The Classic Children's Literature Collection: 39 Classic Novels

by Various Authors

  ‘But I am Tortoise,’ said Slow-and-Solid. Your mother was quite right. She said that you were to scoop me out of my shell with your paw. Begin.’

  ‘You didn’t say she said that a minute ago, said Painted Jaguar, sucking the prickles out of his paddy-paw. ‘You said she said something quite different.’

  ‘Well, suppose you say that I said that she said something quite different, I don’t see that it makes any difference; because if she said what you said I said she said, it’s just the same as if I said what she said she said. On the other hand, if you think she said that you were to uncoil me with a scoop, instead of pawing me into drops with a shell, I can’t help that, can I?’

  ‘But you said you wanted to be scooped out of your shell with my paw,’ said Painted Jaguar.

  ‘If you’ll think again you’ll find that I didn’t say anything of the kind. I said that your mother said that you were to scoop me out of my shell,’ said Slow-and-Solid.

  ‘What will happen if I do?’ said the Jaguar most sniffily and most cautious.

  ‘I don’t know, because I’ve never been scooped out of my shell before; but I tell you truly, if you want to see me swim away you’ve only got to drop me into the water.

  ‘I don’t believe it,’ said Painted Jaguar. ‘You’ve mixed up all the things my mother told me to do with the things that you asked me whether I was sure that she didn’t say, till I don’t know whether I’m on my head or my painted tail; and now you come and tell me something I can understand, and it makes me more mixy than before. My mother told me that I was to drop one of you two into the water, and as you seem so anxious to be dropped I think you don’t want to be dropped. So jump into the turbid Amazon and be quick about it.’

  ‘I warn you that your Mummy won’t be pleased. Don’t tell her I didn’t tell you,’ said Slow-Solid.

  ‘If you say another word about what my mother said—’ the Jaguar answered, but he had not finished the sentence before Slow-and-Solid quietly dived into the turbid Amazon, swam under water for a long way, and came out on the bank where Stickly-Prickly was waiting for him.

  ‘That was a very narrow escape,’ said Stickly-Prickly. ‘I don’t rib Painted Jaguar. What did you tell him that you were?’

  ‘I told him truthfully that I was a truthful Tortoise, but he wouldn’t believe it, and he made me jump into the river to see if I was, and I was, and he is surprised. Now he’s gone to tell his Mummy. Listen to him!’

  They could hear Painted Jaguar roaring up and down among the trees and the bushes by the side of the turbid Amazon, till his Mummy came.

  ‘Son, son!’ said his mother ever so many times, graciously waving her tail, ‘what have you been doing that you shouldn’t have done?’

  ‘I tried to scoop something that said it wanted to be scooped out of its shell with my paw, and my paw is full of per-ickles,’ said Painted Jaguar.

  ‘Son, son!’ said his mother ever so many times, graciously waving her tail, ‘by the prickles in your paddy-paw I see that that must have been a Hedgehog. You should have dropped him into the water.

  ‘I did that to the other thing; and he said he was a Tortoise, and I didn’t believe him, and it was quite true, and he has dived under the turbid Amazon, and he won’t come up again, and I haven’t anything at all to eat, and I think we had better find lodgings somewhere else. They are too clever on the turbid Amazon for poor me!’

  ‘Son, son!’ said his mother ever so many times, graciously waving her tail, ‘now attend to me and remember what I say. A Hedgehog curls himself up into a ball and his prickles stick out every which way at once. By this you may know the Hedgehog.’

  ‘I don’t like this old lady one little bit,’ said Stickly-Prickly, under the shadow of a large leaf. ‘I wonder what else she knows?’

  ‘A Tortoise can’t curl himself up,’ Mother Jaguar went on, ever so many times, graciously waving her tail. ‘He only draws his head and legs into his shell. By this you may know the tortoise.’

  ‘I don’t like this old lady at all—at all,’ said Slow-and-Solid Tortoise. ‘Even Painted Jaguar can’t forget those directions. It’s a great pity that you can’t swim, Stickly-Prickly.’

  ‘Don’t talk to me,’ said Stickly-Prickly. ‘Just think how much better it would be if you could curl up. This is a mess! Listen to Painted Jaguar.’

  Painted Jaguar was sitting on the banks of the turbid Amazon sucking prickles out of his Paws and saying to himself—

  ‘Can’t curl, but can swim—

  Slow-Solid, that’s him!

  Curls up, but can’t swim—

  Stickly-Prickly, that’s him!’

  ‘He’ll never forget that this month of Sundays,’ said Stickly-Prickly. ‘Hold up my chin, Slow-and-Solid. I’m going to try to learn to swim. It may be useful.’

  ‘Excellent!’ said Slow-and-Solid; and he held up Stickly-Prickly’s chin, while Stickly-Prickly kicked in the waters of the turbid Amazon.

  ‘You’ll make a fine swimmer yet,’ said Slow-and-Solid. ‘Now, if you can unlace my back-plates a little, I’ll see what I can do towards curling up. It may be useful.’

  Stickly-Prickly helped to unlace Tortoise’s back-plates, so that by twisting and straining Slow-and-Solid actually managed to curl up a tiddy wee bit.

  ‘Excellent!’ said Stickly-Prickly; ‘but I shouldn’t do any more just now. It’s making you black in the face. Kindly lead me into the water once again and I’ll practice that side-stroke which you say is so easy.’ And so Stickly-Prickly practiced, and Slow-Solid swam alongside.

  ‘Excellent!’ said Slow-and-Solid. ‘A little more practice will make you a regular whale. Now, if I may trouble you to unlace my back and front plates two holes more, I’ll try that fascinating bend that you say is so easy. Won’t Painted Jaguar be surprised!’

  ‘Excellent!’ said Stickly-Prickly, all wet from the turbid Amazon. ‘I declare, I shouldn’t know you from one of my own family. Two holes, I think, you said? A little more expression, please, and don’t grunt quite so much, or Painted Jaguar may hear us. When you’ve finished, I want to try that long dive which you say is so easy. Won’t Painted Jaguar be surprised!’

  And so Stickly-Prickly dived, and Slow-and-Solid dived alongside.

  ‘Excellent!’ said Slow-and-Solid. ‘A leetle more attention to holding your breath and you will be able to keep house at the bottom of the turbid Amazon. Now I’ll try that exercise of putting my hind legs round my ears which you say is so peculiarly comfortable. Won’t Painted Jaguar be surprised!’

  ‘Excellent!’ said Stickly-Prickly. ‘But it’s straining your back-plates a little. They are all overlapping now, instead of lying side by side.’

  ‘Oh, that’s the result of exercise,’ said Slow-and-Solid. ‘I’ve noticed that your prickles seem to be melting into one another, and that you’re growing to look rather more like a pinecone, and less like a chestnut-burr, than you used to.’

  ‘Am I?’ said Stickly-Prickly. ‘That comes from my soaking in the water. Oh, won’t Painted Jaguar be surprised!’

  They went on with their exercises, each helping the other, till morning came; and when the sun was high they rested and dried themselves. Then they saw that they were both of them quite different from what they had been.

  ‘Stickly-Prickly,’ said Tortoise after breakfast, ‘I am not what I was yesterday; but I think that I may yet amuse Painted Jaguar.

  ‘That was the very thing I was thinking just now,’ said Stickly-Prickly. ‘I think scales are a tremendous improvement on prickles—to say nothing of being able to swim. Oh, won’t Painted Jaguar be surprised! Let’s go and find him.’

  By and by they found Painted Jaguar, still nursing his paddy-paw that had been hurt the night before. He was so astonished that he fell three times backward over his own painted tail without stopping.

  ‘Good morning!’ sa
id Stickly-Prickly. ‘And how is your dear gracious Mummy this morning?’

  ‘She is quite well, thank you,’ said Painted Jaguar; ‘but you must forgive me if I do not at this precise moment recall your name.’

  ‘That’s unkind of you,’ said Stickly-Prickly, ‘seeing that this time yesterday you tried to scoop me out of my shell with your paw.’

  ‘But you hadn’t any shell. It was all prickles,’ said Painted Jaguar. ‘I know it was. Just look at my paw!’

  ‘You told me to drop into the turbid Amazon and be drowned,’ said Slow-Solid. ‘Why are you so rude and forgetful to-day?’

  ‘Don’t you remember what your mother told you?’ said Stickly-Prickly,—

  ‘Can’t curl, but can swim—

  Stickly-Prickly, that’s him!

  Curls up, but can’t swim—

  Slow-Solid, that’s him!’

  Then they both curled themselves up and rolled round and round Painted Jaguar till his eyes turned truly cart-wheels in his head.

  Then he went to fetch his mother.

  ‘Mother,’ he said, ‘there are two new animals in the woods to-day, and the one that you said couldn’t swim, swims, and the one that you said couldn’t curl up, curls; and they’ve gone shares in their prickles, I think, because both of them are scaly all over, instead of one being smooth and the other very prickly; and, besides that, they are rolling round and round in circles, and I don’t feel comfy.’

  ‘Son, son!’ said Mother Jaguar ever so many times, graciously waving her tail, ‘a Hedgehog is a Hedgehog, and can’t be anything but a Hedgehog; and a Tortoise is a Tortoise, and can never be anything else.’

  ‘But it isn’t a Hedgehog, and it isn’t a Tortoise. It’s a little bit of both, and I don’t know its proper name.’

  ‘Nonsense!’ said Mother Jaguar. ‘Everything has its proper name. I should call it “Armadillo” till I found out the real one. And I should leave it alone.’

  So Painted Jaguar did as he was told, especially about leaving them alone; but the curious thing is that from that day to this, O Best Beloved, no one on the banks of the turbid Amazon has ever called Stickly-Prickly and Slow-Solid anything except Armadillo. There are Hedgehogs and Tortoises in other places, of course (there are some in my garden); but the real old and clever kind, with their scales lying lippety-lappety one over the other, like pine-cone scales, that lived on the banks of the turbid Amazon in the High and Far-Off Days, are always called Armadillos, because they were so clever.

  So that; all right, Best Beloved. Do you see?

  I’VE never sailed the Amazon,

  I’ve never reached Brazil;

  But the Don and Magdelana,

  They can go there when they will!

  Yes, weekly from Southampton,

  Great steamers, white and gold,

  Go rolling down to Rio

  (Roll down—roll down to Rio!)

  And I’d like to roll to Rio

  Some day before I’m old!

  I’ve never seen a Jaguar,

  Nor yet an Armadill

  O dilloing in his armour,

  And I s’pose I never will,

  Unless I go to Rio

  These wonders to behold—

  Roll down—roll down to Rio—

  Roll really down to Rio!

  Oh, I’d love to roll to Rio

  Some day before I’m old!

  HOW THE FIRST LETTER WAS WRITTEN

  ONCE upon a most early time was a Neolithic man. He was not a Jute or an Angle, or even a Dravidian, which he might well have been, Best Beloved, but never mind why. He was a Primitive, and he lived cavily in a Cave, and he wore very few clothes, and he couldn’t read and he couldn’t write and he didn’t want to, and except when he was hungry he was quite happy. His name was Tegumai Bopsulai, and that means, ‘Man-who-does-not-put-his-foot-forward-in-a-hurry’; but we, O Best Beloved, will call him Tegumai, for short. And his wife’s name was Teshumai Tewindrow, and that means, ‘Lady-who-asks-a-very-many-questions’; but we, O Best Beloved, will call her Teshumai, for short. And his little girl-daughter’s name was Taffimai Metallumai, and that means, ‘Small-person-without-any-manners-who-ought-to-be-spanked’; but I’m going to call her Taffy. And she was Tegumai Bopsulai’s Best Beloved and her own Mummy’s Best Beloved, and she was not spanked half as much as was good for her; and they were all three very happy. As soon as Taffy could run about she went everywhere with her Daddy Tegumai, and sometimes they would not come home to the Cave till they were hungry, and then Teshumai Tewindrow would say, ‘Where in the world have you two been to, to get so shocking dirty? Really, my Tegumai, you’re no better than my Taffy.’

  Now attend and listen!

  One day Tegumai Bopsulai went down through the beaver-swamp to the Wagai river to spear carp-fish for dinner, and Taffy went too. Tegumai’s spear was made of wood with shark’s teeth at the end, and before he had caught any fish at all he accidentally broke it clean across by jabbing it down too hard on the bottom of the river. They were miles and miles from home (of course they had their lunch with them in a little bag), and Tegumai had forgotten to bring any extra spears.

  ‘Here’s a pretty kettle of fish!’ said Tegumai. ‘It will take me half the day to mend this.’

  ‘There’s your big black spear at home,’ said Taffy. ‘Let me run back to the Cave and ask Mummy to give it me.’

  ‘It’s too far for your little fat legs,’ said Tegumai. ‘Besides, you might fall into the beaver-swamp and be drowned. We must make the best of a bad job.’ He sat down and took out a little leather mendy-bag, full of reindeer-sinews and strips of leather, and lumps of bee’s-wax and resin, and began to mend the spear.

  Taffy sat down too, with her toes in the water and her chin in her hand, and thought very hard. Then she said—’I say, Daddy, it’s an awful nuisance that you and I don’t know how to write, isn’t it? If we did we could send a message for the new spear.’

  ‘Taffy,’ said Tegumai, ‘how often have I told you not to use slang? “Awful” isn’t a pretty word, but it could be a convenience, now you mention it, if we could write home.’

  Just then a Stranger-man came along the river, but he belonged to a far tribe, the Tewaras, and he did not understand one word of Tegumai’s language. He stood on the bank and smiled at Taffy, because he had a little girl-daughter Of his own at home. Tegumai drew a hank of deer-sinews from his mendy-bag and began to mend his spear.

  ‘Come here, said Taffy. ‘Do you know where my Mummy lives?’ And the Stranger-man said ‘Um!’ being, as you know, a Tewara.

  ‘Silly!’ said Taffy, and she stamped her foot, because she saw a shoal of very big carp going up the river just when her Daddy couldn’t use his spear.

  ‘Don’t bother grown-ups,’ said Tegumai, so busy with his spear-mending that he did not turn round.

  ‘I aren’t, said Taffy. ‘I only want him to do what I want him to do, and he won’t understand.’

  ‘Then don’t bother me, said Tegumai, and he went on pulling and straining at the deer-sinews with his mouth full of loose ends. The Stranger-man—a genuine Tewara he was—sat down on the grass, and Taffy showed him what her Daddy was doing. The Stranger-man thought, this is a very wonderful child. She stamps her foot at me and she makes faces. She must be the daughter of that noble Chief who is so great that he won’t take any notice of me.’ So he smiled more politely than ever.

  ‘Now,’ said Taffy, ‘I want you to go to my Mummy, because your legs are longer than mine, and you won’t fall into the beaver-swamp, and ask for Daddy’s other spear—the one with the black handle that hangs over our fireplace.’

  The Stranger-man (and he was a Tewara) thought, ‘This is a very, very wonderful child. She waves her arms and she shouts at me, but I don’t understand a word of what she says. But if I don’t do wh
at she wants, I greatly fear that that haughty Chief, Man-who-turns-his-back-on-callers, will be angry.’ He got up and twisted a big flat piece of bark off a birch-tree and gave it to Taffy. He did this, Best Beloved, to show that his heart was as white as the birch-bark and that he meant no harm; but Taffy didn’t quite understand.

  ‘Oh!’ said she. ‘Now I see! You want my Mummy’s living-address? Of course I can’t write, but I can draw pictures if I’ve anything sharp to scratch with. Please lend me the shark’s tooth off your necklace.’

  The Stranger-man (and he was a Tewara) didn’t say anything, So Taffy put up her little hand and pulled at the beautiful bead and seed and shark-tooth necklace round his neck.

  The Stranger-man (and he was a Tewara) thought, ‘This is a very, very, very wonderful child. The shark’s tooth on my necklace is a magic shark’s tooth, and I was always told that if anybody touched it without my leave they would immediately swell up or burst, but this child doesn’t swell up or burst, and that important Chief, Man-who-attends-strictly-to-his-business, who has not yet taken any notice of me at all, doesn’t seem to be afraid that she will swell up or burst. I had better be more polite.’

  So he gave Taffy the shark’s tooth, and she lay down flat on her tummy with her legs in the air, like some people on the drawing-room floor when they want to draw pictures, and she said, ‘Now I’ll draw you some beautiful pictures! You can look over my shoulder, but you mustn’t joggle. First I’ll draw Daddy fishing. It isn’t very like him; but Mummy will know, because I’ve drawn his spear all broken. Well, now I’ll draw the other spear that he wants, the black-handled spear. It looks as if it was sticking in Daddy’s back, but that’s because the shark’s tooth slipped and this piece of bark isn’t big enough. That’s the spear I want you to fetch; so I’ll draw a picture of me myself ‘splaining to you. My hair doesn’t stand up like I’ve drawn, but it’s easier to draw that way. Now I’ll draw you. I think you’re very nice really, but I can’t make you pretty in the picture, so you mustn’t be ‘fended. Are you ‘fended?’