The Phoenix and the Carpet

and a doubt arose in some breast-Robert's, I fancy-as to the q

was Robert, 'and suppose they didn't go off on the night? T

'I know they are, because the man at the sh

ble isn't gramm

e word can't be grammar all by itself

and how the boys had been disappointed of that ride to London and back on the top of the tram, which their mother had promised t

all right, and you'll have the eightpence that your tram fares didn't cost to-day, to bu

, coldly; 'but it's not

don't want to be disgraced before those kids next door. They thin

ss it was black to be beheaded in, if I was M

One great point about Robert is th

ught to test

'fireworks are like postage-stam

ans by "Carter's tested se

Cyril touched his forehead wit

f that with poor Robert. All that cleverness, you know

d there, and if those grow you can feel pretty sure the others will be-what do you call it?-Father told me-"up to sam

ing cats and d

table, and let them off on the old tea-tray we play toboggans with. I don't know what YOU think, but I think it's time we did somethin

g to do,' Cyril owned

dow till the carpet was turned round, showed most awfully. But Anthea stole out on tip-t

in-the-box that had cost two shillings, and one at least of the party-I will not say which, because it was sorry afterwards-declared that Jane had done it on purpose. Nobody was pleased. For the worst of it was that these four children, with a very proper dislike of anything

Jane, near tears. 'I don'

done it, and you'll have to stand by it-and us too, worse luck. Never mind. YOU'LL have your pocket-mo

ept, and the rosiny fire-lighters that smell so nice and like the woods where pine-trees grow, and the old newspapers and the bees-wax and turpentine, and the horrid an stiff dark rags that are used for cleaning brass and furniture, and the paraffin for the lamps. She came back with a little pot that had once cost sevenpence-halfpenny when it was full of red-currant jelly; but the jelly had been all eaten long ago, and now Anthea had filled the jar with paraffin. She came in, and she threw the paraff

ith emotion, 'You've do

rt and Cyril saw that no time was to be lost. They turned up the edges of the carpet, and kicked them over the tray. This cut off the

beneath their feet made the amateur firemen start back. Another crack-the carpet moved as if it had had a cat wrapped in it;

thea screamed, Jane burst into tears, and Cyril turned the table wrong way up on top of the carpe

he firework desisted and there was a dead silence, and the children stood looking at e

hat bed should prove the immediate end of the adventure. It has been said that all roads lead to Rome; this may

pleased when father let them off himself in the back garden, th

r bedroom windows looked out on to the back garden. So that they all saw the fi

e nursery had to be deeply cleaned (like spring-

next day a man came with a rolled-up car

tion, you know, I shall expect you

re was one, and I'm more'n 'arf sorry I let it go at the price; but we can

the nursery, and sure enough the

or it, and Cyril got it. He took it to the gas. It was shaped like an egg, very yellow and shiny, half-transparent, and it had an odd sort of ligh

mayn't I, moth

man who had brought the carpet, because she had only paid fo

a poky little shop, and the man was arranging furniture outside on the pavement very cunningly, so that the more broken parts should sho

back no carpets, so don't you make no bloomin' errer. A

it back,' said Cyril; 'bu

he man, with indignant promptness, 'for there ain't nothi

wasn't CLEAN,'

pect it was only an odd one. I tell you the carpet's good through and thro

nterrupted Jane; 'there

f rush at the childre

omers to 'ear you a-coming 'ere a-charging me with finding things in goods what I s

r father thinks, that they couldn't have do

id they might

he brought the carpet,' said he, 'any more than your

was dingy, because it was a basement room, and its windows looked out on a stone area with a rock

ch in the evenings when the gas was alight, but then it was in the evening that the blackbeetles got so sociable, and used to come out of the low cupboards on each

heatre, and the children were not happy, because the Pro

allowed to have a b

thank you,' was father's a

bed the children sat sadly r

y bored,' s

id Anthea, who generally tried to g

o happen. It's awfully stuffy for a chap not to be allowed out in the eve

f her home-lessons and s

f memory,' said she. 'Jus

bother about its not being really for their good, or anything like that. And if you want to know what kind of things they wished for, and how their wishes turned out you can read it all in a book called Five Children and It (It was the Psammead). If you've not read it, perhaps I ought to tell you that

leasures of memory,' said Cyril; '

as it is,' said Jane. 'Why, no one else ever

h?' Cyril asked-'lucky, I mean, not

omfortably. 'Do you know, sometimes I think we

nteresting things, and others-nothing ever happens to them, excep

s do happen to. I have a sort of feeling things would happen right enough if we

e sighed. 'I believe if we could do a lit

drab Venetian blinds, or the worn brown oil-cloth on the floor. Even the new carpet suggested nothing, though it

nthea; 'I've read lots about it. But

nybody; and what's more, we jolly well couldn't if we tried. Let's get the Ingoldsby Legends. There's a thing about Abra-cadabra there,' said Cyril, yawning. 'We ma

nkindly; 'you can play the goat right en

id Anthea, hastily. 'You

ourse, that it is stealing to take a new stick of chalk, but it is not wrong to take a broken piece, so long as you only take one. (I do not know the reason of this rule, nor who made it.) And they chanted all

except cedar,' said Robert; 'but I've g

s of lead pencil. And

ucalyptus oil we have for

ed. Then they got some clean tea-cloths from the dresser drawer in the kitchen, and waved them over the magic chalk-tracings, and sang 'The Hymn of the Moravian Nuns at Bethlehem', which is very impressi

said more th

ts front to look under the grate, and there

uch hotter than any one would have believed it could possibly get in such a short time, and Robert had to drop it wit

had last been used to fish up the doll's teapot from the bottom of the water-butt, where the Lamb had dropped it.

, 'we'll get it out with

t it! Look! look! look! I do beli

sound; the egg burst in two, and out of it came a flame-coloured bird. It rested a moment among the f

s a-gape, ever

Then it perched on the fender. The children looked at each other. Then Cyril put out a hand towards the bird. It put its head on one side and looked up at him, as y

ed, but they were very

re like gold. It was about as large as a bantam, only its beak was not at all b

oks say, 'the desired result'. But when he came back into the room holding out a paper, and crying, 'I say

was saying, 'put th

voices, and three fin

st it was more like th

debtor,' it said w

curiosity-all except Robert. He held the paper

who yo

er, at the head of which was a little pic

said Robert; and the

Allow me to look at my portrait.' It looked at the page whi

And what are these characters?' it

YOU, you know,' said Cyril, with unconsciou

its?' asked

ever saw any portrait of you but that one, but I c

d fetched Volume X of the old Encyclopedi

ology, a fabulous

,' said the Phoenix, 'but f

ok its head.

his bird as single, or t

enough,' sai

t as about the s

s,' said the Phoenix; 'it's n

g on the hearthrug, to be as

f golden wings it fluttered from the fender to the table. It was so nearly cool that th

the Phoenix, apologetically; 'it will com

gathered ro

ail white, and the eyes sparkling like stars. They say that it lives about five hundred years in the wilderness, and when advanced in age it builds itself a pile of sweet wood and ar

way; they always were people who gave nothing for nothing. That book ought to be destroyed. It's most i

vely presented its gold

not,' said

irds. It makes a pile-that part's all right-and it lays its egg, and it burns itself; and it goes to sleep and wakes up in its egg, and co

ur egg get HERE

e always been a misunderstood bird. You can tell that by what they say about the worm. I might tell YOU,' it wen

re of sweet-scented woods a

t, telling the truth with some difficulty, for he did not know how

id, 'removes my last scrupl

anything sudden will you

ut the golden feathers, 'd

ry one, with unmis

ix again, looking mode

vanish or anything sudden. And I will tell you my tale. I had resided, as your book says, for many thousand years in the wilderness, which is a large, quiet place with very little really good society, an

l; 'Jane used to

it,' urged Jane, rather

t bitter aloes on

I awoke one morning from a feverish dream-it was getting near the time for me to lay that tiresome fire and lay that tedious egg upon it-and I saw two people, a man and a woman. They were sitting on a carpet-and when I accosted them civilly they narrated to me their life-story, which, as you have not yet h

s of stories, and you seem to be getting deeper and deeper in them every

were so fond of each other that they did not want any one else, and the enchanter-don't be alarmed, I won't go into his history-had given them a magic carpet (you've heard of a magic carpet?), and they had just sat on it and t

th a carpet,' said Jane, 'when

. Take that egg somewhere where it can't be hatched for two thousand years, and where, when that time's up, some one will light a fire of sweet wood and aromatic gums, and put the egg in to hatch;" and you see it's all come out ex

its claw at

e magic carpet that takes you anyw

ly-'I should say that that is the carp

he carpet which mother had bought in the Kentish

her's latch-key was

'now we shall catch i

nix, in a hurried whisper, 'and then

, and a little breathless; but when things seemed right way up

voice of the Phoenix

e your curtains,' it said. 'Please

ough the half-open door to the girls; 'talk about adventures and things happe

aid the gir

s, 'go to sleep at once. What do you

is question, but under the b

now what we mean. I don't

gic carpet AND a Ph

ther comes in and catches you,'

u do that the adventures of that carpet a

ppened in their absence. This is often the case, even w

would rather wait till the next c