“Oh, well, come, on then; let’s try this way,” said Dick, putting his arm under one of the Dodo’s wings, while Marjorie did the same to the other. “Now then—one—two—three.”
Slowly, very slowly, the children rose, for the Dodo was rather heavy after all, as he dangled down clumsily and uncomfortably between them.
I think they would have managed, however, but just as they had reached the lower branches of the trees, they heard a voice scream furiously—
“Now, then, what are you up to?”
In their agitation they let go of the Dodo, who, after making several frantic efforts to support himself, fell to the ground with a dull thud.
“What are you up to, I say?” said the voice again, and the children could see that the parrot, who had been so insolent to them before, was sitting on one of the branches near them.
“Pretty objects you are making of yourselves, I must say,” he remarked, sneeringly. “What do you think you are doing, I should like to know?”
“I don’t see what it has to do with you,” said Dick, crossly, while the Dodo, with his eyes shut and his head on one side, ran about rubbing his back with one pinion, and crying, “Oh! oh! oh!” for he had evidently hurt himself very much.
“You don’t, do you?” said the parrot. “Well, then, it has a great deal to do with me. Trying to fly, weren’t you? Well, you are not birds, and it isn’t allowed; do you hear? The idea of mere human creatures aping their betters in that way. Flying, indeed! Don’t you let me catch you at it again, or you will be sorry for it, I can tell you. Now move on, and walk on your feet in a sensible way, like rational human beings. Go along! What next, I wonder!”
He was evidently so very angry that the children thought it best not to provoke him further, so, leading the Dodo, who hobbled along painfully, they walked silently away in the direction of the sea, while the parrot watched them with a severe expression, screaming out—“Move on! move on!” every time they stopped.