“I declare—­I haven’t cut the holes for your eyes!” the tailor exclaimed.  “Just wait a moment and I’ll make everything satisfactory.”  He clinked his shears together sharply as he spoke.

But Solomon Owl told him that he wouldn’t think of letting anybody use shears so near his eyes.

[Image:  Illustration 1]

Solomon Found Mr. Frog’s Shop Was Closed

“I’ll take off the coat,” he said.  “And I know now that you’re a very poor tailor, or you wouldn’t have made such a mistake.”  He began to tug at the coat.  But he soon found that taking it off was not so easy as putting it on.  Solomon’s sharp claws caught in the cloth; and his hooked beak, too, fastened itself in the hood the moment he tried to pull the coat over his head.  “Here!” he cried to Mr. Frog.  “Just lend me a hand!  I can’t see to help myself.”

But Mr. Frog did not even answer him.

“Don’t you hear me?” Solomon Owl shouted, as he struggled with his new coat, only to become tangled in it more than ever.

Still, the tailor said never a word, though something very like a giggle, followed by a splash, caught Solomon’s ear.

“He’s left me!” Solomon Owl groaned.

“Mr. Frog has left me to get out of this coat alone.  And goodness knows how I’m ever a-going to do it.”  He threshed about so vigorously that he tripped himself and fell upon the bank of the brook, rolling over and over toward the water.

He had a very narrow escape.  If he hadn’t happened to bring up against an old stump he would certainly have tumbled into the stream.

Though Solomon couldn’t see, he knew that he was in danger.  So he lay on his back on the ground and carefully tore his new coat into strings and ribbons.

At last he was free.  And he rose to his feet feeling very sheepish, for he knew that Mr. Frog had played a sly trick on him.

“Nevermind!” said Solomon Owl, as he flew way.  “I’ll come back to-morrow and ask Mr. Frog to make me a waistcoat and trousers.  And then——­” He did not finish what he was saying.  But there is no doubt that whatever it was, it could not have been very pleasant for Mr. Frog.

Just as he had planned, Solomon Owl returned to the brook the next day.  And he was both surprised and disappointed at what he found.

The door of Mr. Frog’s tailor’s shop was shut and locked.  And on it there was a sign, which said: 

TO LET

“He’s moved away!” cried Solomon Owl.  And he went off feeling that he had been cheated out of a good dinner—­to say nothing of a new waistcoat—­and new trousers, too.

He had not been gone long when the door opened.  And Mr. Frog leaped nimbly outside.  He took the sign off the door; and sitting down cross-legged upon the bank, he began to sew upon Jasper Jay’s new blue suit, while his face wore a wider smile than ever.