day when all the goats were grazing in the pasture, Billy looked up and saw coming toward them the farmer and a large, fat man.
"What can they want?" thought Billy. "I guess I will walk out and meet them and hear what they are talking about."
As he came within hearing distance, he heard the farmer say: "Here he comes now, the one I was telling you about and I don't think you will have any trouble in teaching him anything you want to, for he seems very smart and not afraid of 'Old Nick' himself."
"That is good," said the circus-man, "for a timid goat is no good in a circus where they have to be with all the other animals."
"So," thought Billy, "this is a man from the circus up in town and he is thinking of buying me and making me perform in his circus. Well, I guess not," and he kicked up his heels in their faces and skipped off to the other side of the stream where they could not get him.
"It takes three to make a bargain where there is a goat in the case," said Billy to himself, "and I will give them a good chase if they try to catch me. And should they catch me, I pity the men and animals at the circus when I get there for I shall use my sharp horns to advantage and split a hole in their old tent and come back to Nanny. Now they are looking at Satan, maybe the man will buy him. No, I am afraid he won't for he is shaking his head and pointing at me and here they come. The farmer is holding out his hand as if he had something in it for me to eat. Oh, no, Mr. Farmer, I am too old a goat to be caught with chaff. However, I will stand still on this side of the stream and see what they will do."
And there Billy stood with his head raised waiting for them and he made as fine a picture of a goat as you ever saw, standing on a little green knoll with the silvery stream running at his feet.
The circus-man was delighted with him for he was almost twice the size of any other goat he had ever seen, and he thought how fine he would look dressed up as a professor with his long, silky beard.
By this time the men were directly opposite Billy and he noticed that the circus-man kept his hands behind him all the time, but presently he drew them forward and in one he held a rope with a long loop in it.
"So, ho," thought Billy, "he expects to tie that rope around my neck, does he? Well, let him cross the stream and catch me first."