Redcoat Captain: A Story of That CountryOllivant, Alfred
Science
Redcoat Captain: A Story of That Country
Ollivant, Alfred
English fiction; Parables
And there the train was waiting with a white rosette on the puff part.
And they got in, and Tiny leaned out, and shook hands confidentially
with the nice old guard, who locked the door in return, though there
was nobody else to go, only a milk-can.
For it is a private train that goes once a day loaded with honeymoon
couples only, by order of the King, who is very good and kind, although
he has to be so strict.
Then Tiny said to the driver,
"Moonland, please!" and came in, and shut all the windows without
asking Baby's leave, and turned up his collar, and sat down in the
cosiest corner, and after a good big yawn went to sleep: for that is
what you do if you are a man even in That Country.
But Baby played with the window-strap in the corner furthest away, and
smiled.
And after that the train went till it could go no further, because of
no more land to go on.
Then Tiny woke up in a great fuss: for Tiny was always either asleep or
in a terrible state; and he poked out and cried,
"Good! here we are. Come along, I say! Come along. _Do_ come along,
Ma-bel." And he climbed down with the bag full of luggage, and Baby
after him with her cage of canary.
And they stood together on the platform, and looked about them.
And it was about morning by now, and the sky was a sort of grey blank,
and the platform quite bare only for a great label across it that said
in huge letters,
MOONLAND
And Moonland is a great space with nothing in it only a green hill, a
brown moor, and in the middle a blue lake supposed to have a fish in it.
And on the edge of the lake is a stodgy house made of mud and dirt,
whitewashed over, where they let lodgings; only nobody takes them.
And when Baby saw that, she stood on one leg, and whistled,
"I say! _do_ look," because she loved it so.
But Tiny, who only really cared about his food, answered,
"Yes, yes, my dear, I know, I know," and fussed off with the bag, and
climbed on to the box of the cab, because, he said, he was such friends
with the cabman, and began to whip up the horse, and tug at the reins,
shouting,
"Gee-woa! Gee-woa!" for it was one of Tiny's things that he thought he
was very good at a horse.
But the cabman, who was rusty and crusty in an old top-hat, said,
"Leggo, will ye?" and went into Tiny's wind with his elbow to quiet him.
So they drove across the moor, over the hill, down to the lake, till
they came to the house.
And in the window hung a cardboard saying,
_Lessons, Singing, and Boxing taught here:_ for it is a school as well
as a lodging; only no pupils come.
And in the porch the landlady was sitting in curls, playing with her
thumbs rather dumpily.
But when Tiny bustled down with the bag, yelling,
"Lodgin' fer two, quick, please!" she cheered up, and ran round, and
cooked a little cake, and gave it them; only they couldn't eat it,
because of too tough.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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