Page:The water-babies.djvu/110

THE WATER BABIES And what was the oddest of all, the whisks at the end of his tail had grown five times as long as they were before.

"Ah!" said he, "now I will see the gay world. My living won't cost me much, for I have no mouth, you see, and no inside, so I can never be hungry nor have the stomach-ache, neither."

No more he had. He had grown as dry and hard and empty as a quill, as such silly, shallow-hearted fellows deserve to grow.

But, instead of being ashamed of his emptiness, he was quite proud of it, as a good many fine gentlemen are, and began flirting and flipping up and down, and singing—

And he danced up and down for three days and three nights, till he grew so tired that he tumbled into the water, and floated down. But what became of him, Tom never knew, and he himself never minded, for Tom heard him singing to the last as he floated down—

And if he did not care, why, nobody else cared either.

But one day Tom had a new adventure. He was sitting on a water-lily leaf, he and his friend the dragon-fly, watching the gnats dance. The dragon-fly had eaten 92