dear, you ought to have,’ said the worm. ‘I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll bore you a little tunnel to stand in whilst I go past, then I shan’t
spoil your suits.’
The worm began to make them a little passage leading out of the main tunnel.
‘There you are,’ he said. ‘Get in there, and you’ll be quite safe.’
The brownies hopped in. Then, rustle-squelch-rustle! The worm pulled his long body past them, called goodbye, and left them.
‘Well, thank goodness, we’ve got over
that
difficulty,’ said Hop. ‘Now let’s get to the cross-roads before we meet any other worms.’
On they went again, meeting no one but a centipede, who fled past in such a hurry on his many legs that the brownies didn’t know
what
he was.
‘Must be the fast train to Wormland, I should think!’ said Hop, picking himself up, for the centipede had rushed straight between his legs.
Soon the brownies saw a light in the distance. They hurried towards it, and found that they stood at the cross-roads. In the middle was a sign-post with a lamp on top.
‘To Giantland,’ Hop read. ‘Ugh! That’s the way we’ve just come. What’s this other way? To the Land of Giggles! That sounds silly. To Cross-patch Country!
That
won’t do for us. Now what’s this last one?’
All the brownies peered at it.
‘To the Land of Clever People,’ they read.
‘Clever People
might
be able to tell us the way to Witchland,’ said Hop.
‘Yes, let’s go,’ said Jump.
‘I hope they’ll let us in,’ said Skip doubtfully. ‘I don’t really feel very clever, you know.’
‘You’re not,’ said Hop. ‘
I’m
the clever one.’
‘Yes, you were clever enough to get us all sent out of Fairyland,’ grumbled Skip.
‘Don’t let’s quarrel,’ said Hop. ‘Come on, and see what this new land is like.’
Off they went again, and found that the tunnel they were now in sloped upwards, and was lit by many little green lamps.
‘Green for safety, anyway,’ said Jump, cheerfully.
The lamps suddenly turned red. The brownies jumped in fright.
‘Red for danger!’ said Skip in a shaky voice.
The lamps turned blue. Hop thought of an idea.
‘I expect it’s somebody in the Land of Clever People, showing us how clever they are,’ he whispered. Then aloud he said in an admiring voice, ‘H’m, blue for
cleverness!’
All the lamps turned back to green.
‘There you are!’ whispered Hop. ‘Green for safety again.’
They went on up the slope and came to a corner. Just round the bend was a turnstile, and at it was seated an ugly little man, with an enormous bald head. He wore spectacles, and was writing in a
huge book. As the brownies drew near he looked at them over his spectacles. Then he spoke in a way that gave the brownies rather a surprise:
‘Good morning. Do I understand,
You wish to enter in this Land?’
‘He’s talking in poetry!’ said Jump. ‘Isn’t he clever! Are we supposed to answer in poetry too?’
‘We can’t,’ said Skip. ‘So that settles it.’
He turned to the turnstile man.
‘Yes, we want to come in,’ he said. ‘You see we . . .’
The bald-headed man interrupted him:
‘Please talk in rhyme. Unless you do,
I simply cannot let you through.’
‘Oh goodness gracious!’ groaned the brownies.
‘They must be
terribly
clever people,’ said Hop. ‘Let’s see if we can make up an answer in rhyme.’
They thought for some time, and at last they found one they thought would do. Hop went up to the turnstile man and bowed.
‘Will you kindly let us through,
There’s lots of things we want to do,’
he said. At once the man waved his hand to tell them to pass, and his turnstile clicked as they went through. Before they left him he handed them a book of rules.
‘Keep every rule that’s written here,
You’ll find them printed nice and clear,’
he said in his singsong voice.
‘Thank you very much indeed,
I like to have a book to read,’
answered Hop, as