Often and often the puma had laid traps for the monkey , which he felt sure his foe could not escape ; and the monkey would pretend that he saw nothing , and rejoice the hidden puma 's heart by seeming to walk straight into the snare , when , lo ! a loud laugh would be heard , and the monkey 's grinning face would peer out of a mass of creepers and disappear before his foe could reach him . This state of things had gone on for quite a long while , when at last there came a season such as the oldest parrot in the forest could never remember . Instead of two or three hundred inches of rain falling , which they were all accustomed to , month after month passed without a cloud , and the rivers and springs dried up , till there was only one small pool left for everyone to drink from . There was not an animal for miles round that did not grieve over this shocking condition of affairs , not one at least except the puma . His only thought for years had been how to get the monkey into his power , and this time he imagined his chance had really arrived . He would hide himself in a thicket , and when the monkey came down to drink -- and come he must -- the puma would spring out and seize him . Yes , on this occasion there could be no escape ! And no more there would have been if the puma had had greater patience ; but in his excitement he moved a little too soon . The monkey , who was stooping to drink , heard a rustling , and turning caught the gleam of two yellow , murderous eyes . With a mighty spring he grasped a creeper which was hanging above him , and landed himself on the branch of a tree ; feeling the breath of the puma on his feet as the animal bounded from is cover . Never had the monkey been so near death , and it was some time before he recovered enough courage to venture on the ground again . Up there in the shelter of the trees , he began to turn over in his head plans for escaping the snares of the puma . And at length chance helped him . Peeping down to the earth , he saw a man coming along the path carrying on his head a large gourd filled with honey . He waited till the man was just underneath the tree , then he hung from a bough , and caught the gourd while the man looked up wondering , for he was no tree-climber . Then the monkey rubbed the honey all over him , and a quantity of leaves from a creeper that was hanging close by ; he stuck them all close together into the honey , so that he looked like a walking bush . This finished , he ran to the pool to see the result , and , quite pleased with himself , set out in search of adventures . Soon the report went through the forest that a new animal had appeared from no one knew where , and that when somebody had asked his name , the strange creature had answered that it was Jack-in-the-Green . Thanks to this , the monkey was allowed to drink at the pool as often as he liked , for neither beast nor bird had the faintest notion who he was .
And if they made any inquiries the only answer they got was XXXXX the water of which he had drunk deeply had turned his hair into leaves , so that they all knew what would happen in case they became too greedy .
With before from in into on over that to while