by admiring friends ; but Pinky, because he was 

 the runt and looked very sorry and forlorn, was 

 not chosen. He was left with me. I kept him, — 

 his mother had choked to death on a fish-bone, — 

 and fed him milk until he caught up to the size 

 of the biggest mother-fed possum of his age in 

 the woods. Then I took him down to the old 

 stump in the brier-patch where he was born, and 

 left him to shift for himself. 



Being thrown into a brier-patch was exactly 

 what tickled Br'er Kabbit half to death ; and 

 any one would have supposed that being put 

 gently down in his home brier-patch would have 

 tickled this little possum even more. 



Not he ! I went home and forgot him. But 

 the next morning, when breakfast was preparing, 

 whom should we see but Pinky, curled up in the 

 feather cushion of the kitchen settee, sound 

 asleep. 



He had found his way back during the night, 

 had climbed in through the trough of the pump- 

 box, and had gone to sleep like the rest of the 

 family. He gaped and grinned and looked about 

 him when awakened, altogether at home, and 

 really surprised that morning had come so soon. 

 [207] 



