‘Mother,’ he said, ‘there are two new animals in the woods to-day, and the one that you said couldn’t swim, swims, and the one that you said couldn’t curl up, curls; and they’ve gone shares in their prickles, I think, because both of them are scaly all over, instead of one being smooth and the other very prickly; and, besides that, they are rolling round and round in circles, and I don’t feel comfy.’ ‘Son, son!’ said Mother Jaguar ever so many times, graciously waving her tail, ‘a Hedgehog is a Hedgehog, and can’t be anything but a Hedgehog; and a Tortoise is a Tortoise, and can never be anything else.’ ‘But it isn’t a Hedgehog, and it isn’t a Tortoise. It’s a little bit of both, and I don’t know its proper name.’ ‘Nonsense!’ said Mother Jaguar. ‘Everything has its proper name. I should call it “Armadillo” till I found out the real one. And I should leave it alone.’ So Painted Jaguar did as he was told, especially about leaving them alone; but the curious thing is that from that day to this, O Best Beloved, no one on the banks of the turbid Amazon has ever called Stickly-Prickly and Slow-Solid anything except Armadillo. There are Hedgehogs and Tortoises in other places, of course (there are some in my garden); but the real old and clever kind, with their scales lying lippety-lappety one over the other, like pine-cone scales, that lived on the banks of the turbid Amazon in the High and Far-Off Days, are always called Armadillos, because they were so clever. So that; all right, Best Beloved. Do you see? I’VE never sailed the Amazon, I’ve never reached Brazil; But the Don and Magdelana, They can go there when they will! Yes, weekly from Southampton, Great steamers, white and gold, Go rolling down to Rio (Roll down--roll down to Rio!) And I’d like to roll to Rio Some day before I’m old! I’ve never seen a Jaguar, Nor yet an Armadill O dilloing in his armour, And I s’pose I never will, Unless I go to Rio These wonders to behold-- Roll down--roll down to Rio-- Roll really down to Rio! Oh, I’d love to roll to Rio Some day before I’m old! HOW THE FIRST LETTER WAS WRITTEN