Doctor Doolittle's Zoo by Hugh Lofting

Author:Hugh Lofting
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Start Publishing LLC
Published: 2021-02-19T00:00:00+00:00

THE NINETEENTH CHAPTER

PROFESSOR FOOZLEBUGG'S MASTERPIECE

“WELL,” sighed the Museum Mouse, “you can imagine how I felt. There I was with a whole family of youngsters, shut up in a glass case. I dare not show myself outside the nest, hardly, because even when that ridiculous Professor Foozlebugg had moved away with the fat woman, odd visitors in ones and twos were always browsing by and looking in. It would be difficult to think of a more uncomfortable, un-private home than ours had become.

“However, there were moments when that end of the hall was free from visitors and attendants. And during one of these I suddenly saw Sarsparilla with a wild look in her eye frantically hunting around outside for her lost family. Standing at the door of the nest, I waved and made signs to her and finally caught her attention. She rushed up to the glass and called through it:

“'Get the children out of there, Nutmeg. Get them out at once!'

“That was the last straw.

“Sarsparilla,' I called back, 'don't be a fool. Do you think I brought the nest and the children here myself? How am I to get them out? I can't bite through glass.'

“'But they must be fed!' she wailed. 'It is long past their morning meal-time.'

“'Bother their morning meal-time!' said I. 'What about my morning meal-time? They'll have to wait. We can't do anything till the museum closes to the public—at five o'clock. You had better get away from there before you get seen.'

“But Sarsparilla, like all women, was quite unreasonable. She just kept running up and down outside the glass, moaning and wringing her hands.

“'Can't you give them some of that stuffed duck there, on the shelf above your head?' she moaned.

“'I could not,' I said. 'Stuffed museum duck is full of arsenic. Don't worry. They can manage until five—the same as me.'

“Sarsparilla would have gone on arguing all day, I believe, if an attendant hadn't come strolling down to that end of the wing and made it necessary for her to hide.

“The rest of the day I had my hands full. For the children, having missed two meals, suddenly got as lively as crickets. They were all for climbing out of the nest—though they hadn't had their eyes open more than a few days. I could have slapped them.

“We would squat on the edge”

“'Where's Ma?' they kept on saying. 'What's happened to Ma? I'm hungry. Where's Ma?—Let's go and find her.'

“I tell you they had me busy, yanking them down from the hole one after another. They didn't care how many people were looking in the glass case. All that they cared about was that they were hungry and wanted Ma—the stupid little things!

“Never was I so glad in all my experience of museum routine to see the attendants clearing the people out of the halls and locking up the doors. I knew all those old fellows in uniform well. It was a funny life they led—generally pleasant enough. One of the things they had to do was to look out for bomb-throwers.

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