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"Oh, yes," said the Doctor. "I know the island you mean. It's only a short distance from the mainland. But I hadn't heard that that was the name of it. Humph! If you'll lend me this bone a while, Jip, I think I'll go to see the King about it."
WEATHER BUREAUS
And now the Doctor set out with his animals and the old Chief to return to Nyam-Nyam's country from the land where he had been imprisoned. On the way they kept meeting with groups of the Chief's people who were still hiding in the jungle. These were told the glad tidings of the Emir's promise. When they learned that their land was now free and safe again the people joined the Doctor's party for the return journey. And long before he came in sight of the village John Dolittle looked like a conquering general coming back at the head of an army, so many had gathered to him on the way.
Another thing in which the Doctor's post office was peculiar was its pens. Most post offices, the Doctor had found, always had abominably bad pens that spluttered and scratched and wouldn't write. In fact very many post offices even nowadays seem to pride themselves on their bad pens. But the Doctor saw to it that his pens were of the very best quality. Of course, in those times there were no steel pens. Only quills were used. And John Dolittle got the albatrosses and the seagulls to keep for him their tail feathers which fell out in the moulting season. And of course, with such a lot of quills to choose from, it was easy to have the best pens in the post office.
"And, sure enough, he had hardly said the words before all over the king's garden parsnips began springing up thick and fast. Even the gravel walks were covered with them.
"Oh, certainly not," said John Dolittle. "No cow ever had a bone like that. That's a jawbut not a cow's jaw. Listen, Your Majesty, would you mind lending me a canoe and some paddlers? I want to go over to visit No-Man's-Land."
"How wonderful!" exclaimed the Doctor. "Let us push on. I am most anxious to see himand the Secret Lake."
"Well, I'm glad we were in time," said the bird.
"There you are," said the Doctor. "I always thought you birds had at least the beginnings of a written languageotherwise you couldn't be so clever. Now all we have to do is to build up on these signs a regular and proper system of bird-writing. And I have no doubt whatever that with the animals we can do the same thing. Then we'll get the Swallow Mail going and we'll have animals and birds writing letters to one another all over the worldand to people, too, if they want to."
"But what kind of work is invalids' work?" asked the white mouse.
"P. S.I have always worn my engagement ring in my nose. Is this the right place?"
"Mixing the turtle's medicine"
The next morning the Doctor was up early. After a light breakfast (it was impossible to get any other kind in that poverty-stricken country) he asked Nyam-Nyam the way to the Harmattan Rocks and the Chief told him they were just beyond sight from here, about an hour and a half's paddle straight out into the ocean.
By this time all the animals had heard Cheapside arriving and they came rushing in to see the traveler and to hear the news of Puddleby and England.
"The Doctor patted him on the shoulder"
"Not much chance of that, I'm afraid," said John Dolittle. "He will probably sell them the first chance he gets. That's all he wants them forfor the money they'll bring in. Whereas the young spoonbills appreciated their beauty. It's a shame they should lose themand when they were in my care, too. Wellit's no use crying over spilt milk. They're gone. That's all."
"Good morning," said the Doctor, cracking open the top of a hard-boiled egg. "What can I do for you?"
"Well," said the gull, "I suppose two great advantages we birds have over the sailors in telling when and where to expect bad weather are our good eyesight and our experience. For one thing, we can always rise high in the air and look over the sea for a distance of fifty or sixty miles. Then if we see gales approaching we can turn and run for it. And we can put on more speed than the fastest gale that ever blew. And then, another thing, our experience is so much better than sailors'. Sailors, poor duffers, think they know the seathat they spend their life on it. They don'tbelieve me, they don't. Half the time they spend in the cabin, part of the time they spend on shore and a lot of the time they spend sleeping. And even when they are on deck they're not always looking at the sea. They fiddle around with ropes and paint brushes and mops and buckets. You very seldom see a sailor looking at the sea."