and make
noises. Roses don't make noises."

"Yes, they do. They rustle."

"Woses wustle," said Baby.

"That's not a living noise. That's an all-the-same noise. Different to
Roy, who barks and makes different noises all the time. Fancy the roses
all barkin' at you. Daddy, will you tell us about animals?"

That is one of the child stages which takes us back to the old tribe
life--their inexhaustible interest in animals, some distant echo of those
long nights when wild men sat round the fires and peered out into the
darkness, and whispered about all the strange and deadly creatures who
fought with them for the lordship of the earth. Children love caves, and
they love fires and meals out of doors, and they love animal talk--all
relics of the far distant past.

"What is the biggest animal in South America, Daddy?"

Daddy, wearily: "Oh, I don't know."

"I s'pose an elephant would be the biggest?"

"No, boy; there are none in South America."

"Well, then, a rhinoceros?"

"No, there are none."

"Well, what is there, Daddy?"

"Well, dear, there are jaguars. I suppose a jaguar is the biggest."

"Then it must be thirty-six feet long."

"Oh, no, boy; about eight or nine feet with his tail."

"But there are boa-constrictors in South America thirty-six feet long."

"That's different."

"Do you fink," asked Dimples, with his big, solemn, grey eyes wide open,
"there was ever a boa-'strictor forty-five feet long?"

"No, dear; I never heard of one."

"Perhaps there was one, but you never heard of it. Do you fink you would
have heard of a boa-'strictor forty-five feet long if there was one in
South America?"

"Well, there may have been one."

"Daddy," said Laddie, carrying on the cross-examination with the intense
earnestness of a child, "could a boa-constrictor swallow any small
animal?"

"Yes, of course he could."

"Could he swallow a jaguar?"

"Well, I don't know about that. A jaguar is a very large animal."

"Well, then," asked Dimples, "could a jaguar swallow a boa-'strictor?"

"Silly ass," said Laddie. "If a jaguar was only nine feet long and the
boa-constrictor was thirty-five feet long, then there would be a lot
sticking out of the jaguar's mouth. How could he swallow that?"

"He'd bite it off," said Dimples. "And then another slice for supper and
another for breakfast--but, I say, Daddy, a 'stricter couldn't swallow a
porkpine, could he? He would have a sore throat all the way down