top hurting my nice Elephant, Rope!"

Archie's voice was loud and clear. Suddenly the rope which had been
winding up, around the big wheel, came to a stop, and a voice called:

"What's the matter down there? Are any of you children hurt?"

"Oh, that's Jake!" exclaimed Elsie. "It's our man Jake!"

"What's the trouble there, Archie?" Jake asked. He was somewhere in the
loft of the barn.

"It's my Elephant!" Archie answered, trying to keep from crying. "My
nice, Stuffed Christmas Elephant. He's hanging on a rope!"

"On a rope!" exclaimed Jake. "Do you mean this wheel rope that I use to
hoist up bags of oats to the bin here? Is it that rope?"

"I don't know--but it's some rope!" Archie answered. "Can't you save my
Elephant?"

"Of course I can!" called Jake. "Don't worry! Your Elephant isn't
alive--choking with a rope can't hurt him!"

"Yes, it can, too!" insisted Archie. "It can choke all the stuffing out
of him and make him flat like a pancake."

"Well, yes, that might happen," admitted Jake. "But I didn't know any of
your toys were tangled in the hoisting rope, or I would not have pulled
it. Wait a minute, now, and I'll turn the wheel the other way and let
your Elephant down to you."

Slowly the big wheel turned in the other direction, and the end of the
rope that was about the Elephant's neck dropped toward the barn floor.
The Elephant, also, began slowly to come down.

"Thank goodness!" said the toy to himself. "I could not have stood being
hanged much longer. I'm glad it's over!"

And it was over a moment later when Archie could reach up, take the loop
of rope from around his plaything's neck and set the Elephant down on
the barn floor.

"How did it happen?" asked Jake. He came down out of the loft, or place
where he stored the bags of oats. The oats were hauled to the lower
floor of the barn. There a rope was put about each bag and it was lifted
to the upper floor where it was stored in a bin. The lifting rope went
around a big wheel, acting like a dumbwaiter in some houses.

Jake had turned the wheel by pulling on a second rope upstairs in the
barn, and as the wheel turned it wound up the longer rope. It was the
end of this rope that had looped itself about the Elephant.

"How did it happen?" asked Jake again.

"I don't know," Archie replied. "I left my Elephant here when I went to
slide down the hay. When I came back he was on the rope."

"Some of you children must have left the Elephant too nea