Rabbit sat down on his new sled. And in a few minutes Peter
Mink had nailed Jimmy's trousers fast to the sled.

"Now you simply _can't_ fall off," Peter said. "I'll give you a push;
and the first thing you know, you'll be down in the valley."

Jimmy Rabbit said to himself that Peter Mink was very bright, to think
of such a splendid plan as nailing his trousers to the sled. He thanked
Peter; and he gripped the sled tightly--though he didn't need to--while
Peter gave him a push that sent him flying down the mountainside.

Though he went like the wind, he never fell off once. And soon he was
down in Pleasant Valley, skimming over the crust which covered the
drifts in Farmer Green's meadow.

At last the sled stopped. And then Jimmy Rabbit decided that Peter Mink
had forgotten something. How was he to get off the sled with his
trousers nailed fast to it? And what would his mother say, when she saw
the nail-holes in his trousers? And what would his father do, when _he_
saw the nails in Jimmy's new sled?

It was not very pleasant for Jimmy Rabbit, sitting all alone in the
meadow, with such thoughts running through his head.

After he had sat there a while Jimmy heard something that worried him
even more. He heard old dog Spot barking. And he saw that he would be in
a good deal of a fix if Spot should happen to come along and find him.
For he couldn't stir from his sled.

Jimmy began to hate that sled. He wished he had never seen it.... And
then he heard somebody scampering over the crust. He was almost too
frightened to look around to see who it was. But he turned his head.
And he was glad to find that it was Peter Mink, who had run all the way
down from Blue Mountain.

"You had a fine ride, didn't you?" said Peter Mink.

"Yes," Jimmy answered. "But I liked the beginning of it better than the
end."

"Why, what's the matter?" Peter inquired.

"I can't get off the sled," Jimmy said.

Peter Mink pretended to be surprised. And he said that he hadn't thought
of that.

"But I'll help you," he promised.

Jimmy Rabbit thanked him.

"But," said Peter Mink, "I can't do all these things for you for
nothing, of course. I have too much else to do, to be wasting my time
like this, without pay."

"What do you want?" Jimmy Rabbit asked him.

"Give me the sled," said Peter Mink, "and I'll help you to get off it."

"All right," Jimmy agreed. He would even have given Peter his
wheelbarrow, too, he was so anxious to be fre