and a fireplace, all made of stone.
On the hearth a pot was bubbling and steaming, and Trot thought it had
a rather nice smell. The visitors seated themselves upon the
benches--except the Ork. which squatted by the fireplace--and the Bumpy
Man began stirring the kettle briskly.

"May I ask what country this is, sir?" inquired Cap'n Bill.

"Goodness me--fruit-cake and apple-sauce!--don't you know where you
are?" asked the Bumpy Man, as he stopped stirring and looked at the
speaker in surprise.

"No," admitted Cap'n Bill. "We've just arrived."

"Lost your way?" questioned the Bumpy Man.

"Not exactly," said Cap'n Bill. "We didn't have any way to lose."

"Ah!" said the Bumpy Man, nodding his bumpy head. "This," he announced,
in a solemn, impressive voice, "is the famous Land of Mo."

"Oh!" exclaimed the sailor and the girl, both in one breath. But, never
having heard of the Land of Mo, they were no wiser than before.

"I thought that would startle you," remarked the Bumpy Man, well
pleased, as he resumed his stirring. The Ork watched him a while in
silence and then asked:

"Who may you be?"

"Me?" answered the Bumpy Man. "Haven't you heard of me? Gingerbread and
lemon-juice! I'm known, far and wide, as the Mountain Ear."

They all received this information in silence at first, for they were
trying to think what he could mean. Finally Trot mustered up courage to
ask:

"What is a Mountain Ear, please?"

For answer the man turned around and faced them, waving the spoon with
which he had been stirring the kettle, as he recited the following
verses in a singsong tone of voice:

"Here's a mountain, hard of hearing,
That's sad-hearted and needs cheering,
So my duty is to listen to all sounds that Nature makes,
So the hill won't get uneasy--
Get to coughing, or get sneezy--
For this monster bump, when frightened, is quite liable to quakes.

"You can hear a bell that's ringing;
I can feel some people's singing;
But a mountain isn't sensible of what goes on, and so
When I hear a blizzard blowing
Or it's raining hard, or snowing,
I tell it to the mountain and the mountain seems to know.

"Thus I benefit all people
While I'm living on this steeple,
For I keep the mountain steady so my neighbors all may thrive.
With my list'ning and my shouting
I prevent this mount from spouting,
And that makes me so important that I'm glad that I'm alive."

When he had finished these li