to try."

His keeper led him up in back of the hippopotamus wagon. It was very
large and heavy, and had settled far down in the soft mud of the road.
The hippo was still in it, and the hippo was very heavy himself,
weighing as much as two tons of coal. The circus men could not let the
hippopotamus out of his cage, because he was rather wild, and might
have run away or made trouble. So they had to leave him in.

"Now, Tum Tum, you have some hard work ahead of you!" said his trainer,
as he led the elephant up behind the wagon. "Let me see, if you can push
this out of the mud hole."

"Umph! Umph!" grunted Tum Tum through his trunk. That was his way of
saying that he would do his best.

Tum Tum went close up to the wagon, and stuck his four big feet well
down in the mud to brace himself. Then he put his large head against the
wagon, and began to push.

Tum Tum took a long breath, and then he pushed, and pushed and pushed
some more.

"He can never do it," said one of the two elephants who had tried to
pull the wagon.

"Indeed he cannot," spoke the other.

"Wait and see!" grunted Tum Tum. "I have not finished yet."

He pushed harder and harder. His head was hurting him, and his feet were
slipping in the mud of the road. Still he kept on pushing.

"I don't believe your elephant can do it," said one of the circus men.
"We had better hitch about four of them to the wagon."

"No, let Tum Tum try once more. I am sure he can do it," spoke the
elephant's kind keeper.

When Tum Tum heard this, he felt himself swell up inside. It was as
though he had new strength.

"I _will_ push that wagon!" he said to himself. "I _will_ push it out of
the mud!"

Then he took another long breath, and pushed with all his might on the
wagon.

"Now it's going!" cried Tum Tum.

Slowly at first, and then faster, the big hippopotamus wagon rolled out
of the mud, and on to the firm, hard road.

"There it goes!" cried a circus man.

"Hurray! Tum Tum has done it!" shouted another.

"I told you he was strong," said Tum Tum's keeper.

"He surely is," spoke the head circus man. "But I never thought he could
push that wagon."

Tum Tum had not thought so himself, but even an elephant never knows
what he can do until he tries.

"Huh! I s'pose he thinks he's smart, because he pushed a wagon we
couldn't," said one of the two elephants to the other.

"Yes," said the second one, "but if they'd given us another chance, we
could have done