"And I saw the eggs after she
left--"
"They were your own old flat eggs," said the Countess contemptuously.
"You haven't mind enough to remember where you put them!"
"Oh, roses!" sighed the Monarch, "I suppose I'll never have any
peace. Always on the verge of civil war! Yesterday it was the
clover-caterpillars complaining that the zebras were eating their
food--"
Sara was just thinking how shockingly unbecoming such conduct was, and
how they were all behaving more like children than like the nice,
unintelligent lower animals they ought to be, when another messenger
came flying in in a state of actual excitement.
"Your Majesty!" he cried. "There's a strange animal attacking the
caterpillars!"
Sara's heart sank. The Snoodle--she knew it must be the Snoodle! And
she felt responsible for him!
She jumped up from her silver table-cloth and ran out of the palace
door, with the whole court zigzagging excitedly after her. It was a
noiseless chase, for the butterflies (except when they quarrel) are
very quiet; but there was much excitement nevertheless. Sara ran a
little way from the palace before she came to the scene of the
disturbance--and such a scene as it was! Caterpillars everywhere,
bristling, smooth, green, pink, eye-marked and eyeless; caterpillars
standing on their tails, or crouching in every conceivable attitude of
defense; and in their midst the little Snoodle, frisking and fawning
and endeavoring to come to grips with the horny and horrified worms.
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