Part 26 (1/2)

THE BADGERS AND THE HERRINGS.

There be three Badgers on a mossy stone, Beside a dark and covered way.

Each dreams himself a monarch on his throne, And so they stay and stay-- Though their old Father languishes alone, They stay, and stay, and stay.

There be three Herrings loitering around, Longing to share that mossy seat.

Each Herring tries to sing what she has found That makes life seem so sweet Thus, with a grating and uncertain sound, They bleat, and bleat, and bleat.

The Mother-Herring, on the salt sea-wave, Sought vainly for her absent ones; The Father-Badger, writhing in a cave, Shrieked out, ”Return, my sons!

You shall have buns,” he shrieked, ”if you'll behave!

Yea buns, and buns, and buns!”

”I fear,” said she, ”your sons have gone astray.

My daughters left me while I slept.”

”Yes'm,” the Badger said, ”it's as you say.

They should be better kept.”

Thus the poor parents talked the time away, And wept, and wept, and wept.

But the thoughtless young ones, who had wandered from home, are having a good time, a rollicking good time, for the _Herrings_ sing:

Oh, dear, beyond our dearest dreams, Fairer than all that fairest seems!

To feast the rosy hours away, To revel in a roundelay!

How blest would be A life so free-- Ipwergis pudding to consume And drink the subtle Azzigoom!

And if in other days and hours, 'Mid other fluffs and other flowers, The choice were given me how to dine-- ”Name what thou wilt: it shall be thine!”

Oh, then I see The life for me-- Ipwergis pudding to consume And drink the subtle Azzigoom!

The Badgers did not care to talk to Fish; They did not dote on Herrings' songs; They never had experienced the dish To which that name belongs.

”And, oh, to pinch their tails” (this was their wish) ”With tongs, yea, tongs, and tongs!”

”And are not these the Fish,” the eldest sighed, ”Whose mother dwells beneath the foam?”

”They _are_ the Fis.h.!.+” the second one replied, ”And they have left their home!”

”Oh, wicked Fish,” the youngest Badger cried, ”To roam, yea, roam, and roam!”

Gently the Badgers trotted to the sh.o.r.e-- The sandy sh.o.r.e that fringed the bay.

Each in his mouth a living Herring bore-- Those aged ones waxed gay.

Clear rang their voices through the ocean's roar.

”Hooray, hooray, hooray!'”

Most of Lewis Carroll's best nonsense rhymes abounded with all sorts of queer animals. In earlier years he had made quite a study of natural history, so that he knew enough about the habits of the animals who figured in his verses to make humorous portraits of them. Yet we know, apart from the earth-worms and snails of ”little boy” days, he never cared to cultivate their acquaintance except in a casual way. He was never unkind to them, and fought with all his might against vivisection (which in plain English means cutting up live animals for scientific purposes), as well as against the cruel pastime of English cross-country hunting, where one poor little fox is run to earth and torn in pieces by the savage hounds. Big hunting, where the object was a man-eating lion or some other animal which menaced human life, he heartily approved of, but wanton cruelty he could not abide. Yet the dog he might use every effort to save from the knife of science did not appeal to him as a pet; he preferred a nice, plump, rosy-cheeked, bright-eyed, ringleted little girl--if _she_ liked dogs, why, very well, only none of them in _his_ rooms, thank you!

These fairy children, _Sylvie_ and _Bruno_, travel many leagues in the story, for good fairies must be able to go from place to place very quickly. We find them in Elfland, and Outland, and even Dogland.

A quaint episode in this book is the loss of Queen t.i.tania's baby.

”We put it in a flower,” Sylvie explained, with her eyes full of tears.