DON'T TALK TO STRANGE BEARS

. . . warns little Nat's mother as he sets out on a walk through the magic woods. Vacationing vegetables sunning themselves in a clearing are strange, he thinks, but they are not strange bears, so he says Hello; but the vegetables don't want to be disturbed, and send him away. So do the mythological beasts having a meeting, the farm animals farming, the birds at a concert, the prehistoric animals studying in a forest library, the beavers man-making a dam. ""Go home, kid,"" say the beavers, and Nat does; he tells his adventures to his mother, who ""listen(s) to his every word."" A droll conceit but not a complete success: the sepia drawings, in cartoonist Koven's characteristically scraggly style, lack definition and accent in the crowd scenes; it's hard to distinguish the figures, sometimes even to find little Nat (and once he gets lost in the centerfold).