house with the bright red sides, took the color as a personalinsult to himself. Down went his head and up went his heels, and inanother minute he would have bounced right into poor Mr. Timmy Timmens'dwelling, when one of the drivers saw him, and rushing up, gave him agood whack with his whip. Master Bull turned round to see what was topay; in an instant his tail was caught in the door as I told you,and, frightened half out of his wits, he galloped off, dragging thelittle house on wheels after him, and roaring with pain, while thedrivers looked on, roaring with laughter.
THE MAD BULL.]
Meanwhile, the little old man remained standing on one leg, not daringto open his eyes, for fear the charm would be broken, and only wishingthat the little old woman were with him. At last the house stopped,moving with another jerk, that sent the little old man toppling back inhis rocking chair, and a moment afterward the door was opened a littlebit, and a strange voice said, "Well, here we are at the village, oldgentleman, begging your pardon," and then all was silent.
Up jumped the little old man, opening his eyes very wide this time,hobbled to the door, and looked out. There, sure enough, he was, in thepleasant, shady village street, with the church directly opposite, sonice for Sundays, and nothing to be seen but a drove of cows and oxengoing down the road at some distance!
"Well, was there ever anything known like this?" cried Mr. TimmyTimmens. "If this isn't the most wonderful fairy doings I ever heard of!I must go right off to find Polly, and tell her the happy news."
So saying, he went down the bright yellow steps, carefully shut thebright blue door behind him, and toddled off as fast as he could to thecommon.
Now the little old woman, before she had finished digging up thepotatuses, found the sun very warm and herself very sleepy, and thinkingher husband would be sure to call her when twelve o'clock came, she justgot under the shade of the tomatuses, and went off in a nice nap. Whenshe woke, she jumped up in a hurry, exclaiming, "Why, bless me--howcould I have forgotten about twelve o'clock? I must make haste into thehouse this minute." But where was the house? The little old woman staredall around until she nearly stared her eyes out, but it was nowhere tobe seen.
"Why, my goodness gracious, stars, and what's-his-names!" squealed thelittle old woman, letting fall her knife and basket; "where has thehouse runned to? Timmy must have tried the fairy charm without evertelling me! I mean to go right to the village and see if it is there."
So she gathered up her basket and knife, stuffed the basket, and herapron, and her pockets with all the vegetables she could carry, andstarted off for the village. Before she was half way there, however, shemet her husband. "Where is it?" "There it is!" they called at the samemoment, and falling into each other's arms and a mud puddle, they stoodfor a long time, saying by turns: "Did you ever?" "No, I never!" "Wouldyou believe it?" "Not 'less I see'd it!" and then they took hold ofhands and trotted off to the little house that ran on wheels.
There they found it, all high and dry, under a big apple tree, lookingas nice as ninepence. With joyful hearts they hurried inside, picked upthe saucepans, and cooked all the tomatuses and potatuses for dinner,with an apple dumpling for dessert, made of some of the apples that hadfallen off the tree; and after that, the little old man and the littleold woman, and the bright green blinds, and the bright red walls, andthe bright blue door with the bright brass knocker, and the brightyellow steps, all lived in peace and the middle of the village,believing more firmly than ever in the existence of fairies, and neverdoubting that their house had been moved solely by the miraculous powerof the fairy spell,
"Rorum corum torum snorum, Highcum tickleme cockolorum!"
And if they're not dead they live there still! Don't you believe it?Well I NEVER did!
THE END OF THE FOURTH BOOK.
* * * * *
Transcriber's Note:
Obvious punctuation errors repaired.
Page 18, the indentation of the third line on the stanza that begins, "Ican go, on busy feet" was adjusted to match the rest of the poem'slayout. The original looked like:
"I can go, on busy feet, Errands for her all day through; Work for her, I feel, is sweet-- This can 'ittle Luly do!
Page 50, "_himed" changed to "chimed" (chimed both the little)
Page 68, "barege" changed to "barege" (barege dress, trimmed)
Page 74, there is a closing quote after Mrs. Montague speaks.Although there is no opening quote, the closing quote indicates thatshe's no longer speaking so it was retained.
Page 76, "acommodated" changed to "accomodated" (Miss Morris wasaccomodated)
Page 104, "litle" changed to "little" (little old tea tray)
Page 105, "throught" changed to "through" (through the wall)
Funny Little Socks Page 10