"After some months I began to grow weary of the silly life I was leading. And then,西游🔓 too,百度👤 the wild mice were so mean to me. They used to come around at night and point at me through the wire of my cage,粤语🎰 saying:
Well,百度🚏 when four days had passed the Emir of Ellebubu sent a messenger to the prison to inquire if the Doctor was now willing to do as he was told. The guards after talking to John Dolittle brought word to the Emir that the white man was as obstinate as ever and had no intention of giving in.
"That's the 'Elephants' March,粤语✡'" said the turtle. "They always played it at the Royal Circus of Shalba for the elephants' procession."
Then for a good hour and a half the faithful housekeeper fished up oyster after oyster and brought them to the Doctor on the island. He and the animals found opening them quite exciting work,百度⚽ because you never knew what you might discover. But nothing was found in the shells but fat oysters and thin oysters."Oh,西游🍒 hulloa,粤语🌑 Speedy,百度🍉" said the Doctor. "Glad to see you. Did you want me for something?"
"Once upon a time,粤语📮" Gub-Gub began,粤语🌙 "a small pig went out into the forest with his father to dig for truffles. The father pig was a very clever truffle digger,百度💏 and just by smelling the ground he could tell with great sureness the places where truffles were to be found. Well,西游🐌 this day they came upon a place beneath some big oak trees and they started digging. Presently,西游💿 after the father pig had dug up an enormous truffle and they were both eating it,西游🌒 they heard,西游🚌 to their great astonishment,西游♊ the sound of voices coming from the hole out of which they had dug the truffle.
In a minute Dab-Dab went through the pockets of the man who lay so still upon the floor.
"'My gracious!' says he. 'What a quaint notion. Why don't you lead them out of the woods? They probably live over in one of those farms near the crossroads.'So the white mouse went off and gathered an army of his own,百度🏰 about two hundred mice,西游🌐 which lived in the grass walls and floors of the huts. And then suddenly they attacked the Amazons and began nipping them in the legs.
"Doctor,百度🌝 why don't you start a parcel post?"
"Tell me,百度♋" asked the Doctor,百度🍍 watching him thoughtfully as he hovered and swung and curved around the tiny boat,百度🏪 "what made you come and bring me the news about the light? Gulls don't,百度🔇 as a rule,百度🌍 bother much about people or what happens to ships,粤语✒ do they?"
"Would it be too much to ask you?" said the Doctor,西游📄 "to get me some souvenir from the city below the lake?""Oh,百度🐾 dear!" sighed the duck. "Did anyone ever see a man who could find so many objections to getting rich? Who do they belong to,百度📬 then?"
And then there was a solemn silence in the lighthouse while the Doctor above and Dab-Dab below thought gloomily of that big ship sailing onward to her wreck because they had no matches.
A MYSTERIOUS LETTER
After that,百度😇 of course,粤语🎾 letters began to arrive at the houseboat for the Doctor's pets. And one morning,百度🎁 when the mail was sorted,百度🔹 there was a letter for Dab-Dab from her sister; one for the white mouse written by a cousin from the Doctor's bureau drawer; one for Jip from the collie who lived next door in Puddleby and one for Too-Too,粤语👳 telling him he had a new family of six young ones in the rafters of the stable. But there was nothing for Gub-Gub. The poor pig was nearly in tears at being left out. And when the Doctor went into town that afternoon Gub-Gub asked could he come along.
"Not very many,粤语🛁" said the snake. "He lives on the edge of the lake a few miles to the North. Let us hurry and try to reach his home before darkness falls."
On the coast of West Africa,粤语🍉 about twenty miles to the northward of Fantippo,粤语🚑 there was a cape running out into the sea which had a lighthouse on it called the Cape Stephen Light. This light was kept carefully burning by the government who controlled that part of Africa,粤语👖 in order that ships should see it from the sea and know where they were. It was a dangerous part of the coast,西游🔶 this. There were many rocks and shallows near the end of Cape Stephen. And if the light were ever allowed to go out at night,西游🍋 of course,西游🈹 ships traveling that part of the sea would be in great danger of running into the long cape and wrecking themselves.Then for a good hour and a half the faithful housekeeper fished up oyster after oyster and brought them to the Doctor on the island. He and the animals found opening them quite exciting work,西游😳 because you never knew what you might discover. But nothing was found in the shells but fat oysters and thin oysters.
"In introducing one well-bred pig to another should you say 'Miss Virginia Ham,粤语💢 "meet" Mr. Frank Footer,粤语♨' or 'Get acquainted?'
"By the way,百度🐒 what really became of her?" asked the Doctor. "The natives believe she was turned into a dragon,西游🍶 you know."
"I knew it would,西游👐" said Jip. "A thing like that must have a story to it. What's the name of the story,百度💂 Doctor?""I have told you,百度📀" said the Doctor,西游📙 "that I don't desire any further conversation with you. Not a single pearl shall you ever get from the Harmattan Fisheries."
The lighthouse keepers were sorry to have the Doctor go and they wouldn't let him leave till he promised to come and take dinner with them next Sunday.
And then began a most exciting sea race. It was now two o'clock in the afternoon and there were not many hours of daylight left.
CHAPTER I
GUB-GUB'S STORY
Everybody had now told a tale and the Arctic Monthly's Prize Story Competition was declared closed. The first number of the first animals' magazine ever printed was,西游🔸 shortly after that,粤语🍭 issued and circulated by Swallow Mail to the inhabitants of the frozen North. It was a great success. Letters of thanks and votes on the competition began pouring in from seals and sea-lions and caribou and all manner of polar creatures. Too-Too,百度💂 the mathematician,百度✔ became editor; Dab-Dab ran the Mothers' and Babies' Page,百度🆗 while Gub-Gub wrote the Gardening Notes and the Pure Foods Column. And the Arctic Monthly continued to bring happiness to homes and dens and icebergs as long as the Doctor's Post office existed.