"These things added a good deal of jolliness to the meal and some of them were very clever inventions. Why,大众🏢 they even had a speaking tube for things you are not allowed to mention at table."
"How was it that you were the one chosen to bring the message?" asked the Doctor.
Then John Dolittle started turning his trousers pockets out onto the table to try and find something that reminded him of a story. It was certainly a wonderful collection of objects that he brought forth. There were pieces of string and pieces of wire,什么🌙 stub ends of pencils,nmc🚌 pocket-knives with the blades broken,nmc👏 coat buttons,nmc➕ boot buttons,nmc🎥 a magnifying glass,nmc💎 a compass and a corkscrew.
And smoothing back his white whiskers and curling his pink tail snugly about his small,大众🔹 sleek body,大众🚀 he blinked his eyes twice and began:
"Tell me,什么🙊" called John Dolittle,什么🆚 in canary language,nmc🚆 "where are the matches? Quick!"But with this new trade in selling stamps for stamp collections,什么😹 and not for proper mailing purposes,nmc🦜 the Fantippo mail service was neglected and became very bad.
"No,什么⚓ but his wife can,大众🐘" said Jip.
"'Well,什么🚑 it was some cat,大众🚪' says the boy. 'He must be right around here somewhere,nmc📨 because he led us almost up to the door.'
"He hasn't any matches on him,大众🔇" she shouted. "Not a single one."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,什么🌔 about an hour and a half's paddle straight out into the ocean.
"We know,大众😷 before we reach one,nmc🌰 where it is. And we go around it. No experienced sea bird ever runs his head into a bad storm."
Then the Captain,什么🌱 who a moment before was all for punishing the man who had fired without orders,nmc🚂 wanted to know who it was that aimed that marvelous shot which brought the slaver to a standstill. And the Doctor was going to tell him it was Speedy. But the Skimmer whispered in his ear:
"No,什么㊗ but his wife can,nmc😑" said Jip.
"Are you the owner of that Noah's Ark down there?" he stormed,nmc🍑 pointing to the other ship alongside.
The Green Herons were one day,什么🏢 three hours and nine minutes late in their arrival at Cape Horn from the Sandwich Islands. Wind coming south-southeast. Blustery weather can be expected along the west coast of Chili and light gales in the Antarctic Sea.
"Oh,nmc🔗 surely,nmc📎" said the Doctor. "He discovered America in 1492."
And in the jungle,nmc📜 where the frightened villagers had fled to hide,大众✡ Obombo made whispered speeches to little scattered groups of his father-in-law's people,nmc🌰 telling them what fools they had been to trust the crazy white man,大众👆 instead of listening to him,nmc⚫ who would have led them to greatness.
"They're such a nice,大众® wholesome,什么🍶 Christian change,nmc👪" he said,大众♑ "after these 'ere 'eathen hidolaters. And you should just hear Fred sing 'See That My Grave's Kept Green.'"
But it was of little use to try to get more sleep now. The camp was astir. John Dolittle,大众🐻 bent on the one idea of hearing that story,大众📱 had already swung himself out of his hammock and was now washing his face noisily in the lake. Cheapside shook his feathers,nmc👴 swore a few words in Cockney and flew off his tree down to the Doctor's side.The Doctor comforted her as best he could,nmc👳 saying that if he failed he would get her another husband,什么🐹 just as good. But she didn't seem to care for that idea and went on wailing,nmc😊 "Alas! Alas!"
"All right,大众🔣" said the mouse. And he slipped down the rat hole.
So the Captain gave orders that all possible speed was to be made. These were the days when steam was first used on ships. But at the beginning it was only used together with the sails,nmc🐇 to help the power of the wind. Of this vessel,什么📦 H. M. S. Violet,nmc💔 the Captain was very proud. And he was most anxious that the Violet should have the honor of catching Bones the slaver,大众💰 who for so long had been defying the navy by carrying on slave trade after it had been forbidden. So the Violet's steam engines were put to work their hardest. And thick,nmc🔲 black smoke rolled out of her funnels and darkened the blue sea and smudged up her lovely white sails humming tight in the breeze.
The Doctor threw a tomato skin out of the canoe and the gull caught it neatly in the air before it touched the water.
As they were approaching the houseboat they noticed a large number of canoes collected about it. To-day was not one of the outgoing or incoming mail days and the Doctor wondered what the excitement could be.
"'Why,nmc💠 it's Jip!' he cried. 'Good dog. Come here. You're the very fellow I want.'
Still another thing in which the Doctor's post office was different from all others was the gum used on the stamps. The supply of gum which the King had been using for his stamps ran short and the Doctor had to set about discovering and making a new kind. And after a good deal of experiment he invented a gum made of licorice,大众🌙 which dried quickly and worked very well. But,什么😎 as I have said,什么🎳 the Fantippans were very fond of sweetmeats. And soon after the new gum was put into use the post office was crowded with people buying stamps by the hundred.
And she went off to fetch the Skimmer.