In the Franklin Zoo Dennis Toole had just removed the lid of
his tin lunch-pail when the telegraph boy handed him the yellow
envelope. He turned it over and over, studying its exterior,
while the boy went to look at the shop-worn brown bear. The zoo
keeper decided that there was no way to find out what was inside
of the envelope but to open it. He was ready for the worst. He
wondered, unthinkingly, which one of his forty or more cousins
was dead, and opened the envelope.

"Dennis Toole, Franklin Zoo," he read, "Dongolas won't swim.
How do you make them swim? Telegraph at once. Michael Toole."

He laid the telegram across his knees and looked at it as if it
was some strange communication from another sphere. He pushed his
hat to one side of his head and scratched the tuft of red hair
thus bared.

"'Dongolas won't swim!"' he repeated slowly. "An' how do I make
thim swim? I wonder does Cousin Mike take th' goat t' be a fish,
or what? I wonder does he take swimmin' to be wan of th'
accomplishments of th' goat?" He shook his head in puzzlement,
and frowned at the telegram. "Would he be havin' a goat regatta,
I wonder, or was he expectin' th' goat t' be a web-footed animal?
'Won't swim!' he repeated angrily. 'Won't swim!' An' what is it
to me if they won't swim? Nayther would I swim if I was a goat.
'Tis none of me affair if they will not swim. There was nawthin'
said about 'swimmin' goats.' Goats I can give him, an' dongola
goats I can give him, an jumpin' goats, an' climbin' goats, an'
walkin' goats, but 'tis not in me line t'furnish submarine goats.