As he reached the land half a million oysters sank into the sea in the silence of defeat and despair, while from the beaches rose a mighty shout. The sun, as if it gestured, flung the mists from its face, and beamed benignly. “Back! Back! Give him air!” cried Parrot Feathers, as she addressed herself to the task of removing the oyster from his foot. The giant beast was dying, and its jaws were locked in the rigour of its suffering. There was no way to remove it gently. Parrot Feathers laid her unconscious hero's foot upon one rock, and broke the oyster loose with another. Incidentally she smashed Probably Arboreal's toe. He sat up in pained surprise. Unthinkingly, as you or I would put a hurt finger into our mouths, he put his crushed toe into his mouth. At that period of man's history the trick was not difficult. And then---- A beatific smile spread over his face! Man had tasted the oyster! In half an hour, mankind was plunging into the waves searching for oysters. The oyster's doom was sealed. His monstrous pretension that he belonged in the van of evolutionary progress was killed forever. He had been tasted, and found food. He would never again battle for supremacy. Meekly he yielded to his fate. He is food to this day. Parrot Feathers and Probably Arboreal were married after breakfast. On the toes of their first child were ten cunning, diminutive oyster shells. Mankind, up to that time, had had sharp toenails like the claws of birds. But the flat, shell-like toenails, the symbols of man's triumph over, and trampling down of, the oyster were inherited from the children of this happy couple. They persist to this day. “IF WE COULD ONLY SEE” I Lunch finished, Mr. Ferdinand Wimple, the poet, sullenly removed his coat and sulkily carried the dishes to the kitchen sink. He swore in a melodious murmur, as a cat purrs, as he turned the hot water on to the plates, and he splashed profanely with a wet dishcloth. “I'm going to do the dishes to-day, Ferd,” announced his wife, pleasantly enough. She was a not unpleasant-looking woman; she gave the impression that she might, indeed, be a distinctly pleasant-looking woman, if she could avoid seeming hurried. She would have been a pretty woman, in fact, if she had been able to give the time to it. When she said that she would do the dishes herself, Mr. Wimple immediately let the dishcloth drop without another word, profane or otherwise, and began to dry his hands, preparatory to putting on his coat again. But she continued: “I want you to do the twins' wash.”