fish, and bios, a beast. An animal supposed by our ignorant
ancestors to be compounded of a fish and a beast; which therefore,
like the hippopotamus, can't live on the land, and dies in the
water."

However that may be, Tom was amphibious: and what is better still,
he was clean. For the first time in his life, he felt how
comfortable it was to have nothing on him but himself. But he only
enjoyed it: he did not know it, or think about it; just as you
enjoy life and health, and yet never think about being alive and
healthy; and may it be long before you have to think about it!

He did not remember having ever been dirty. Indeed, he did not
remember any of his old troubles, being tired, or hungry, or
beaten, or sent up dark chimneys. Since that sweet sleep, he had
forgotten all about his master, and Harthover Place, and the little
white girl, and in a word, all that had happened to him when he
lived before; and what was best of all, he had forgotten all the
bad words which he had learned from Grimes, and the rude boys with
whom he used to play.

That is not strange: for you know, when you came into this world,
and became a land-baby, you remembered nothing. So why should he,
when he became a water-baby?

Then have you lived before?

My dear child, who can tell? One can only tell that, by
remembering something which happened where we lived before; and as
we remember nothing, we know nothing about it; and no book, and no