"He was just like that in my great-grandfather's time," the old gentleman explained.
And all the rest of the villagers remarked that Timothy Turtle was old enough to have better manners. Certainly, they said, the youngest Beaver child knew better than to treat people in such a rude fashion.
Brownie Beaver's mother especially announced that she had never in all her life met a gentleman who had treated her so disrespectfully as old Mr. Turtle. And she grew red and pale by turns as she recalled how he had seized her by the tail and held her fast for a whole day.[p. 59]
"I hope," she said, "that by the time he comes here again he will have learned how to behave himself."
But Grandaddy Beaver shook his head.
"Timothy Turtle," he declared, "will be no different even if he lives to be a thousand years old."
And everybody said that it was a great pity.