COCKLE BURR, THE ROUGH-NECK 123 



asked him what he meant by carrying burrs around 

 in his tail that way. 



"I thought I was rid of them," exclaimed Reddy. 

 "You see I picked them up in Farmer Careless's 

 corn field, and I have been puUing them off all the 

 way down here. I left some in Farmer Jones's field, 

 then some more in Farmer Smith's field and, to 

 treat them all alike, we will now give Farmer Good 

 a collection," remarked Reddy as he dropped down 

 on his right side, curling his bushy tail around in 

 front of him, and proceeded to puU the remaining 

 burrs out to start a new colony in the clover field. 



So far. Cockle Burr had made good selections for 

 the young burrs in providing methods of transporta- 

 tion for them, but on the next attempt one of the 

 young fellows made a terrible mistake. Billy Skunk 

 came along and Cockle Burr decided that on that 

 great, bushy, black tail would be a great place to 

 ride, so he hooked on, as Billy went slowly by, and 

 no sooner had he done so than he realized his mis- 

 take. He had hardly settled himself in that mass 

 of fur when he detected a frightful odor, and was 

 fully convinced that "his day was spoiled." He be- 

 gan at once to lay plans to arrange for other trans- 

 portation, where it would not only be more rapid 



