llaph-tree, had turned
a most sickly green. The water was frozen in the pool; and, imprisoned
below it, she could see the Echo of the Plynck, perfectly stiff, and
looking as if she were in some sort of awful trance. The Plynck, on
the other hand, drooped on her accustomed branch like the leaves on
the trees, as if she hardly had strength to hold her loosened plumes
together. The Snimmy's wife sat on her own toadstool, rigid and
angry-looking, with her tail wound tightly around the base, and with
the half-hemmed doorknob forgotten in her lap; the Snimmy lay
watchfully at the door of the prose-bush, with his long, debilitating
nose on his paws, shivering terribly; and the Snoodle looked as if
somebody had put salt on his mother. And the poor, timid Teacup looked
like a gentle, fat little old lady who has just been shot out of a
volcano.

Avrillia and Pirlaps were standing together in the little arch,
looking with passionate and indignant eyes upon the general distress
and havoc, and especially upon the insolent creatures who had caused
it. For Sara saw, after a few minutes of bewilderment, that the
beautiful place with its gentle inhabitants had been overrun in the
night by a horde of Fractions.

For there they sat, grouped insolently around the fountain, drinking
tears out of mugs of enormous sighs, and hammering with their fists
upon the peculiarly disagreeable-looking tables at which they sat.
These tables were of various sizes, but they were all very ponderous
and slippery-looking; and observing them closely, Sara saw that her
instinctive aversion was well founded--for they were multiplication
tables. The Two-Times table was nearest to her, being placed just to
the left of the dimple-holder; and they increased regularly in size up
to the Twelve-Times table, at which the officers were sitting.
The whole crowd of invaders were disgustingly haughty and
self-important--worse even than the Strained Relations, Sara thought;
but the officers were the worst of all. From the Least Common Multiple
up to the Greatest Common Divisor, from the thin, poker-like Quotient
with the fierce white moustache to the enormous, puffy Multiplicand,
Sara thought they were the most pompous lot she had ever seen. However,
since they were officers and units, she could imagine that they might
have some excuse; but what possible excuse could there be for conceit
in the Fractions, every one of whom had something missing about him?
Some of them, o