But Redy interrupted to say, "First let's agree on a place where we can all meet, and what sign we shall tell it by."
So they arranged that the Prisoner should turn his prison in the direction of a red flag, which Smaly would tie to a tree near the frontier.
THE PRISONER'S STORY
"I was hurled into this country," said the Prisoner, "by the powerful breath of a Black Toad. At first I was not at all badly received. I was able to render several services to the Wigs, and was especially useful to them in building their walls of gingerbread.
"Unfortunately, however, the Chief Contractor is a fool. Without his idiotic conceit this country would be happy and prosperous, but you have undoubtedly seen for yourself what a ridiculous creature he is. Only to give you one instance, I will tell you what happened that made him put me in this prison of sugar-canes.
"One day some feather-headed person or other began describing a bridge to him. The Chief Contractor insisted on having the nature of a bridge fully explained to him, and next day he caused a canal to be dug right across the middle of the country; but all the water that they poured into it disappeared at once, for it soaked away through the soil of sugar and flour.
"However, in spite of the fact that there was no water in the canal, he caused the bridge of nougat to be built across it; the bridge which I have destroyed a hundred times passing over it in my prison.
"I have destroyed a hundred times passing over it in my prison"