Danny was stuffing the leg of an old pair of blue trousers with straw, flattening it out until it bore a faint resemblance to the paddle-shaped tail of a beaver.

“What is that you’re making?” Jerry asked.

“Why, that’s the el’funt’s tail!” said Danny.  “Anybody could tell that.”

He held it proudly up, displaying it in all its blue glory.

“El’funts’ tails are small like a rope,” Jerry remarked.

Danny laughed derisively.  “Much you know about it!  I guess a el’funt’s about the biggest animal in the world and it wouldn’t have a little ole tail like a rope.”

“They are little, like a rope,” Jerry insisted.

“How do you know they are?” asked Danny.  “Just tell me how you know anything about it.”

“I don’t know, but I know,” Jerry said, feeling all his obstinacy aroused by Danny’s air of conscious superiority.

“There, you just said you didn’t know,” Celia Jane interposed, going to her elder brother’s aid, as she always did in a dispute with Jerry.

“I didn’t neither,” asseverated Jerry.

“You said you didn’t know,” insisted Celia Jane.

“I don’t know how I know,” said Jerry, “but I know el’funts have little tails—­like a rope.”

“Have you ever been to a circus?” asked Chris.

“Not that I remember.”

“Have you ever seen a el’funt?” pursued Danny.

“N-n-no, but it kind of seems as if I almost had.”

“I guess you’d know if you had seen a el’funt, wouldn’t you?”

“Y-y-yes,” responded Jerry doubtfully.

“Then if you ain’t ever been to a circus or seen a el’funt, I guess you don’t know what you are talking about.”

“El’funts’ tails are little, like a rope,” Jerry insisted.

“Like a cow’s tail?” asked Celia Jane.

Jerry nodded assent.  “Only they haven’t so much hair on the end,” he added.

“A el’funt’s a hundred times as big as a cow, I guess,” interposed Danny, “an’ it wouldn’t have a little tail like a cow.  I guess I know more about it than you do.  I’m older, ain’t I?”

“Yes,” Jerry admitted, “but they are little.”

Nora now interposed.  “Why don’t you go see the picture of the elephant jumpin’ the fence and find out?” she asked.

“Of course,” said Chris.  “The picture’ll show whether they’re small like a rope or great big ones.”

“I’ll beat you there,” challenged Danny, as he dropped the flat, beaver-like elephant’s tail and darted at a run out of the woodshed, followed by the others.  As they lined up in front of the gaudy, delectable poster, there came a simultaneous gasp of amazement from all of them.

“Why, it ain’t got no tail at all!” exclaimed Celia Jane.

True enough, there was no tail in evidence, as the elephant seemed to be headed straight towards them.  Jerry flushed as they all turned and looked accusingly at him.