'What do you make of this?' asked Leonora, tapping her dainty foot on the floor.
'Flags,' I replied phlagmatically, and she was silent.
In the centre of the space was a dark pool, circled by crystalline palaces inhabited by the sacred snakes, from huge pythons to the terrapin proud of his tureen. Again, there was a whipsnake, and a toad, bloated as the aristocracy of old time, and puffed up as the plutocracy of to-day. For such is the lot of toads!
Now a strange thing happened.
'Hark!' said Ustâni; 'hark! hark! hark! a den is opening!'
He was right; it was the den of a catawampuss, an animal whose habits are so well known that I need not delay to describe them.
In the centre of the dark pool in the middle of the vague space lay one crocodile. The rest were sleeping on the banks. The catawampuss secretly emerged from its den—horror, I am not ashamed to say, prevented me from interfering—stealthily crept across the cold floor, and, true to the instincts of all the feline tribe,20 made straight for the water.
20
Is the catawampuss one of the Felidæ?—Publisher.
Of course he is. Look at his name!—Ed.