Page:The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle.djvu/238

 through the giant seaweed forests of the Indian Ocean, seeking the delicious eggs of the pop-pop! To play hide-and-seek among the castles of the coral towns with their pearl and jasper windows spangling the floor of the Spanish Main! To picnic in the anemone-meadows, dim blue and lilac-gray, that lie in the lowlands beyond the South Sea Garden! To throw somersaults on the springy sponge-beds of the Mexican Gulf! To poke about among the dead ships and see what wonders and adventures lie inside!—And then, on winter nights when the Northeaster whips the water into froth, to swoop down and down to get away from the cold, down to where the water's warm and dark, down and still down, till we spy the twinkle of the fire-eels far below where our friends and cousins sit chatting round the Council Grotto—chatting, Brother, over the news and gossip of the Sea! … Oh—'

"And then she broke down completely, sniffling.

"'Stop it!' I said. 'You make me homesick. Look here: let's pretend we're sick—or better still, let's pretend we're dead; and see what happens. If they throw us on a rubbish-heap and we fry in the sun, we'll not be much worse off than we are here in this smelly prison. What do you say? Will you risk it?'

"'I will,' she said—'and gladly.'

"So next morning two fidgits were found by the keeper floating on the top of the water in their