AN EASTER STORY
"WHY do we always have rabbits at Easter?" asked the Little Lady. "Is that a story, too?"
The Story Teller lit his pipe, thinking all the time, and pretty soon he said: "Why, yes, there is a story about that, and it goes this way":—
One afternoon in the early spring Mr. Jack Rabbit and his friends were out for an airing. The Hollow Tree people were along, and Mr. Turtle, as usual. By and by they came to a log under a big tree and sat down for a smoke and talk. They talked about the weather at first and other things, till somebody mentioned Easter. Then they all had something to say about that.
"What I object to," says Mr. Rabbit, when it came his time to talk, "is this thing of people always saying that the Easter eggs belong to me."
"Oh, but that's just a joke," says Mr. 'Coon, laughing.
"I know it's just a joke, of course, but it's a pretty old joke, and I'm tired of it," says Jack Rabbit.
"How did it get started anyway?" asked Mr. 'Possum.
Then Mr. Rabbit took his pipe out of his mouth and leaned forward a little, so he could talk better.
"I tell you how it got started," he says, "and after that I don't want to hear any more of it. This is how it happened:—