ago when the world was young." Grandfather Frog was talking
quite as if nothing had happened, and he had never thought of laughing.
Peter was so put out that he wanted to keep right on, but he just
couldn't miss that story. His curiosity wouldn't let him. So he shook
himself and then lay down in the sunniest spot he could find within
hearing.

"Lightfoot's great-great-ever-so-great-grandfather was named Lightfoot
too, and was not a whit less handsome than Lightfoot is now," continued
Grandfather Frog in his best story-telling voice. "He had just such slim
legs as Lightfoot has now and just such wonderful, branching horns. When
he had the latter, he was not much afraid of anybody. Those enemies
swift enough of foot to catch him he could successfully fight with his
horns, and those too big and strong for him to fight were not swift
enough to catch him. But there was a season in every year when he had no
horns, as is the case with Lightfoot. You know, or ought to know, that
every spring Lightfoot loses his horns and through the summer a new pair
grows. It was so with Mr. Deer of that long-ago time, and when he lost
those great horns, he felt very helpless and timid.

"Now old Mr. Deer loved the open meadows and spent most of his time
there. When he had to run, he wanted nothing in the way of his slim
legs. And how he could run! My, my, my, how he could run! But there were
others who could run swiftly in those days too,--Mr. Wolf and Mr. Dog.
Mr. Deer always had a feeling that some day one or the other would catch
him. When he had his horns, this thought didn't worry him much, but when
he had lost his horns, it worried him a great deal. He felt perfectly
helpless then. 'The thing for me to do is to keep out of sight,' said he
to himself, and so instead of going out on th