"It comes on sort of sneaking, and you don't notice it," said the Admiral. "We'd have been completely inwisible by this time if we hadn't jumped overboard."
"It was an awful jump!" said Dorothy, solemnly. "Didn't it hurt to fall so far?"
"Not at all," said the Admiral, cheerfully. "The falling part of it was quite agreeable—so cool and rushing, you know; but the landing was tremenjious severe."
"Banged us like anything," explained the Highlander; and with this the Caravan locked arms and walked away with the tails of their shawls trailing behind them.
"What strange little things they are!" said Dorothy, reflectively, as she walked along after them, "and they're for all the world precisely like arimated dolls—movable, you know," she added, not feeling quite sure that "arimated" was the proper word,—"and speaking of dolls, here's a perfect multitude of 'em!" she exclaimed, for just then she came upon a long row of dolls beautifully dressed, and standing on their heels with their heads against the wall. They were at least five times as big as Dorothy herself, and had price-tickets tucked into their sashes, such as "2/6, CHEAP," "5s., REAL WAX," and so on; and Dorothy, clapping her hands in an ecstasy of delight, exclaimed: "Why, it's a monstrous, enormous toy-shop!" and then she hurried on to see what else there might be on exhibition.
"Marbles, prob'bly," she remarked, peering over the edge of a basket full of what looked like enormous stone cannon-balls of various colors; "for mastodons, I should say, only I don't know as they ever play marbles,—grocery shop, full of dear little drawers with real knobs on 'em,—'pothecary's shop with true pill-boxes," she went on, examining one delightful thing after another; "and here's a farm out of a box, and all the same funny old things—trees with green shavings on them and fences with feet so they'll stand up, and here's the dear fam'ly, same size as the trees and the houses, of course, and—oh! I beg your pardon," she exclaimed, for her frock had touched the farmer and knocked him over flat on his back. "And here's a Noah's Ark, full of higgledy-piggledy animals—why, what are you doing here?" she cried, for just at that moment she suddenly discovered the Caravan, all huddled together at the door of the ark, and apparently discussing something of vast importance.
"We're buying a camel," said the Admiral, excitedly; "they've got just the one we want for the Caravan."
"His name is Humphrey," shouted the Highlander, uproariously, "and he's got three humps!"
"Nonsense!" cried Dorothy, bursting into a fit of uncontrollable laughter. "There never was such a thing."
"They have 'em in arks," said the Admiral, very earnestly. "You can find anything in arks if you only go deep enough. I've seen 'em with patriarchs in 'em, 'way down at the bottom."