don't fall into the error of thinking that the Snoodle was a dog; you
remember his mother was a snail.)

It was a novel and exhilarating sensation to Sara (that means the way
you feel when you shoot the chutes at the Park) to go bounding through
the sunny air on the back of the Gahoppigas. The soft wind whistled
through her hair, and blew past her so strongly that she was not even
conscious of the Snoodle's drawback, though he sat so close to her. At
the end of every leap the Gahoppigas rested for an instant upon a
daisy head, and Sara saw that the heads of these daisies were as big
as her own.

Now, though Sara was really a nice child, there were two things she
had always been rather greedy about: and they were flowers and
butterflies. She had often wished, of a spring morning, wandering
along her own garden paths, and gazing at the velvety brightness of
the daisies, and the marvelous patterns of the butterflies who
uncoiled their long tongues above them, that she might some day
discover a meadow full of flowers as large as moons, perpetually
fluttered over by butterflies as big as peacocks! Here, at last, were
just such flowers; and since the grasshoppers were as large as
hobby-horses--no, it was not a grasshopper, it was an Equine
Gahoppigas! Still, it was more like a grasshopper than anything else
she had ever seen.

You must not be surprised that Sara's thoughts were quite jerky and
disconnected, for she had never before traversed a meadow in soaring
leaps, with only a minute now and then to take breath--and even that
minute spent among the flying yellow hair of a swaying daisy. Still,
all through the enjoyment and excitement, she managed to keep tight
hold of one wish--if only there would be butterflies as big as
peacocks!

Well, there were, of course; on that side of the ivory doors you
cannot wish for anything as hard as Sara did without getting your
wish. To be sure, they must have been there long before Sara wished;
for the Butterfly Country on which Sara now rested her astonished eyes
had the look of a long-settled community. I need not tell you that it
was so beautiful it fairly took your breath: you would know that it
had to be, with those great flowers nodding everywhere, and those
great gay wings drifting, and sailing, and soaring, and zigzagging,
and crossing over them. But, all of a sudden, Sara made a discovery
that stopped her heart in a breath. In a country where the butterflies
were as big as