Who on a prickly porcupine¹
 
Makes up his mind that he will dine
 
Must overcome a thousand quills²
 
Before his stomach Porky fills.
 
And so it is with you and me;
 
With everybody whom we see;
 
With Reddy Fox and Billy Mink³,
 
And all the rest of whom we think
 
On Meadows Green, in Smiling Pool
 
Or hidden in the Forest cool:
 
The thing we've set our hearts upon
 
Must past a thousand spears be won.
 
 
NO one knows this better than did Old Man Coyote as he ran around and around Prickly Porky. He had never felt one of those little spears which Prickly Porky rattled⁴ so fiercely, and he had no mind to feel one. You see, he didn't like the look of them. When finally Prickly Porky lay down and curled up into a great prickly ball, like a huge chestnut⁵ burr, Old Man Coyote sat down just a little way off to study how he was going to get at Prickly Porky without getting hurt by some of those sharp, barbed little spears.
 
For a long time he sat and studied and studied, his tongue hanging out of one side of his mouth. Once he looked up at Sammy Jay and Blacky the Crow and winked⁷, but he didn't make a sound. Sammy and Blacky chuckled⁸ to themselves and winked back, and for a wonder they didn't make a sound. Somehow that wink⁶ made them have more of a friendly feeling for Old Man Coyote. You see, that wink told them that Old Man Coyote was just the same kind of a sly rogue⁹ as themselves, and so right away they had a fellow feeling for him.
 
And none of the little meadow and forest people looking on made a sound. Some of them didn't dare to, and others............