The Voyage of the Dawn Tread

URE IN T

oke to him, for he had none. He didn't call his Father and Mother "Father" and "Mother", but Harold and Alberta. They were very up-to-date and advanced people. They were vegetarians

d on a card. He liked books if they were books of information and had pictures

coming to stay. For deep down inside him he liked bossing and bullying; and, though he was a puny little person who couldn't have stood up even to Lucy

al holiday for ten years. Peter was working very hard for an exam and he was to spend the holidays being coached by old Professor Kirke in whose house these four children had had wonderful adventures long ago in the war years. If he had still been in th

out of a trip to America than the youngsters". Edmund and Lucy tried not to grudge Susan her luck, but it was dreadful having to spend the summer holidays at their Au

untry but for most of us it is only an imaginary country. Edmund and Lucy were luckier than other people in that respect. Their secret country was real. They had already visited it twice; not in a game or a dream but in reality. They had got there of c

icture in the house that they liked. Aunt Alberta didn't like it at all (that was why it was put away in a little back ro

ere green. She had just run up to the top of one glorious blue wave, and the nearer slope of that wave came down towards you, with streaks and bubbles on it. She was obviously running fast before a gay wind, listing over a little on her port side. (By the way, if you are going to read this story at all, and if yo

it doesn't make things worse, looking at

nothing," said Lucy. "And she

ear, when he had been staying with the Pevensies, he had managed to hear them all talking of Narnia and he loved teasing them about it. H

ted here," said

a limerick," said Eustac

es about Narnia Got gradu

ier don't rhyme, to b

sonance," s

said Edmund. "He's only longing to be ask

have cleared out or flared up. Eustace did neither. He j

that pictur

all that," said Edmund hurriedly, but Lucy, who was very tr

en picture,"

if you step outs

ke it?" said E

as if it was really moving. And the water looks as if it was reall

k very much indeed as if they were going up and down. He had only once been in a ship (and then only as far as the Isle of Wight) and had been horribly seasick. The

t the wave behind her, and her stern and her deck became visible for the first time, and then disappeared as the next wave came to meet her and her bows went up again. At the same moment an exercise book which had been lying beside Edmund on the bed flapped, rose and sailed through the air to the wall behind him, and Lucy felt all her hair whipping round her face as it does o

ight and bad temper. "It's some silly trick you

aid "Ow," they both said "Ow" too. The reason was that a great cold, salt splash had broken ri

s time either they had grown much smaller or the picture had grown bigger. Eustace jumped to try to pull it off the wall and found himself standing on the frame; in front of him was not glass but real sea, and wind and waves rushing up to the frame as they might to a rock. He lost his head and clutched at the o

an it had looked while it was only a picture. Still, she kept her head and kicked her shoes off, as everyone ought to do who falls into deep water in their clothes. She even kept her mouth shut and her eyes open. The

ads crowding together above the bulwarks, ropes being thrown. Edmund and the stranger were fastening ropes round her. After that followed what seemed a very long delay during which her face got blue and her teeth began chattering. In reality the delay was not very long; they were waiting till the moment when she could be g

boy king of Narnia whom they had helped to set on the throne during their last visit. Immediately Ed

ut Eustace was crying much harder than any boy of his age has a right to cry when nothing worse than

said Caspian

aps a glimpse of Lucy's bedroom. What he saw was blue waves flecked with foam, and paler blue sky, both sprea

flows differently from ours. If you spent a hundred years in Narnia, you would still come back to our world at the very same hour of the very same day on which you left. And then, if you went back to Narnia after spending a week here, you might find that a thousand Narnian years had passed,

el the warmth going right down to their toes. But Eustace made faces and spluttered and spat it out and was sick again and began to cry again and asked if

" whispered Caspian to Edmund with a chuckle; but bef

h's that! Take it away

her and in this was stuck a long crimson feather. (As the Mouse's fur was very dark, almost black, the effect was bold and striking.) Its left paw rested on the hilt of a sword very nearly as long as its tail. Its balance, as it paced gravely along the swaying deck, was perfect, and its manners courtly. Lucy and Edmund recognized it at once Reepicheep, the mo

ht, bowed, kissed her hand, straightened himself, twir

too." (Here he bowed again.) "Nothing except your Maj

ice. And I never could bear performing animals

g stare at Eustace, "that this singularly discourteous pe

Lucy and Edmu

and get changed. I'll give you my cabin of course, Lucy, but I'm afraid we have no women's clothes

e windows that looked out on the blue, swirling water astern, the low cushioned benches round three sides of the table, the swinging silver lamp overhead (Dwarfs' work, she knew at once by its exquisite delicacy) and the flat gold image of Aslan the Lion on the forward wall above the door. All this she took in in a flash, f

cabin was very tiny but bright with painted panels (all birds and beasts and crimson dragons and vines) and spotlessly clean. Caspian's clothes were too big for her, but she could manage. His shoes, sandals and sea-boots were ho