“ ‘Tommy, you seem to be getting enormously tall’ ”
Another matter which came up about this time was the effect of moon food on ourselves. Polynesia was the first to remark upon it.
“Tommy,” said she one day, “you seem to be getting enormously tall—and fat, aren’t you?”
“Er—am I?” said I. “Well, I had noticed my belt seemed a bit tight. But I thought it was just ordinary growing.”
“And the Doctor too,” the parrot went on. “I’ll swear he’s bigger—unless my eyesight is getting queer.”
“Well, we can soon prove that,” said John Dolittle. “I know my height exactly—five feet two and a half. I have a two-foot rule in the baggage. I’ll measure myself against a tree right away.”
When the Doctor had accomplished this he was astonished to find that his height had increased some three inches since he had been on the Moon. Of what my own had been before I landed, I was not so sure; but measurement made it too a good deal more than I had thought it. And as to my waist line, there was no doubt that it had grown enormously. Even Chee-Chee, when we came to look at him, seemed larger and heavier. Polynesia was of course so small that it would need an enormous increase in her figure to make difference enough to see.
“His height had increased some three inches”