Just so stories
At this, O Best Beloved, the Elephant’s Child was much annoyed, and he
said, speaking through his nose, like this, ‘Led go! You are hurtig be!’
Then the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake scuffled down from the bank and
said, ‘My young friend, if you do not now, immediately and instantly,
pull as hard as ever you can, it is my opinion that your acquaintance in
the large-pattern leather ulster’ (and by this he meant the Crocodile)
‘will jerk you into yonder limpid stream before you can say Jack
Robinson.’
This is the way Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snakes always talk.
Then the Elephant’s Child sat back on his little haunches, and pulled,
and pulled, and pulled, and his nose began to stretch. And the Crocodile
floundered into the water, making it all creamy with great sweeps of his
tail, and he pulled, and pulled, and pulled.
And the Elephant’s Child’s nose kept on stretching; and the Elephant’s
Child spread all his little four legs and pulled, and pulled, and
pulled, and his nose kept on stretching; and the Crocodile threshed his
tail like an oar, and he pulled, and pulled, and pulled, and at each
pull the Elephant’s Child’s nose grew longer and longer--and it hurt him
hijjus!
Then the Elephant’s Child felt his legs slipping, and he said through
his nose, which was now nearly five feet long, ‘This is too butch for
be!’
Then the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake came down from the bank, and
knotted himself in a double-clove-hitch round the Elephant’s Child’s
hind legs, and said, ‘Rash and inexperienced traveller, we will now
seriously devote ourselves to a little high tension, because if we do
not, it is my impression that yonder self-propelling man-of-war with
the armour-plated upper deck’ (and by this, O Best Beloved, he meant the
Crocodile), ‘will permanently vitiate your future career.
That is the way all Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snakes always talk.
So he pulled, and the Elephant’s Child pulled, and the Crocodile pulled;
but the Elephant’s Child and the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake pulled
hardest; and at last the Crocodile let go of the Elephant’s Child’s nose
with a plop that you could hear all up and down the Limpopo.
Then the Elephant’s Child sat down most hard and sudden; but first he
was careful to say ‘Thank you’ to the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake; and
next he was kind to his poor pulled nose, and wrapped it all up in cool
banana leaves, and hung it in the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo to
cool.
‘What are you doing that for?’ said the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake.
‘’Scuse me,’ said the Elephant’s Child, ‘but my nose is badly out of
shape, and I am waiting for it to shrink.
‘Then you will have to wait a long time, said the
Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake. ‘Some people do not know what is good for
them.’
The Elephant’s Child sat there for three days waiting for his nose to
shrink. But it never grew any shorter, and, besides, it made him squint.
For, O Best Beloved, you will see and understand that the Crocodile
had pulled it out into a really truly trunk same as all Elephants have
to-day.
At the end of the third day a fly came and stung him on the shoulder,
and before he knew what he was doing he lifted up his trunk and hit that
fly dead with the end of it.
‘’Vantage number one!’ said the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake. ‘You
couldn’t have done that with a mere-smear nose. Try and eat a little
now.’
Before he thought what he was doing the Elephant’s Child put out his
trunk and plucked a large bundle of grass, dusted it clean against his
fore-legs, and stuffed it into his own mouth.
‘Vantage number two!’ said the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake. ‘You
couldn’t have done that with a mear-smear nose. Don’t you think the sun
is very hot here?’
‘It is,’ said the Elephant’s Child, and before he thought what he was
doing he schlooped up a schloop of mud from the banks of the great
grey-green, greasy Limpopo, and slapped it on his head, where it made a
cool schloopy-sloshy mud-cap all trickly behind his ears.
‘Vantage number three!’ said the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake. ‘You
couldn’t have done that with a mere-smear nose. Now how do you feel
about being spanked again?’
‘’Scuse me,’ said the Elephant’s Child, ‘but I should not like it at
all.’
‘How would you like to spank somebody?’ said the
Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake.
‘I should like it very much indeed,’ said the Elephant’s Child.
‘Well,’ said the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake, ‘you will find that new
nose of yours very useful to spank people with.’
‘Thank you,’ said the Elephant’s Child, ‘I’ll remember that; and now I
think I’ll go home to all my dear families and try.’
So the Elephant’s Child went home across Africa frisking and whisking
his trunk. When he wanted fruit to eat he pulled fruit down from a tree,
instead of waiting for it to fall as he used to do. When he wanted grass
he plucked grass up from the ground, instead of going on his knees as he
used to do. When the flies bit him he broke off the branch of a tree
and used it as fly-whisk; and he made himself a new, cool, slushy-squshy
mud-cap whenever the sun was hot. When he felt lonely walking through
Africa he sang to himself down his trunk, and the noise was louder than
several brass bands.
He went especially out of his way to find a broad Hippopotamus (she was
no relation of his), and he spanked her very hard, to make sure that the
Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake had spoken the truth about his new trunk.
The rest of the time he picked up the melon rinds that he had dropped on
his way to the Limpopo--for he was a Tidy Pachyderm.
One dark evening he came back to all his dear families, and he coiled up
his trunk and said, ‘How do you do?’ They were very glad to see him,
and immediately said, ‘Come here and be spanked for your ‘satiable
curtiosity.’
‘Pooh,’ said the Elephant’s Child. ‘I don’t think you peoples know
anything about spanking; but I do, and I’ll show you.’ Then he uncurled
his trunk and knocked two of his dear brothers head over heels.
‘O Bananas!’ said they, ‘where did you learn that trick, and what have
you done to your nose?’
‘I got a new one from the Crocodile on the banks of the great
grey-green, greasy Limpopo River,’ said the Elephant’s Child. ‘I asked
him what he had for dinner, and he gave me this to keep.’
‘It looks very ugly,’ said his hairy uncle, the Baboon.
‘It does,’ said the Elephant’s Child. ‘But it’s very useful,’ and he
picked up his hairy uncle, the Baboon, by one hairy leg, and hove him
into a hornet’s nest.
Then that bad Elephant’s Child spanked all his dear families for a long
time, till they were very warm and greatly astonished. He pulled out
his tall Ostrich aunt’s tail-feathers; and he caught his tall uncle, the
Giraffe, by the hind-leg, and dragged him through a thorn-bush; and he
shouted at his broad aunt, the Hippopotamus, and blew bubbles into her
ear when she was sleeping in the water after meals; but he never let any
one touch Kolokolo Bird.
At last things grew so exciting that his dear families went off one
by one in a hurry to the banks of the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo
River, all set about with fever-trees, to borrow new noses from the
Crocodile. When they came back nobody spanked anybody any more; and ever
since that day, O Best Beloved, all the Elephants you will ever see,
besides all those that you won’t, have trunks precisely like the trunk
of the ‘satiable Elephant’s Child.
I Keep six honest serving-men:
(They taught me all I knew)
Their names are What and Where and When
And How and Why and Who.
I send them over land and sea,
I send them east and west;
But after they have worked for me,
I give them all a rest.
I let them rest from nine till five.
For I am busy then,
As well as breakfast, lunch, and tea,
For they are hungry men:
But different folk have different views:
I know a person small--
She keeps ten million serving-men,
Who get no rest at all!
She sends ‘em abroad on her own affairs,
From the second she opens her eyes--
One million Hows, two million Wheres,
And seven million Whys!
THE SING-SONG OF OLD MAN KANGAROO
NOT always was the Kangaroo as now we do behold him, but a Different
Animal with four short legs. He was grey and he was woolly, and
his pride was inordinate: he danced on an outcrop in the middle of
Australia, and he went to the Little God Nqa.
He went to Nqa at six before breakfast, saying, ‘Make me different from
all other animals by five this afternoon.’
Up jumped Nqa from his seat on the sandflat and shouted, ‘Go away!’
He was grey and he was woolly, and his pride was inordinate: he danced
on a rock-ledge in the middle of Australia, and he went to the Middle
God Nquing.
He went to Nquing at eight after breakfast, saying, ‘Make me different
from all other animals; make me, also, wonderfully popular by five this
afternoon.’
Up jumped Nquing from his burrow in the spinifex and shouted, ‘Go away!’
He was grey and he was woolly, and his pride was inordinate: he danced
on a sandbank in the middle of Australia, and he went to the Big God
Nqong.
He went to Nqong at ten before dinner-time, saying, ‘Make me different
from all other animals; make me popular and wonderfully run after by
five this afternoon.’
Up jumped Nqong from his bath in the salt-pan and shouted, ‘Yes, I
will!’
Nqong called Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--always hungry, dusty in the
sunshine, and showed him Kangaroo. Nqong said, ‘Dingo! Wake up, Dingo!
Do you see that gentleman dancing on an ashpit? He wants to be popular
and very truly run after. Dingo, make him SO!’
Up jumped Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--and said, ‘What, that cat-rabbit?’
Off ran Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--always hungry, grinning like a
coal-scuttle,--ran after Kangaroo.
Off went the proud Kangaroo on his four little legs like a bunny.
This, O Beloved of mine, ends the first part of the tale!
He ran through the desert; he ran through the mountains; he ran through
the salt-pans; he ran through the reed-beds; he ran through the blue
gums; he ran through the spinifex; he ran till his front legs ached.
He had to!
Still ran Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--always hungry, grinning like a
rat-trap, never getting nearer, never getting farther,--ran after
Kangaroo.
He had to!
Still ran Kangaroo--Old Man Kangaroo. He ran through the ti-trees; he
ran through the mulga; he ran through the long grass; he ran through the
short grass; he ran through the Tropics of Capricorn and Cancer; he ran
till his hind legs ached.
He had to!
Still ran Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--hungrier and hungrier, grinning like
a horse-collar, never getting nearer, never getting farther; and they
came to the Wollgong River.
Now, there wasn’t any bridge, and there wasn’t any ferry-boat, and
Kangaroo didn’t know how to get over; so he stood on his legs and
hopped.
He had to!
He hopped through the Flinders; he hopped through the Cinders; he
hopped through the deserts in the middle of Australia. He hopped like a
Kangaroo.
First he hopped one yard; then he hopped three yards; then he hopped
five yards; his legs growing stronger; his legs growing longer. He
hadn’t any time for rest or refreshment, and he wanted them very much.
Still ran Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--very much bewildered, very much
hungry, and wondering what in the world or out of it made Old Man
Kangaroo hop.
For he hopped like a cricket; like a pea in a saucepan; or a new rubber
ball on a nursery floor.
He had to!
He tucked up his front legs; he hopped on his hind legs; he stuck out
his tail for a balance-weight behind him; and he hopped through the
Darling Downs.
He had to!