t smells good, eh?" _See page 152._]

"At you," said Edmund, and went on laughing. The dragon bore it as long
as she could, but, like everyone else, she couldn't stand being made fun
of, so presently she dragged herself up the mountain very slowly,
because she had just had a rather heavy meal, and stood outside and
said, "What are you laughing at?" in a voice that made Edmund feel as if
he should never laugh again.

Then the good cockatrice called out: "At you! You've eaten your own
drakling--swallowed it with the town. Your own little drakling! He, he,
he! Ha, ha, ha!"

And Edmund found the courage to cry "Ha, ha!" which sounded like
tremendous laughter in the echo of the cave.

"Dear me," said the dragon. "I _thought_ the town stuck in my throat
rather. I must take it out, and look through it more carefully." And
with that she coughed--and choked--and there was the town, on the
hillside.

Edmund had run back to the cockatrice, and it had told him what to do.
So before the dragon had time to look through the town again for her
drakling, the voice of the drakling itself was heard howling miserably
from inside the mountain, because Edmund was pinching its tail as hard
as he could in the round iron door, like the one where the men pour the
coals out of the sacks into the cellar. And the dragon heard the voice
and said: "Why, whatever's the matter with Baby? He's not here!" and
made herself thin, and crept into the mountain to find her drakling. The
cockatrice kept on laughing as loud as it could, and Edmund kept on
pinching, and presently the great dragon--very long and narrow she had
made herself--found her head where the round hole was with the iron lid.
Her tail was a mile or two off--outside the mountain. When Edmund heard
her coming he gave one last nip to the drakling's tail, and then heaved
up the lid and stood behind it, so that the dragon could not see him.
Then he loosed the drakling's tail from the hook, and the dragon peeped
down the hole just in time to see her drakling's tail disappear down the
smooth, slanting shaft with one last squeak of pain. Whatever may have
been the poor dragon's other faults, she was an excellent mother. She
plunged headfirst into the hole, and slid down the shaft after her baby.
Edmund watched her head go--and then the rest of her. She was so long,
now she had stretched herself thin, that it took all night. It was like
watching a goods train go by in Germany. When the last join