"We must be on our way," Ozma said, shivering slightly. "Elephant, why don't we all ride on you, and we'll talk as we go along and plan our strategy."
"Good idea," Elephant answered, picking Ozma up again.
Meanwhile, Tweaty and the owls flew up and perched on Elephant's head. Elephant then lowered his trunk to allow Nibbles to jump aboard and be lifted up behind Ozma.
"Okay, every one!" shouted Elephant as he raised his trunk high in the air and let out a great trump which just about blew everyone off his back. He then proceeded to waddle down the road making trumping sounds that sounded suspiciously like a trombone playing the bass part to When the Saints go marching in. In fact, pretty soon everyone was singing along—
Oh when the saints
Go mar chin' in.
When the saints go marchin' in.
Lord, I want to be in that number,
When the saints go marchin' in…
[Illustration: Sniffer and Stinkfoot arguing.]
CHAPTER 8
THE JOURNEY TOWARD THE SNIFFER NATION
"As I see it," said Lisa as they traveled along, "there is at least one major difference between the problems in the Sniffer Nation and the problems of Chilepepperland. The Chilepeppers, so far as I can determine, are different from one another only in their viewpoints. Some may have had a better education than others, but all were born essentially equal. On the other hand, even if they were born equal, the Sniffer citizens have a real physical reason for their disagreement with the Stinkfoots. If you will forgive my saying so, I cannot believe that either group is necessarily better or more important than the other. It's just that they are physically unable to co-exist."
"As much as it pains me to say it," replied the Sniffer citizen, "I have to agree. After all, the Stinkfoot people used to get along fine with my people, so long as we kept our distance from one another. Now that the Stinkfoots are infringing on our territory, we are forced to take action against them despite our former friendship. But there simply is no alternative. They are taking away our homeland, and pushing us away. There is no other option but to push them back."