away underground and wedged in as tight as
tight. Well, thank goodness, my wants are few, and at any rate I had
peace and quietness and wasn't always being asked to come along and do
something. And I've got such an active mind--always occupied, I assure
you! But time went on, and there was a certain sameness about the life,
and at last I began to think it would be fun to work my way upstairs and
see what you other fellows were doing. So I scratched and burrowed, and
worked this way and that way and at last I came out through this cave
here. And I like the country, and the view, and the people--what I've
seen of 'em--and on the whole I feel inclined to settle down here."

"What's your mind always occupied about?" asked the Boy. "That's what I
want to know."

The dragon coloured slightly and looked away. Presently he said
bashfully:

"Did you ever--just for fun--try to make up poetry--verses, you know?"

"'Course I have," said the Boy. "Heaps of it. And some of it's quite
good, I feel sure, only there's no one here cares about it. Mother's
very kind and all that, when I read it to her, and so's father for that
matter. But somehow they don't seem to--"

"Exactly," cried the dragon; "my own case exactly. They don't seem to,
and you can't argue with 'em about it. Now you've got culture, you
have, I could tell it on you at once, and I should just like your candid
opinion about some little things I threw off lightly, when I was down
there. I'm awfully pleased to have met you, and I'm hoping the other
neighbours will be equally agreeable. There was a very nice old
gentleman up here only last night, but he didn't seem to want to
intrude."

"That was my father," said the boy, "and he is a nice old gentleman, and
I'll introduce you some day if you like."

"Can't you two come up here and dine or something to-morrow?" asked the
dragon eagerly. "Only, of course, if you 'ye got nothing better to do,"
he added politely.

"Thanks awfully," said the Boy, "but we don't go out anywhere without
my mother, and, to tell you the truth, I 'm afraid she mightn't quite
approve of you. You see there's no getting over the hard fact that
you're a dragon, is there? And when you talk of settling down, and the
neighbours, and so on, I can't help feeling that you don't quite realize
your position. You 're an enemy of the human race, you see!

"Haven't got an enemy in the world," said the dragon, cheerfully. "Too
lazy to make 'em, to begin wi