e.

"It's a goat! It's our goat! It's Nicknack!" yelled Teddy. "He's stuck
his head right through the bower and, oh, Jan! he's eating it!"

And so Nicknack was. His head was half-way through the side of the
tree-tent nearest Jan and the goat was chewing some of the green leaves.
It was Nicknack's whiskers that had tickled Jan on the back of her neck.

"Whoa there, Nicknack!" called Ted, as the goat from the outside pushed
his way farther into the tent. "Whoa, there! You'll upset this place in
a minute!"

And so it seemed Nicknack would do, for he was hungrily eating the
leaves of the branches from which Jan and Ted had made their playhouse.

"How'd he get loose?" asked Jan.

"I don't know," Ted answered. "I tied him good and tight by his rope. I
wonder if----"

Just then a voice called:

"Wait for me, Nicknack! Wait for me!"

"It's Trouble!" cried Jan and Ted together.

Ted looked out through the hole the goat had eaten in the side of the
bower, and saw Baby William toddling toward him.

"Did you let Nicknack loose?" demanded Ted.

"Ess, I did," answered Trouble. "I cutted his wope with a knife, I did.
I wants a wide. Wait for me, Nicknack!"

The goat was in no hurry to get away, for he liked to eat the green
leaves, and Ted, coming out of the bower, which was almost ready to fall
down now that the goat was half-way inside it, saw where the rope, fast
around his pet's horns, had been cut.

"You mustn't do that, Trouble," Ted said to his little brother. "You
mustn't cut Nicknack's rope. He might run away into the lake."

"Trouble wants a wide."

"Well, we'll give you a ride," added Jan. "But did mother or Nora give
you the knife to cut the rope?"

"No. Trouble got knife offen table."

"Oh, you must _never_ do that!" cried Jan. "You might fall on the sharp
knife and cut yourself. Trouble was bad!"

The little fellow had really taken a knife from the table, and had sawed
away with it on Nicknack's rope until he had cut it through. Then
Nicknack had wandered over to the green bower to get something to eat,
and Trouble, dropping the knife, had followed.

Mrs. Martin, to punish Baby William so he would remember not to take
knives again, would not let him have a goat ride, and he cried very hard
when Ted and Jan went off without him. But even little boys must learn
not to do what is wrong, and Trouble was no different from any others.

One afternoon, when the Curlytops had been wandering around the wo