think that I am a trifle envious of him. The rest of us are not in his
class."
XIII
WRIGGLETTO
It was in the afternoon of a beautiful summer day, and Mr. Munchausen
had come up from the simmering city of Cimmeria to spend a day or two
with Diavolo and Angelica and their venerable parents. They had all
had dinner, and were now out on the back piazza overlooking the
magnificent river Styx, which flowed from the mountains to the sea,
condescending on its way thither to look in upon countless
insignificant towns which had grown up on its banks, among which was
the one in which Diavolo and Angelica had been born and lived all
their lives. Mr. Munchausen was lying comfortably in a hammock,
collecting his thoughts.
Angelica was somewhat depressed, but Diavolo was jubilant and all
because in the course of a walk they had had that morning Diavolo had
killed a snake.
"It was fine sport," said Diavolo. "He was lying there in the sun, and
I took a stick and put him out of his misery in two minutes."
Here Diavolo illustrated the process by whacking the Baron over his
waist-coat with a small malacca stick he carried.
"Well, I didn't like it," said Angelica. "I don't care for snakes, but
somehow or other it seems to me we'd ought to have left him alone. He
wasn't hurting anybody off there. If he'd come walking on our place,
that would have been one thing, but we went walking where he was, and
he had as much right to take a sun-bath there as we had."
"That's true enough," put in Mr. Munchausen, resolved after Diavolo's
whack, to side against him. "You've just about hit it, Angelica. It
wasn't polite of you in the first place, to disturb his snakeship in
his nap, and having done so, I can't see why Diavolo wanted to kill
him."
"Oh, pshaw!" said Diavolo, airily. "What's snakes good for except to
kill? I'll kill 'em every chance I get. They aren't any good."
"All right," said Mr. Munchausen, quietly. "I suppose you know all
about it; but I know a thing or two about snakes myself that do not
exactly agree with what you say. They are some good sometimes, and, as
a matter of fact, as a general rule, they are less apt to attack you
without reason than you are to attack them. A snake is rather inclined
to mind its own business unless he finds it necessary to do otherwise.
Occasionally too you'll find a snake with a truly amiable character.
I'll never forget my old pet Wriggletto, for instance, and as long as
I remember him I can't help having a warm corner for snakes in my
heart."
Here Mr. Munchausen paused and puffed thoughtfully on his cigar as a
far-away half-affectionate look came into his eye.
"Who was Wriggletto?" asked Diavolo, transferring a half dollar from
Mr. Munchausen's pocket to his own.
"Who was he?" cried Mr. Munchausen. "You don't mean to say that I have
never told you about Wriggletto, my pet boa-constrictor, do you?"
"You never told me," said Angelica. "But I'm not everybody. Maybe
you've told some other little Imps."
"No, indeed!" said Mr. Munchausen. "You two are the only little Imps I
tell stories to, and as far as I am concerned, while I admit you are
not everybody you are somebody and that's more than everybody is.
Wriggletto was a boa-constrictor I once knew in South America, and he
was without exception, the most remarkable bit of a serpent I ever
met. Genial, kind, intelligent, grateful and useful, and, after I'd
had him a year or two, wonderfully well educated. He could write with
himself as well as you or I can with a pen. There's a recommendation
for you. Few men are all that--and few boa-constrictors either, as far
as that goes. I admit Wriggletto was an exception to the general run
of serpents, but he was all that I claim for him, nevertheless."
"What kind of a snake did you say he was?" asked Diavolo.
"A boa-constrictor," said Mr. Munchausen, "and I knew him from his
childhood. I first encountered Wriggletto about ten miles out of Para
on the river Amazon. He was being swallowed by a larger
boa-constrictor, and I saved his life by catching hold of his tail and
pulling him out just as the other was getting ready to give the last
gulp which would have taken Wriggletto in completely, and placed him
beyond all hope of ever being saved."
"What was the other boa doing while you were saving Wriggletto?" asked
Diavolo, who was fond always of hearing both sides to every question,
and whose father, therefore, hoped he might some day grow up to be a
great judge, or at least serve with distinction upon a jury.
"He couldn't do anything," returned Mr. Munchausen. "He was powerless
as long as Wriggletto's head stuck in his throat and just before I got
the smaller snake extracted I killed the other one by cutting off his
tail behind his ears. It was not a very dangerous rescue on my part as
long as Wriggletto was likely to be grateful. I must confess for a
minute I was afraid he might not comprehend all I had done for him,
and it was just possible he might attack me, but the hug he gave me
when he found himself free once more was reassuring. He wound himself
gracefully around my body, squeezed me gently and then slid off into
the road again, as much as to say 'Thank you, sir. You're a brick.'
After that there was nothing Wriggletto would not do for me. He
followed me everywhere I went from that time on. He seemed to learn
all in an instant that there were hundreds of little things to be done
about the house of an old bachelor like myself which a willing serpent
could do, and he made it his business to do those things: like picking
up my collars from the floor, and finding my studs for me when they
rolled under the bureau, and a thousand and one other little services
of a like nature, and when you, Master Diavolo, try in future to say
that snakes are only good to kill and are of no use to any one, you
must at least make an exception in favour of Wriggletto."
"I will," said Diavolo, "But you haven't told us of the other useful
things he did for you yet."
"I was about to do so," said Mr. Munchausen. "In the first place,
before he learned how to do little things about the house for me,
Wriggletto acted as a watch-dog and you may be sure that nobody ever
ventured to prowl around my house at night while Wriggletto slept out
on the lawn. Para was quite full of conscienceless fellows, too, at
that time, any one of whom would have been glad to have a chance to
relieve me of my belongings if they could get by my watch-snake. Two
of them tried it one dark stormy night, and Wriggletto when he
discovered them climbing in at my window, crawled up behind them and
winding his tail about them crept down to the banks of the Amazon,
dragging them after him. There he tossed them into the river, and came
back to his post once more."
"Did you see him do it, Uncle Munch?" asked Angelica.
"No, I did not. I learned of it afterwards. Wriggletto himself said
never a word. He was too modest for that," said Mr. Munchausen. "One
of the robbers wrote a letter to the Para newspapers about it,
complaining that any one should be allowed to keep a reptile like that
around, and suggested that anyhow people using snakes in place of dogs
should be compelled to license them, and put up a sign at their gates:
BEWARE OF THE SNAKE!
"The man never acknowledged, of course, that he was the robber,--said
that he was calling on business when the thing happened,--but he
didn't say what his business was, but I knew better, and later on the
other robber and he fell out, and they confessed that the business
they had come on was to take away a few thousand gold coins of the
realm which I was known to have in the house locked in a steel chest.
"I bought Wriggletto a handsome silver collar after that, and it was
generally understood that he was the guardian of my place, and robbers
bothered me no more. Then he was finer than a cat for rats. On very
hot days he would go off into the cellar, where it was cool, and lie
there with his mouth wide open and his eyes shut, and catch rats by
the dozens. They'd run around in the dark, and the first thing they'd
know they'd stumble into Wriggletto's mouth; and he swallowed them and
licked his chops afterwards, just as you or I do when we've swallowed
a fine luscious oyster or a clam.
"But pleasantest of all the things Wriggletto did for me--and he was
untiring in his attentions in that way--was keeping me cool on hot
summer nights. Para as you may have heard is a pretty hot place at
best, lying in a tropical region as it does, but sometimes it is awful
for a man used to the Northern climate, as I was. The act of fanning
one's self, so far from cooling one off, makes one hotter than ever.
Maybe you remember how it was with the elephant in the poem:
"'Oh my, oh dear!' the elephant said,
'It is so awful hot!
I've fanned myself for seventy weeks,
And haven't cooled a jot.'
"And that was the way it was with me in Para on hot nights. I'd fan
and fan and fan, but I couldn't get cool until Wriggletto became a
member of my family, and then I was all right. He used to wind his
tail about a huge palm-leaf fan I had cut in the forest, so large that
I couldn't possibly handle it myself, and he'd wave it to and fro by
the hour, with the result that my house was always the breeziest place
in Para."
"Where is Wriggletto now?" asked Diavolo.
"Heigho!" sighed Mr. Munchausen. "He died, poor fellow, and all
because of that silver collar I gave him. He tried to swallow a jibola
that entered my house one night on wickedness intent, and while
Wriggletto's throat was large enough when he stretched it to take down
three jibolas, with a collar on which wouldn't stretch he couldn't
swallow one. He didn't know that, unfortunately, and he kept on trying
until the jibola got a quarter way down and then he stuck. Each
swallow, of course, made the collar fit more tightly and finally poor
Wriggletto choked himself to death. I felt so badly about it that I
left Para within a month, but meanwhile I had a suit of clothes made
out of Wriggletto's skin, and wore it for years, and then, when the
clothes began to look worn, I had the skin re-tanned and made over
into shoes and slippers. So you see that even after death he was
useful to me. He was a faithful snake, and that is why when I hear
people running down all snakes I tell the story of Wriggletto."
[Illustration: "He used to wind his tail about a fan and he'd wave it
to and fro by the hour." _Chapter XIII._]
There was a pause for a few moments, when Diavolo said, "Uncle Munch,
is that a true story you've been giving us?"
"True?" cried Mr. Munchausen. "True? Why, my dear boy, what a
question! If you don't believe it, bring me your atlas, and I'll show
you just where Para is."
Diavolo did as he was told, and sure enough, Mr. Munchausen did
exactly as he said he would, which Diavolo thought was very
remarkable, but he still was not satisfied.
"You said he could write as well with himself as you or I could with a
pen, Uncle Munch," he said. "How was that?"
"Why that was simple enough," explained Mr. Munchausen. "You see he
was very black, and thirty-nine feet long and remarkably supple and
slender. After a year of hard study he learned to bunch himself into
letters, and if he wanted to say anything to me he'd simply form
himself into a written sentence. Indeed his favourite attitude when in
repose showed his wonderful gift in chirography as well as his
affection for me. If you will get me a card I will prove it."
Diavolo brought Mr. Munchausen the card and upon it he drew the
following:
[Illustration: A snake in the form of 'UncleMunch']
"There," said Mr. Munchausen. "That's the way Wriggletto always used
to lie when he was at rest. His love for me was very affecting."
XIV
THE POETIC JUNE-BUG, TOGETHER WITH SOME REMARKS ON THE GILLYHOOLY BIRD
"Uncle Munch," said Diavolo one afternoon as a couple of bicyclers
sped past the house at breakneck speed, "which would you rather have,
a bicycle or a horse?"
"Well, I must say, my boy, that is a difficult question to answer,"
Mr. Munchausen replied after scratching his head dubiously for a few
minutes. "You might as well ask a man which he prefers, a hammock or a
steam-yacht. To that question I should reply that if I wanted to sell
it, I'd rather have a steam-yacht, but for a pleasant swing on a cool
piazza in midsummer or under the apple-trees, a hammock would be far
preferable. Steam-yachts are not much good to swing in under an apple
tree, and very few piazzas that I know of are big enough--"
"Oh, now, you know what I mean, Uncle Munch," Diavolo retorted,
tapping Mr. Munchausen upon the end of his nose, for a twinkle in Mr.
Munchausen's eye seemed to indicate that he was in one of his chaffing
moods, and a greater tease than Mr. Munchausen when he felt that way
no one has ever known. "I mean for horse-back riding, which would you
rather have?"
"Ah, that's another matter," returned Mr. Munchausen, calmly. "Now I
know how to answer your question. For horse-back riding I certainly
prefer a horse; though, on the other hand, for bicycling, bicycles are
better than horses. Horses make very poor bicycles, due no doubt to
the fact that they have no wheels."
Diavolo began to grow desperate.
"Of course," Mr. Munchausen went on, "all I have to say in this
connection is based merely on my ideas, and not upon any personal
experience. I've been horse-back riding on horses, and bicycling on
bicycles, but I never went horse-back riding on a bicycle, or
bicycling on horseback. I should think it might be exciting to go
bicycling on horse-back, but very dangerous. It is hard enough for me
to keep a bicycle from toppling over when I'm riding on a hard,
straight, level well-paved road, without experimenting with my wheel
on a horse's back. However if you wish to try it some day and will get
me a horse with a back as big as Trafalgar Square I'm willing to make
the effort."
Angelica giggled. It was lots of fun for her when Mr. Munchausen
teased Diavolo, though she didn't like it quite so much when it was
her turn to be treated that way. Diavolo wanted to laugh too, but he
had too much dignity for that, and to conceal his desire to grin from
Mr. Munchausen he began to hunt about for an old newspaper, or a lump
of coal or something else he could make a ball of to throw at him.
"Which would you rather do, Angelica," Mr. Munchausen resumed, "go to
sea in a balloon or attend a dumb-crambo party in a chicken-coop?"
"I guess I would," laughed Angelica.
"That's a good answer," Mr. Munchausen put in. "It is quite as
intelligent as the one which is attributed to the Gillyhooly bird.
When the Gillyhooly bird was asked his opinion of giraffes, he
scratched his head for a minute and said,
"'The question hath but little wit
That you have put to me,
But I will try to answer it
With prompt candidity.
The automobile is a thing
That's pleasing to the mind;
And in a lustrous diamond ring
Some merit I can find.
Some persons gloat o'er French Chateaux;
Some dote on lemon ice;
While others gorge on mixed gateaux,
Yet have no use for mice.
I'm very fond of oyster-stew,
I love a patent-leather boot,
But after all, 'twixt me and you,
The fish-ball is my favourite fruit.'"
"Hoh" jeered Diavolo, who, attracted by the allusion to a kind of bird
of which he had never heard before, had given up the quest for a paper
ball and returned to Mr. Munchausen's side, "I don't think that was a
very intelligent answer. It didn't answer the question at all."
"That's true, and that is why it was intelligent," said Mr.
Munchausen. "It was noncommittal. Some day when you are older and know
less than you do now, you will realise, my dear Diavolo, how valuable
a thing is the reply that answereth not."
Mr. Munchausen paused long enough to let the lesson sink in and then
he resumed.
"The Gillyhooly bird is a perfect owl for wisdom of that sort," he
said. "It never lets anybody know what it thinks; it never makes
promises, and rarely speaks except to mystify people. It probably has
just as decided an opinion concerning giraffes as you or I have, but
it never lets anybody into the secret."
"What is a Gillyhooly bird, anyhow?" asked Diavolo.
"He's a bird that never sings for fear of straining his voice; never
flies for fear of wearying his wings; never eats for fear of spoiling
his digestion; never stands up for fear of bandying his legs and never
lies down for fear of injuring his spine," said Mr. Munchausen. "He
has no feathers, because, as he says, if he had, people would pull
them out to trim hats with, which would be painful, and he never goes
into debt because, as he observes himself, he has no hope of paying
the bill with which nature has endowed him, so why run up others?"
"I shouldn't think he'd live long if he doesn't eat?" suggested
Angelica.
"That's the great trouble," said Mr. Munchausen. "He doesn't live
long. Nothing so ineffably wise as the Gillyhooly bird ever does live
long. I don't believe a Gillyhooly bird ever lived more than a day,
and that, connected with the fact that he is very ugly and keeps
himself out of sight, is possibly why no one has ever seen one. He is
known only by hearsay, and as a matter of fact, besides ourselves, I
doubt if any one has ever heard of him."
Diavolo eyed Mr. Munchausen narrowly.
"Speaking of Gillyhooly birds, however, and to be serious for a
moment," Mr. Munchausen continued flinching nervously under Diavolo's
unyielding gaze; "I never told you about the poetic June-bug that
worked the typewriter, did I?"
"Never heard of such a thing," cried Diavolo. "The idea of a June-bug
working a typewriter."
"I don't believe it," said Angelica, "he hasn't got any fingers."
"That shows all you know about it," retorted Mr. Munchausen. "You
think because you are half-way right you are all right. However, if
you don't want to hear the story of the June-bug that worked the
type-writer, I won't tell it. My tongue is tired, anyhow."
"Please go on," said Diavolo. "I want to hear it."
"So do I," said Angelica. "There are lots of stories I don't believe
that I like to hear--'Jack the Giant-killer' and 'Cinderella,' for
instance."
"Very well," said Mr. Munchausen. "I'll tell it, and you can believe
it or not, as you please. It was only two summers ago that the thing
happened, and I think it was very curious. As you may know, I often
have a great lot of writing to do and sometimes I get very tired
holding a pen in my hand. When you get old enough to write real long
letters you'll know what I mean. Your writing hand will get so tired
that sometimes you'll wish some wizard would come along smart enough
to invent a machine by means of which everything you think can be
transferred to paper as you think it, without the necessity of
writing. But as yet the only relief to the man whose hand is worn out
by the amount of writing he has to do is the use of the type-writer,
which is hard only on the fingers. So to help me in my work two
summers ago I bought a type-writing machine, and put it in the great
bay-window of my room at the hotel where I was stopping. It was a
magnificent hotel, but it had one drawback--it was infested with
June-bugs. Most summer hotels are afflicted with mosquitoes, but this
one had June-bugs instead, and all night long they'd buzz and butt
their heads against the walls until the guests went almost crazy with
the noise.
"At first I did not mind it very much. It was amusing to watch them,
and my friends and I used to play a sort of game of chance with them
that entertained us hugely. We marked the walls off in squares which
we numbered and then made little wagers as to which of the squares a
specially selected June-bug would whack next. To simplify the game we
caught the chosen June-bug and put some powdered charcoal on his head,
so that when he butted up against the white wall he would leave a
black mark in the space he hit. It was really one of the most exciting
games of that particular kind that I ever played, and many a rainy day
was made pleasant by this diversion.
"But after awhile like everything else June-bug Roulette as we called
it began to pall and I grew tired of it and wished there never had
been such a thing as a June-bug in the world. I did my best to forget
them, but it was impossible. Their buzzing and butting continued
uninterrupted, and toward the end of the month they developed a
particularly bad habit of butting the electric call button at the side
of my bed. The consequence was that at all hours of the night,
hall-boys with iced-water, and house-maids with bath towels, and
porters with kindling-wood would come knocking at my door and routing
me out of bed--summoned of course by none other than those horrible
butting insects. This particular nuisance became so unendurable that I
had to change my room for one which had no electric bell in it.
"So things went, until June passed and July appeared. The majority of
the nuisances promptly got out but one especially vigorous and
athletic member of the tribe remained. He became unbearable and
finally one night I jumped out of bed either to kill him or to drive
him out of my apartment forever, but he wouldn't go, and try as I
might I couldn't hit him hard enough to kill him. In sheer desperation
I took the cover of my typewriting machine and tried to catch him in
that. Finally I succeeded, and, as I thought, shook the heedless
creature out of the window promptly slamming the window shut so that
he might not return; and then putting the type-writer cover back over
the machine, I went to bed again, but not to sleep as I had hoped. All
night long every second or two I'd hear the type-writer click. This I
attributed to nervousness on my part. As far as I knew there wasn't
anything to make the type-writer click, and the fact that I heard it
do so served only to convince me that I was tired and imagined that I
heard noises.
[Illustration: "Most singular of all was the fact that consciously or
unconsciously the insect had butted out a verse." _Chapter XIV._]
"The next morning, however, on opening the machine I found that the
June-bug had not only not been shaken out of the window, but had
actually spent the night inside of the cover, butting his head against
the keys, having no wall to butt with it, and most singular of all was
the fact that, consciously or unconsciously, the insect had butted out
a verse which read:
"'I'm glad I haven't any brains,
For there can be no doubt
I'd have to give up butting
If I had, or butt them out.'"
"Mercy! Really?" cried Angelica.
"Well I can't prove it," said Mr. Munchausen, "by producing the
June-bug, but I can show you the hotel, I can tell you the number of
the room; I can show you the type-writing machine, and I have recited
the verse. If you're not satisfied with that I'll have to stand your
suspicions."
"What became of the June-bug?" demanded Diavolo.
"He flew off as soon as I lifted the top of the machine," said Mr.
Munchausen. "He had all the modesty of a true poet and did not wish to
be around while his poem was being read."
"It's queer how you can't get rid of June-bugs, isn't it, Uncle
Munch," suggested Angelica.
"Oh, we got rid of 'em next season all right," said Mr. Munchausen. "I
invented a scheme that kept them away all the following summer. I got
the landlord to hang calendars all over the house with one full page
for each month. Then in every room we exposed the page for May and
left it that way all summer. When the June-bugs arrived and saw these,
they were fooled into believing that June hadn't come yet, and off
they flew to wait. They are very inconsiderate of other people's
comfort," Mr. Munchausen concluded, "but they are rigorously bound by
an etiquette of their own. A self-respecting June-bug would no more
appear until the June-bug season is regularly open than a gentleman of
high society would go to a five o'clock tea munching fresh-roasted
peanuts. And by the way, that reminds me I happen to have a bag of
peanuts right here in my pocket."
Here Mr. Munchausen, transferring the luscious goobers to Angelica,
suddenly remembered that he had something to say to the Imps' father,
and hurriedly left them.
"Do you suppose that's true, Diavolo?" whispered Angelica as their
friend disappeared.
"Well it might happen," said Diavolo, "but I've a sort of notion that
it's 'maginary like the Gillyhooly bird. Gimme a peanut."
XV
A LUCKY STROKE