Once upon a time, a quokka lived in a great forest, home to dingoes, wallabies, baboons — and a cockatoo who could curse in three languages.

But the quokka was, as it happened, too popular for her own good. Her sweet smile won nothing but admiration, and no one took her seriously.

So she resolved to disguise herself, that the other animals might see her true nature. She wove a false moustache from juniper twigs and bartered with the cockatoo for a pair of spectacles, paying in carrots she had grown herself by the creek behind the oaks.

Of course, everyone knew her at once — and took to calling her, in jest, Not-a-Quokka. But from then on they treated her with real regard, for they had seen she was a wonderful creature, not only without, but within.