"Oh no! it'll be all right! Come along! Let's swallow them!" cried Lionel, suiting the action to the word and popping one of the stones into his mouth without further ado.
He immediately became so small that I had some difficulty in seeing him at all amongst the stones at the edge of the Pond.
"Are you not going to swallow one of the stones too?" I inquired of the Dwarf before swallowing mine.
"No, I think not," was the reply. "I'll remain as I am, I think, in case you may require assistance of a kind which only a larger person than yourself could afford."
I then swallowed my stone, and immediately became almost as tiny as my small cousin, having, for my part, wished to be reduced to the height of an inch and a half, thinking that some sort of distinction ought to be preserved in our relative sizes.
"There!" exclaimed Lionel in a vexed voice, when I had joined him. "It's no use after all! How on earth are we going to get on board?"
"Ah!" cried Shin Shira, laughing good-humouredly and now looking, to us, like a good-natured giant, towering as he did high above our heads. "Now you see the wisdom of my having remained as I am. I can simply lift you on board and push the boat off for you too."
Suiting the action to the word, he very gently and carefully picked up first Lionel and then me from the ground and placed us on board the yacht, then gave the boat a little shove which, though he didn't intend it to do so, sent us both sprawling on the deck and the boat itself well out into the water.
I think I have mentioned that a slight breeze had sprung up, and the Pond was rippled over with tiny waves, upon which our yacht danced merrily, the sails having filled out with wind which drove her along at a fine rate.
Lionel was running all over the deck examining everything eagerly.