ked old otter, "or it will be worse for you."

But Tom looked at her from between two thick roots, and shook them with
all his might, making horrible faces all the while, just as he used to
grin through the railings at the old women, when he lived before. It was
not quite well bred, no doubt; but you know, Tom had not finished his
education yet.

"Come away, children," said the otter in disgust, "it is not worth
eating, after all. It is only a nasty eft, which nothing eats, not even
those vulgar pike in the pond."

"I am not an eft!" said Tom; "efts have tails."

"You are an eft," said the otter, very positively; "I see your two hands
quite plain, and I know you have a tail."

"I tell you I have not," said Tom. "Look here!" and he turned his pretty
little self quite round; and sure enough, he had no more tail than you.

The otter might have got out of it by saying that Tom was a frog: but,
like a great many other people, when she had once said a thing, she
stood to it, right or wrong; so she answered:

"I say you are an eft, and therefore you are, and not fit food for
gentlefolk like me and my children. You may stay there till the salmon
eat you (she knew the salmon would not, but she wanted to frighten poor
Tom). Ha! ha! they will eat you, and we will eat them"; and the otter
laughed such a wicked cruel laugh--as you may hear them do sometimes;
and the first time that you hear it you will probably think it is
bogies.

"What are salmon?" asked Tom.

"Fish, you eft, great fish, nice fish to eat. They are the lords of the
fish, and we are lords of the salmon"; and she laughed again. "We hunt
them up and down the pools, and drive them up into a corner, the silly
things; they are so proud, and bully the little trout, and the minnows,
till they see us coming, and then they are so meek all at once; and we
catch them, but we disdain to eat them all; we just bite out their soft
throats and suck their sweet juice--Oh, so good!"--(and she licked her
wicked lips)--"and then throw them away, and go and catch another. They
are coming soon, children, coming soon; I can smell the rain coming up
off the sea, and then hurrah for a fresh, and salmon, and plenty of
eating all day long."

And the otter grew so proud that she turned head over heels twice, and
then stood upright half out of the water, grinning like a Cheshire cat.

"And where do they come from?" asked Tom, who kept himself very close,
for he was considerably fri