One hot day the children and Tecla were lying under the big oak tree by the spring, when they saw a small green frog hop among the little yellow water flowers which we call "brass buttons."
"Did I ever tell you the story of the frog and the coyote?" asked Tecla.
"Oh, no; please tell it now"; and Juanita clapped her hands.
"Do tell it, my good Tecla," added Antonio. (Spanish Californian children were trained to be always polite to their elders, no matter what social position these occupied.)
"Well, sit still, thou restless Nita, and I will tell it as my godfather told it to me."
One day the coyote found a frog in the road, and said, "Now, I shall eat you up."
The frog replied: "Oh, don't eat me to-day, Brother Coyote. Let us run a race to-morrow, and if you win, then you may eat me."
The coyote said, "All right."
Then the frog went to see his frog friends, and said, "I am going to run a race with the coyote to-morrow, from the spring to the elder tree and back, and if he wins, he is to eat me."
"Ha, ha! Of course he will win," laughed his friends.
