One evening in late spring, before the maples were out, almost before the ice had gone from the brook, along came Mrs. White-Spot and her four kittens wandering down the trail. She crept warily around the bend of the brook, pushing her black snout cautiously through the dried ferns to make sure no hidden foe lay in ambush; then she marshaled her family behind her, uttering a series of reassuring squeaks, and they followed her down to the deep pool.
Mrs. White-Spot took up her position upon a large flat stone, just at the edge of the pool, and then went about teaching the little skunks how to take a bath. First she urged them all to venture out upon the flat stone, then, as one after another of the little skunk children followed her, she suddenly pushed each one of them with her snout off into the deep water of the pool.
At first they did not care for the wetting, and began to set up little protesting squeaks of terror, trying to scramble back again to the stone. But no sooner did they emerge from the water than, firmly, but gently, their mother pushed each one back into the pool again. Head over heels they went with a splash and a squeak. But finally when they had become quite accustomed to the water, they began to enjoy
themselves, and splashed about like happy children, nosing and jostling each other in high glee.