Animals -- Juvenile fiction; Fantasy literature; Human-animal communication -- Juvenile fiction
They often heard the King’s men searching and talking in the jungle
round about. But they were quite safe, for no one knew of that
hiding-place but Chee-Chee—not even the other monkeys.
At last, when daylight began to come through the thick leaves overhead,
they heard Queen Ermintrude saying in a very tired voice that it was
no use looking any more—that they might as well go back and get some
sleep.
As soon as the soldiers had all gone home, Chee-Chee brought the Doctor
and his animals out of the hiding-place and they set off for the Land
of the Monkeys.
It was a long, long way; and they often got very tired—especially
Gub-Gub. But when he cried they gave him milk out of the cocoanuts,
which he was very fond of.
They always had plenty to eat and drink; because Chee-Chee and
Polynesia knew all the different kinds of fruits and vegetables that
grow in the jungle, and where to find them—like dates and figs and
ground-nuts and ginger and yams. They used to make their lemonade out
of the juice of wild oranges, sweetened with honey which they got from
the bees’ nests in hollow trees. No matter what it was they asked for,
Chee-Chee and Polynesia always seemed to be able to get it for them—or
something like it. They even got the Doctor some tobacco one day, when
he had finished what he had brought with him and wanted to smoke.
At night they slept in tents made of palm-leaves, on thick, soft beds
of dried grass. And after a while they got used to walking such a lot
and did not get so tired and enjoyed the life of travel very much.
But they were always glad when the night came and they stopped for
their resting-time. Then the Doctor used to make a little fire of
sticks; and after they had had their supper, they would sit round it
in a ring, listening to Polynesia singing songs about the sea, or to
Chee-Chee telling stories of the jungle.
And many of the tales that Chee-Chee told were very interesting.
Because although the monkeys had no history-books of their own before
Doctor Dolittle came to write them for them, they remember everything
that happens by telling stories to their children. And Chee-Chee spoke
of many things his grandmother had told him—tales of long, long,
long ago, before Noah and the Flood,—of the days when men dressed in
bear-skins and lived in holes in the rock and ate their mutton raw,
because they did not know what cooking was—having never seen a fire.
And he told them of the Great Mammoths and Lizards, as long as a train,
that wandered over the mountains in those times, nibbling from the
tree-tops. And often they got so interested listening, that when he
had finished they found their fire had gone right out; and they had to
scurry round to get more sticks and build a new one.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account