the shady forest school had once been a pigeon house, but when the farm was sold and the old buildings torn down, it had been left to shelter mr. and mrs. pigeon, who wouldn't move away.

one night during a great storm it had toppled off the post on which it stood, and rolled down the hillside, helped along by billy breeze, until it had landed on the edge of the shady forest.

here it had been discovered by the little forest folk, and at parson owl's suggestion, had been pushed and shoved in and out among the trees until it stood right-side up in a sunlit clearing.

then parson owl had called together all the grown-ups and persuaded them to make it into a schoolhouse.

and, well, here we are with mrs. rabbit and her little bunny on their way to the opening exercises, so there is no need of saying anything more about it, except that it had a nice door in front and a dozen round holes, under which were fastened little pieces of board for wide windowsills, on which the pigeons used to stand and preen their feathers.

as little jack rabbit and his mother drew near they saw chippy chipmunk's face at one of the little round windows. then busy beaver looked out of another, and pretty soon every little round window had a head peeping through, while in the doorway stood professor jim crow in his black swallowtail coat.

"good morning, mrs. rabbit," he said, looking over his spectacles. "you have brought another scholar, i see."

when they were seated in the schoolroom, he walked over to the big blackboard.

"john," he said, turning to the little rabbit, "tell me how to spell your name."

goodness gracious me! would you believe it, the little rabbit answered "j-a-c-k!" you see, he was so used to being called just "jack" that he spelt "john" the same way.

then professor jim crow asked who was the first president, but he didn't enquire who was going to be the next, for i guess he thought the little rabbit hadn't studied politics enough. after that he told mrs. rabbit that she had a very bright little bunny boy even if he didn't know how to spell his right name.