xclaimed Juno. "You don't think it possible?"

"Of course it is possible," said a pelican, stretching his neck through
his cage-bars. "You'll see what comes of being too obliging."

"We all think you are a good creature, Juno," said a crane. "Indeed, I
should willingly trust you with my young crane children, but really, if
you _will_ do everything that is asked of you, there's no knowing whose
family you may have next."

Juno went and lay down in a sunshiny place near the elephant's house,
and thought over all these words. Very soon she grew sleepy, in spite
of her anxiety, and was just dropping off into a doze, when she heard
the keeper whistle for her. She ran to him and found him in the
hippopotamus's cage.

[Illustration: JUNO TAKES CARE OF THE YOUNG HIPPOPOTAMUS.]

"Juno," said he, "I guess you'll have to take charge of this young
hippopotamus, the poor little fellow has lost his mother."

"Dear, dear!" sighed Juno. "I was afraid it would come to this. I'm
thankful it isn't the young alligators."

So Juno took charge of the young hippo,--she called him hippo for
short, and only when he was naughty she called him: "Hip-po-pot-a-mus,
aren't you ashamed of yourself?" But he was a great trial. He was
awkward and clumsy, and not a bit like her graceful little
lion-puppies. When he got sick, and she had to give him peppermint, his
mouth was so large that she lost the spoon in it, and he swallowed
spoon and all, and was very ill afterward. But he grew up at last, and
just as Juno had made up her mind not to take care of other people's
families any more, the keeper came to her with two young giraffes, and
told her she really must be a mother to the poor little scraps of
misery, for their mother was gone, and they would die if they weren't
cared for immediately. These were a dreadful trouble, and besides, they
would keep trotting after her everywhere, till the pelican, and the
adjutant, and the cranes nearly killed themselves laughing at her. Poor
Juno felt worse and worse, till when one day she heard the keeper say
she certainly would have to take care of the young elephant, she felt
that she could stand it no longer, and made up her mind to run away. So
she said good-bye to all her friends, and ran to the wall of the park.
There she gave a great jump, and,--waked up, and found herself in the
sunshiny grass near the elephant's house.

"Oh, how glad I am!" said Juno.

"What in the world has been the matter?" asked