And the fish would think: "Heat? Phew! that's murderous! And oh, that sizzling old sun!"
"We have legs," I might add.
"Things to walk on. They're like sticks, that grow right on our bodies. We do not use fins."
"What, no fins! Why, with fins, just a flicker will shoot me in any direction. Legs are clumsy and slow: think of tottering around on such stumps! And you can only go on the level with them; you can't rise and dip."
"Yes, we can. We build stairs."
"But how primitive!"
Perhaps he would ask me what drawbacks there were to earthly existence; and how he would moan when I told him about bills and battles.
"And is it true," he might say, "that there really are beings called dentists? Weird creatures, who pull your poor teeth out, and hammer your mouths? Bless my gills! It sounds dreadful! Don't ask me to leave my nice ocean!"
Then, to be fair, he might ask, "What's the other side of the picture, old man? What pleasures have you that would tempt me? What do you do to amuse yourselves?" And I would tell him about Charlie Chaplin, and Geraldine Farrar, and business, and poetry—but how could I describe Charlie Chaplin from the fish point of view? And poetry?—getting ecstasy from little black dots on a page? "You get soulful over that kind of doings?" he would ask, with a smile. "Well, all right, but it sounds pretty crazy to a sensible fish."