alive and credible but his creator has also managed to
invest everybody else in the book with the same kind of life.

Now this business of giving life to animals, making them talk and
behave like human beings, is an extremely difficult one. Lewis Carroll
absolutely conquered the difficulties, but I am not sure that anyone
after him until Hugh Lofting has really managed the trick; even in such
a masterpiece as "The Wind in the Willows" we are not quite convinced.
John Dolittle's friends are convincing because their creator never
forces them to desert their own characteristics. Polynesia, for
instance, is natural from first to last. She really does care about
the Doctor but she cares as a bird would care, having always some place
to which she is going when her business with her friends is over. And
when Mr. Lofting invents fantastic animals he gives them a kind of
credible possibility which is extraordinarily convincing. It will be
impossible for anyone who has read this book not to believe in the
existence of the pushmi-pullyu, who would be credible enough even were
there no drawing of it, but the picture on page 145 settles the matter
of his truth once and for all.

In fact this book is a work of genius and, as always with works of
genius, it is difficult to analyze the elements that have gone to make
it. There is poetry here and fantasy and humor, a little pathos but,
above all, a number of creations in whose existence everybody must
believe whether they be children of four or old men of ninety or
prosperous bankers of forty-five. I don't know how Mr. Lofting has
done it; I don't suppose that he knows himself. There it is--the first
real children's classic since "Alice." HUGH WALPOLE.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

I PUDDLEBY
II ANIMAL LANGUAGE
III MORE MONEY TROUBLES
IV A MESSAGE FROM AFRICA
V THE GREAT JOURNEY
VI POLYNESIA AND THE KING
VII THE BRIDGE OF APES
VIII THE LEADER OF THE LIONS
IX THE MONKEYS COUNCIL
X THE RAREST ANIMAL OF ALL
XI THE BLACK PRINCE
XII MEDICINE AND MAGIC
XIII RED SAILS AND BLUE WINGS
XIV THE RATS WARNING
XV THE BARBARY DRAGON
XVI TOO-TOO, THE LISTENER
XVII THE OCEAN GOSSIPS
XVIII SMELLS
XIX THE ROCK
XX THE FISHERMAN'S TOWN
XXI HOME AGAIN

THE STORY OF DOCTOR DOLITTLE

THE FIRST CHAPTER

PUDDLEBY

ONCE upon a time, many years ago when our grandfathers were little