"And I don't want to; I can jolly well see how silly it looks," Cyril was beginning; but Anthea said-- "Oh, _don't_! I don't know what's the matter with you boys to-day. Look here, Squirrel, let's play fair. It is hateful for poor old Bobs, all alone up there. Let's ask the Sammyadd for another wish, and, if it will, I do really think we ought all to be made the same size." The others agreed, but not gaily; but when they found the Psammead, it wouldn't. "Not I," it said crossly, rubbing its face with its feet. "He's a rude violent boy, and it'll do him good to be the wrong size for a bit. What did he want to come digging me out with his nasty wet hands for? He nearly touched me! He's a perfect savage. A boy of the Stone Age would have had more sense." Robert's hands had indeed been wet--with tears. "Go away and leave me in peace, do," the Psammead went on. "I can't think why you don't wish for something sensible--something to eat or drink, or good manners, or good tempers. Go along with you, do!" It almost snarled as it shook its whiskers, and turned a sulky brown back on them. The most hopeful felt that further parley was vain. They turned again to the colossal Robert. "What ever shall we do?" they said; and they all said it. "First," said Robert grimly, "I'm going to reason with that baker's boy. I shall catch him at the end of the road." "Don't hit a chap smaller than yourself, old man," said Cyril. "Do I look like hitting him?" said Robert scornfully. "Why, I should _kill_ him. But I'll give him something to remember. Wait till I pull up my stocking." He pulled up his stocking, which was as large as a small bolster-case, and strode off. His strides were six or seven feet long, so that it was quite easy for him to be at the bottom of the hill, ready to meet the baker's boy when he came down swinging the empty basket to meet his master's cart, which had been leaving bread at the cottages along the road. Robert crouched behind a haystack in the farmyard, that is at the corner, and when he heard the boy come whistling along he jumped out at him and caught him by the collar. "Now," he said, and his voice was about four times its usual size, just as his body was four times its, "I'm going to teach you to kick boys smaller than you." He lifted up the baker's boy and set him on the top of the haystack, which was about sixteen feet from the ground, and then he sat down on the roof of the barn and told the baker's boy exactly what he thought of him. I don't think the boy heard it all--he was in a sort of trance of terror. When Robert had said everything he could think of, and some things twice over, he shook the boy and said-- [Illustration: He lifted up the baker's boy and set him on top of the haystack] "And now get down the best way you can," and left him.