Today Elfree told me a story about reputation, pride and frogs.

"Elves care a lot about their reputation,
For themselves and for their nation

And even young elves know they should
Give folk a reputation that is good;

For reputation is what you leave behind you
And paves the way that lies before you."

And life is easier," said the elf,
"For other folk and for yourself

If all the good things that folk do
Are well spoken of and remembered too

So we feel reputation deserves protection
And, if sometimes it needs correction,

We try to do it very quickly,
That way life is much less prickly."

"This is a tale of a frog at the age
Where he'd just grown out of the tadpole stage

And he found himself, as most frogs do,
At the edge of a pond, deep and blue.

This little frog was handsome and green
And as he sat on a stump, surveying the scene,

He saw a sulky old trout being teased by
A swiftly darting dragonfly

And various other flying things
With the sun shining brightly in their wings.

He saw a fork-tailed swallow flying fast,
Skimming the water as it flew past

And a butterfly settling softly down
On a water lily's golden crown.

He saw a beaver building a dam of logs
But what interested him most were the other frogs.

A noisy lot, they flopped about,
Rippling the water and scaring the trout.

Leaping from one lily-pad to another,
Croaking and jumping and splashing each other.

They seemed to be having a lot of fun
As they played in the pond in the summer sun;

Then he heard a frog quite close to him say,
'Let's see who can leap the farthest today.'