t be thorns or snakes or anything.
I'm jolly glad to get my boots back too. I say, come on. Let's go to
Helen's palace and get a banquet ready. I know there'll have to be a
banquet. There always is, here. I know a first-rate bun-tree quite near
here.'

'The cocoa-nut-ice plants looked beautiful as I came along,' said Lucy.
'What a lovely island it is. And you made it!'

'No gas,' said Philip warningly. 'Helen and I made it.'

'She's the dearest darling,' said Lucy.

'Oh, well,' said Philip with resignation, 'if you must gas, gas about
her.'

The banquet was all that you can imagine of interesting and magnificent.
And Philip was, of course, the hero of the hour. And when the banquet
was finished and the last guest had departed to its own house--for the
houses on the island were of course all ready to be occupied, furnished
to the last point of comfort, with pin-cushions full of pins in every
room, Mr. Noah and Lucy and Philip sat down on the terrace steps among
the pink roses for a last little talk.

'Because,' said Philip, 'we shall start the first thing in the morning.
So please will you tell me now what the next deed is that I have to
do?'

'Will you go by ark?' Mr. Noah asked, rolling up his yellow mat to make
an elbow rest and leaning on it; 'I shall be delighted.'

'I thought,' said Philip, 'we might go in the _Lightning Loose_. I've
never sailed her yet, you know. Do you think I _could_?'

'Of course you can,' said Mr. Noah; 'and if not, Lucy can show you. Your
charming yacht is steered on precisely the same principle as the ark.
And in this land all the winds are favourable. You will find the yacht
suitably provisioned. And I may add that you can go most of the way to
your next deed by water--first the sea and then the river.'

'And what,' asked Philip, 'is the next deed?'

'In the extreme north of Polistarchia,' said Mr. Noah instructively,
'lies a town called Somnolentia. It used to be called Briskford in
happier days. A river then ran through the town, a rapid river that
brought much gold from the mountains. The people used to work very hard
to keep the channel clear of the lumps of gold which continually
threatened to choke it. Their fields were then well-watered and
fruitful, and the inhabitants were cheerful and happy. But when the
Hippogriff was let out of the book, a Great Sloth got out too. Evading
all efforts to secure him, the Great Sloth journeyed northward. He is a
very large and striki