HOW cosy it was there in the dry hollow of the tree, with the rain beating harder and harder outside and streaming down the tree trunks.

After a while the ducklings got out their play-things and began to play with them, but soon they tired of this, and nestling down about their mother they begged her to tell them a story.

“A story?” said Mother Duck. “Very well. What shall it be about?”

“Tell about Wiggle-Waggle-Wisk-Tail!” cried Squdge and Queek.

“No, no; don’t tell about that,” begged Curly-Tail, almost in tears. “That’s too sad a story, mother. It always makes me cry.”

“Pshaw! I wouldn’t be such a baby as to cry over a story,” cried Squdge. “Go ahead, mother! Tell it, won’t you?”

The other four little ducklings wanted to hear it, too, so Mother Duck told Curly-Tail if she didn’t want to listen she could run over in the corner and play by herself for awhile, and when that story was finished she could come back and choose another one—any one that she liked, and her mother would tell it next.

So Curly-Tail, who was always sweet and obedient, went over in the corner and got out her doll, and began to play, while Mother Duck told the others the story.

And this is the sad tale of Wiggle-Waggle-Wisk-Tail.