Professor with
his knife.
Then all was blotted out; clouds rolled about him; night fell. The man
in the moon laughed at him; the stars winked at each other as if
delighted at the Woggle-Bug's plight, and a witch riding by on her
broomstick yelled at him to keep on the right side of the road, and not
run her down.
But the Woggle-Bug, squatted in the bottom of the basket and hugging
his precious parcel to his bosom, paid no attention to anything but his
own thoughts.
He had often ridden in the Gump; but never had he been so high as this,
and the distance to the ground made him nervous.
When morning came he saw a strange country far beneath him, and
longed to tread the earth again.
Now all woggle-bugs are born with wings, and our highly-magnified
one had a beautiful, broad pair of floppers concealed beneath ample
coat-tails. But long ago he had learned that his wings were not strong
enough to lift his big body from the ground, so he had never tried to fly
with them.
Here, however, was an occasion when he might put these wings to
good use, for if he spread them in the air and then leaped over the side
of the basket they would act in the same way a parachute does, and bear
him gently to the ground.
No sooner did this thought occur to him than he put it into practice.
Disentangling his wings from his coat-tails, he spread them as wide as
possible and then jumped from the car of the balloon.
Down, down the Woggle-Bug sank; but so slowly that there was no
danger in the flight. He began to see the earth again, lying beneath him
like a sun-kissed panorama of mud and frog-ponds and rocks and
brushwood.
There were few trees, yet it was our insect's fate to drop directly above
what trees there were, so that presently he came ker-plunk into a mass
of tangled branches--and stuck there, with his legs dangling helplessly
between two limbs and his wings caught in the foliage at either side.
Below was a group of Arab children, who at first started to run away.
But, seeing that the queer creature which had dropped from the skies
was caught fast in the tree, they stopped and began to throw stones and
clubs at it. One of the missiles struck the tree-limb at the right of the
Woggle-Bug and jarred him loose. The next instant he fluttered to the
ground, where his first act was to fold up his wings and tuck them
underneath his coat-tails again, and his next action was to assure
himself that the beloved plaids were still safe.
Then he looked for the Arab children; but they had scuttled away
towards a group of tents, and now several men with dark skins and gay
clothing came from the tents and ran towards the Woggle-Bug.
"Good morning," said our hero, removing his hat with a flourish and
bowing politely.
"Meb-la-che-bah!" shouted the biggest Arab, and at once two others
wound coils of rope around the Woggle-Bug and tied the ends in hard
knots.
His hat was knocked off and trampled into the mud by the Shiek (who
was the big Arab), and the precious parcel was seized and ruthlessly
opened.
"Very good!" said the Shiek, eyeing the plaids with pleasure. "My
slaves shall make me a new waistcoat of this cloth."
"No! oh, no!" cried the agonized Insect; "it is taken from a person who
has had small-pox and yellow-fever and toothache and mumps--all at
the same time. Do not, I bet you, risk your valuable life by wearing that
cloth!"
"Bah!" said the Shiek, scornfully; "I have had all those diseases and
many more. I am immune. But now," he continued, "allow me to bid
you good-bye. I am sorry to be obliged to kill you, but such is our
custom."
This was bad news for the Woggle-Bug; but he did not despair.
"Are you not afraid to kill me?" he asked, as if surprised.
"Why should I be afraid?" demanded the Shiek.
"Because it is well-known that to kill a woggle-bug brings bad luck to
one."
The Shiek hesitated, for he was very superstitious.
"Are you a woggle-bug?" he asked.
"I am," replied the Insect, proudly. "And I may as well tell you that the
last person who killed one of my race had three unlucky days. The first
his suspenders broke (the Arab shuddered), the second day he smashed
a looking-glass (the Arab moaned), and the third day he was chewed up
by a crocodile."
Now the greatest aversion Arabs have is to be chewed by a crocodile,
because these people usually roam over the sands of the desert, where
to meet an amphibian
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