d great
sheets of water flowed toward the center of the map, and cataracts of
water poured into the great round hole in the middle of the map, and the
dragons were being washed away and disappearing down the waste pipe in
great green masses and scattered green shoals--single dragons and
dragons by the dozen; of all sizes, from the ones that carry off
elephants down to the ones that get in your tea.

Presently there was not a dragon left. So then they turned off the tap
named "Waste," and they half-turned off the one labeled "Sunshine"--it
was broken, so that they could not turn it off altogether--and they
turned on "Fair to moderate" and "Showery" and both taps stuck, so that
they could not be turned off, which accounts for our climate.

* * * * *

How did they get home again? By the Snowdon railway of course.

And was the nation grateful? Well--the nation was very wet. And by the
time the nation had gotten dry again it was interested in the new
invention for toasting muffins by electricity, and all the dragons were
almost forgotten. Dragons do not seem so important when they are dead
and gone, and, you know, there never was a reward offered.

And what did Father and Mother say when Effie and Harry got home?

My dear, that is the sort of silly question you children always will
ask. However, just for this once I don't mind telling you.

Mother said: "Oh, my darlings, my darlings, you're safe--you're safe!
You naughty children--how could you be so disobedient? Go to bed at
once!"

And their father the doctor said: "I wish I had known what you were
going to do! I should have liked to preserve a specimen. I threw away
the one I got out of Effie's eye. I intended to get a more perfect
specimen. I did not anticipate this immediate extinction of the
species."

The professor said nothing, but he rubbed his hands. He had kept his
specimen--the one the size of an earwig that he gave Harry half a crown
for--and he has it to this day.

You must get him to show it to you!

[Illustration: THE ICE DRAGON]

IV. The Ice Dragon, or Do as You Are Told

This is the tale of the wonders that befell on the evening of the
eleventh of December, when they did what they were told not to do. You
may think that you know all the unpleasant things that could possibly
happen to you if you are disobedient, but there are some things which
even you do not know, and they did not know them either