For days and days the baby opossums lay crowded close together in their mother’s furry pocket. They slept and drank milk, and grew and grew till their eyes began to open.

It was dark all around them, but above their heads a gray line showed where light was stealing in over the edge of the pocket.

The biggest baby opossum looked up with his little bright eyes. He wanted to see more. So he crawled up, clambering over the soft tiny bodies of the eleven other babies.

Some of them wriggled and squirmed under his little bare feet. After slipping back once or twice he reached the edge and poked his pointed white snout outside.

He could not see anything because he was under his mother, and her long fur hung down over him. She was lying on a nest of grasses in a hollow tree.

That was where she stayed all day long while the sun was shining. Every night at dusk she climbeddecoration181decoration down the rough trunk and went to hunt for something to eat.

When she felt the tiny claws of her baby clutching her fur she looked down between her fore paws at the little mouse-like fellow.

Then with her smooth pink hands she gently pushed him back into the pocket and closed the opening. He was not big enough yet to come out of the warm dark nursery.

So for a week longer he cuddled down beside the others, while they all slept and drank more milk and grew stronger every hour.

The biggest baby was so restless that he scrambled around and crowded the others. Once he caught hold of a tiny tail between the thumbs and fingers of his hind feet, and pulled till the little one squeaked. His fore feet were like tiny hands without any thumbs.

At last, one day, he saw the edge of the pocket open a crack. He was so glad that he climbed up as fast as he could scramble, and pushed outside. He held on to his mother’s fur with all four feet.

decoration182decoration

When she reached down to smell him the bristles on her lips tickled his nose. Then he climbed around upon her back and twisted his tail about hers to hold him steady.

He looked like a mouse with his long tail, his black ears, his bright eyes twinkling in his little white face, and his pointed nose.

In a few minutes another and another baby followed the big brother and clung there on the mother’s furry back. It must have seemed a noisy place to them, for in the pocket they had heard only the soft rustling and scratching of the mother’s feet on the nest.

Now they could hear a chirping, and a squeaking, and a rattling of branches. They crowded close together in fright at the scream of a blue jay, as it chased a chattering red squirrel through the tree-top.

Then a sudden loud thump—thump—thump of a woodpecker hammering on the bark of the tree sent them tumbling back to the nursery in a hurry.

decoration183decoration

After this the whole family climbed out every day to play about on the mother’s back. The biggest baby liked to curl his small tail about her large one, and then swing off head downward.

Sometimes he pushed the others down just for the fun of seeing them scramble up again, hand over hand, clutching the long fur.

Of course he was the first one to poke his head out every day. Once he woke from a nap in the pocket and started to climb outside.

But he stopped halfway, hanging to the edge with both fore feet. It was nearly evening, and the mother opossum was clambering down the tree-trunk to go hunting for her supper.

The baby held on tightly while she trotted away through the woods. Now and then a leaf rustled or a stick cracked under her feet. Sleepy birds were twittering in their nests.

The mother pricked her ears and listened, for she ate eggs and young birds whenever she could find them. She had not tasted an egg this spring, becausedecoration184decoration she could not climb very nimbly with her pocket full of babies.

Soon she came to a swamp, and splash, splash, splash! the mud went flying. It spattered the baby’s face and made him cough.
possum in moonlight

Then he heard the croakings of dozens of frogs, and it frightened him so that he slid back into the nursery with his brothers.

The mother was trying to catch a frog to eat. Now she jumped this way, and now she jumped that way.decoration185decoration Such a jounce as the babies felt when she gave a spring for a big green fellow sitting on a log.

She caught him, too, but the jounce almost knocked the breath out of the twelve soft bodies in her pocket.

Every day the babies stayed outside the nursery for a longer time, though they were always ready to hurry back at the mother’s first warning grunt.

They kept growing bigger, too, till one night they could not all crowd into the pocket. Then they cuddled together on her back, with their tails twisted around hers.

In this way they rode through the woods when she went hunting. They watched with their bright eyes while she turned over rotting logs with her snout to catch the grubs underneath.

Sometimes she rooted in the ground for sprouting acorns, or nipped off mouthfuls of tender grass. Once she caught a young rabbit. Then how excited the little opossums were! And how they all squeaked and hissed together as they rode trotting home.

By this time they had cut their teeth,—fifty sharpdecoration186decoration little teeth in each hungry mouth. Then the mother picked some sweet red berries, and taught the hungry babies how to eat them. They learned to chew the juicy roots that she dug in the field.

The babies were greedy little things. She was a good and patient mother. Of course, as long as they were small enough to stay in her pocket she carried them everywhere with her. Even when they grew as large as rats they rode on her back through the woods. These twelve fat babies were so heavy that sometimes she staggered and stumbled under the load.

One night when all the babies were trotting along on their own feet they saw gleaming red eyes in the dark bushes befo............