“Not at all,” said Norval; “you know the cow jumped over the moon, so it can’t be very difficult after all.”
The bicycles began to move a little slower, and the boys thought they were going to stop, but it turned out that the little men were only gathering themselves together, like good hunters, for the spring; for in a moment they gave a whistle, as a train does when it goes into a tunnel, and the bicycles bounding up, went right over the top of the moon, the boys keeping their seats in a way that it would be well if some Members of Parliament could imitate.
ECHO ANSWERS.
As they passed, the Man in the Moon, who had come up after his nightcap, shouted, “Don’t you come here again!” and picked up a stone as big as four hayricks to throw after them. But before he could do so, his wife, who had come behind him, and who had a nose as big as a ship’s long-boat, eyes like paddle-boxes, and a mouth like the entrance of a harbour, seized him by the arm, boxed his ears, and said in a voice loud enough to be heard hundreds of miles off—
“Would you hurt the dear little things, you old villain?”
“Old villain! ’ld villain! villain! ’illain! ’lain! ’lan! ln!” cried the echoes in the stars.
The Man in the Moon dropped the big stone on his own toes, and muttering, “Petticoat government again!” pulled his nightcap over his ears, shrugged his shoulders, and went home meekly to breakfast.
“I wonder if we’re going the same way the cow went!” said Ranulf; “if we are, perhaps we may get a drink of milk—I’m so thirsty.”
“And a beefsteak,” said Jaques; “for I’m hungry.”
“Faugh!” said Norval; “what would papa say if he heard of our eating cow-beef in Fairyland? and as for milk, if she runs as fast as we do, she must be run dry long ago.”