y once, he'd wished for a Plesiosaurus instead of an
Ichthyosaurus, because he was too lazy to remember the easy names of
everyday things, and his father had been very vexed with him, and had
made him go to bed before tea-time, and wouldn't let him go out in the
nice flint boat along with the other children,--it was the annual
school-treat next day,--and he came and flung himself down near me on
the morning of the treat, and he kicked his little prehistoric legs
about and said he wished he was dead. And of course then he was."

"How awful! said the children all together.

"Only till sunset, of course," the Psammead said; "still it was quite
enough for his father and mother. And he caught it when he woke up--I
tell you. He didn't turn to stone--I forget why--but there must have
been some reason. They didn't know being dead is only being asleep, and
you're bound to wake up somewhere or other, either where you go to sleep
or in some better place. You may be sure he caught it, giving them such
a turn. Why, he wasn't allowed to taste Megatherium for a month after
that. Nothing but oysters and periwinkles, and common things like that."

All the children were quite crushed by this terrible tale. They looked
at the Psammead in horror. Suddenly the Lamb perceived that something
brown and furry was near him.

"Poof, poof, poofy," he said, and made a grab.

[Illustration: "Poof, poof, poofy," he said, and made a grab]

"It's not a pussy," Anthea was beginning, when the Sand-fairy leaped
back.

"Oh, my left whisker!" it said; "don't let him touch me. He's wet."

Its fur stood on end with horror--and indeed a good deal of the
ginger-beer had been spilt on the blue smock of the Lamb.

The Psammead dug with its hands and feet, and vanished in an instant and
a whirl of sand.

The children marked the spot with a ring of stones.

"We may as well get along home," said Robert. "I'll say I'm sorry; but
anyway if it's no good it's no harm, and we know where the sandy thing
is for to-morrow."

The others were noble. No one reproached Robert at all. Cyril picked up
the Lamb, who was now quite himself again, and off they went by the safe
cart-road.

The cart-road from the gravel-pits joins the road almost directly.

At the gate into the road the party stopped to shift the Lamb from
Cyril's back to Robert's. And as they paused a very smart open carriage
came in sight, with a coachman and a groom on the box, and inside the
carria