Hedgehog was always scribbling¹. He sat at his desk in his house in the woods and wrote so much that he hardly stopped to eat his meals. He had quills² stuck behind his ears, and whenever he thought of anything which would make any of the beasts angry, especially Yellow Lion, he wrote it down on a piece of birch bark. For ink he used pokeberry juice.

 

Yellow Lion awoke one morning and found a sign tacked⁴ to the door of his house with one of Hedgehog’s quills. On the sign was written:

 

“Lion, you are a big, yellow animal.”

 

“Who wrote that?” roared Yellow Lion. “I am no more of an animal than he is.”

 

Everybody knows that Yellow Lion is very proud, for he is the king of beasts. So Yellow Lion went out and sharpened his claws on the trunk of a tree and started to get revenge for the name that he had been called. He had not gone very far before he saw another piece of bark tacked up to a tree with one of Hedgehog’s quills. On it was written:

 

“Lions, take notice. The quill³ is mightier⁵ than the claw.”

 

Yellow Lion picked off the sign and shook it between his paws.

 

“The idea,” he said. “This is an insult. Just let me find out who wrote that and there will be an awful time in this jungle.”

 

He had only gone half a mile before he met Big Elephant.

 

“Elephant,” he roared; “whose writing is this?”

 

Big Elephant put on his glasses and picked up the piece of bark and looked at it very carefully.

 

“Sometimes,” he said, “I write in my sleep. You know, I used to write visiting cards with my feet, and since I stand up when I am asleep maybe I write a little without knowing it. I don’t remember this.”

 

“You are a foolish, old elephant,” roared Yellow Lion, and he bounded away so angrily that he could hardly see. He almost ran into Striped Tiger.

 

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