“‘The what?’ says I.
“‘The Woog!‘ says she.
“Says I, ‘It’s new to me. I never heard of it before.’
“Says she, ‘To hear of it is as close as you want to get to it.’
“Why, I heard of the Woog in my younger days,” remarked Mr. Thimblefinger. “I thought the thing had gone out of fashion.”
“Don’t you believe a word of it,” said Chickamy Crany Crow. “It’s just as much in fashion now as ever it was, especially at certain seasons of the year. The little girl in the Looking-glass—I say little girl, though she’s about my size and shape—told me all about it; and as she lives in the same country with the Woog, she ought to know.”
“What did she say about it?” asked Buster John, who had a vague idea that he might some day be able to organize an expedition to go in search of the Woog.
A HORRIBLE MONSTER GLARED AT THEM
“Well,” replied Chickamy Crany Crow, “she said this,—she said that she and the other children were sitting under the shade of a bazzle-bush in the Looking-glass, telling fairy stories. It had come her turn to tell a story, and she was trying to remember the one about the little girl who had a silk dress made out of a muscadine skin, when all of a sudden there was a roaring noise in the bushes near by. While they were shaking with fright, a most horrible monster came rushing out, and glared at them, growling all the while. It wore great green goggles. Its hair stood out from its head on all sides, except in the bald place on top, and its ears stuck out as big as the wings of a buzzard.