never let you feel that you are intruding, they smile at you and wag
their tail, if they've got one, and they are always ready for a romp or
an excursion or anything you want to propose. I think they are perfect
gentlemen. All these days we have had such good times, and it hasn't
been lonesome for me, ever.

Lonesome! No, I should say not. Why, there's always a swarm of them
around--sometimes as much as four or five acres--you can't count them;
and when you stand on a rock in the midst and look out over the furry
expanse it is so mottled and splashed and gay with color and frisking
sheen and sun-flash, and so rippled with stripes, that you might think
it was a lake, only you know it isn't; and there's storms of sociable
birds, and hurricanes of whirring wings; and when the sun strikes all
that feathery commotion, you have a blazing up of all the colors you can
think of, enough to put your eyes out.

We have made long excursions, and I have seen a great deal of the world;
almost all of it, I think; and so I am the first traveler, and the only
one. When we are on the march, it is an imposing sight--there's nothing
like it anywhere. For comfort I ride a tiger or a leopard, because it
is soft and has a round back that fits me, and because they are such
pretty animals; but for long distance or for scenery I ride the
elephant. He hoists me up with his trunk, but I can get off myself;
when we are ready to camp, he sits and I slide down the back way.

The birds and animals are all friendly to each other, and there are no
disputes about anything. They all talk, and they all talk to me, but it
must be a foreign language, for I cannot make out a word they say; yet
they often understand me when I talk back, particularly the dog and the
elephant. It makes me ashamed. It shows that they are brighter than I