The Book of Dragons by E. Nesbit Read Free Book Online Page B

the back, and she kissed the marble face and she said:
    “Oh, dear, good, kind St. George, please wake up and help us.”
    And at that St. George opened his eyes sleepily, and stretched himself and said: “What’s the matter, little girl?”
    So the children told him all about it; he turned over in his marble and leaned on one elbow to listen. But when he heard that there were so many dragons he shook his head.
    “It’s no good,” he said, “they would be one too many for poor old George. You should have waked me before. I was always for a fair fight—one man, one dragon was my motto.”
    Just then a flight of dragons passed overhead, and St. George half drew his sword.
    But he shook his head again, and pushed the sword back as the flight of dragons grew small in the distance.
    “I can’t do anything,” he said; “things have changed since my time. St. Andrew told me about it. They woke him up over the engineers’ strike, and he came to talk to me. He says everything is done by machinery now; there must be some way of settling these dragons. By the way, what sort of weather have you been having lately?”
    This seemed so careless and unkind that Harry would not answer, but Effie said, patiently, “It has been very fine. Father says it is the hottest weather there has ever been in this country.”
    “Ah, I guessed as much,” said the Champion, thoughtfully. “Well, the only thing would be … dragons can’t stand wet and cold, that’s the only thing. If you could find the taps.”
    St. George was beginning to settle down again on hisstone slab. “Good-night, very sorry I can’t help you,” he said, yawning behind his marble hand.
    “Oh, but you can,” cried Effie. “Tell us—what taps?”
    “Oh, like in the bathroom,” said St. George, still more sleepily; “and there’s a looking-glass, too; shows you all the world and what’s going on. St. Denis told me about it; said it was a very pretty thing. I’m sorry I can’t—good-night.”
    And he fell back into his marble and was fast asleep again in a moment.
    “We shall never find the taps,” said Harry. “I say, wouldn’t it be awful if St. George woke up when there was a dragon near, the size that eats Champions?”
    Effie pulled off her dragon-proof veil. “We didn’t meet any the size of the dining-room as we came along,” she said; “I daresay we shall be quite safe.”
    So she covered St. George with the veil, and Harry rubbed off as much as he could of the dragon poison on to St. George’s armor, so as to make everything quite safe for him.
    “We might hide in the church till it is dark,” he said, and then—”
    But at that moment a dark shadow fell on them, and they saw that it was a dragon exactly the size of the dining-room at home.
    So then they knew that all was lost. The dragon swoopeddown and caught the two children in his claws; he caught Ellie by her green silk sash, and Harry by the little point at the back of his Eton jacket—and then, spreading his great yellow wings, he rose into the air, rattling like a third-class carriage when the brake is hard on.
    “Oh, Harry,” said Effie, “I wonder when he will eat us!” The dragon was flying across woods and fields with great flaps of his wings that carried him a quarter of a mile at each flap.
    Harry and Effie could see the country below, hedges and rivers and churches and farmhouses flowing away from under them, much faster than you see them running away from the sides of the fastest express train.
    And still the dragon flew on. The children saw other dragons in the air as they went, but the dragon who was as big as the dining-room never stopped to speak to any of them, but just flew on quite steadily.
    “He knows where he wants to go,” said Harry. “Oh, if he would only drop us before he gets there!”
    But the dragon held on tight, and he flew and flew and flew until at last, when the children were quite giddy, he settled down, with a rattling of all his