Andiron Tales Page 8

  CHAPTER VII.

  They Reach the Crescent Moon

  As the jolly party sped along through the heavens Tom began to find hiseyes bothering him a trifle. Brilliant as many of the sunshiny days hadbeen at home, particularly when the snow was on the ground, nothing sodazzlingly bright as this great golden arc in the sky was getting to be,as they approached closer, had ever greeted his sight.

  "It's blinding!" he cried, his eyes blinking and filling with water as hegazed upon the scene. "I can't stand it. What shall I do, Lefty?"

  "Turn your head around and approach it backward," said Lefty. "Then youwon't see it."

  "But I want to see it," retorted Tom. "What's the use of visiting the moonif you can't see it?"

  "Reminds me of a poem I wrote once," put in the Poker. "'What's the Use?'was one of my masterpieces, and maybe if I recite it to you it will helpyour eyes."

  "Bosh!" growled the Bellows, who was beginning to get a littleshort-winded with his labors, and, therefore, a trifle out of temper. "Howon earth will reciting your poem help Tom's eyes?"

  "Easy enough," returned the Poker haughtily and with a contemptuous glanceat the Bellows. "My poem is so much brighter than the moon that the moonwill seem dull alongside of it."

  "Go ahead anyhow," said Tom, interested at once and forgetting his eyesfor the moment. "Give us the poem."

  "Here goes, then," said the Poker, with a low bow and then, standingerect, he began. "It's called

  WHAT'S THE USE.

  What's the use of circuses that haven't any beasts? What's the use of restaurants that haven't any feasts?

  What's the use of oranges that haven't any peels? What's the use of bicycles that haven't any wheels?

  What's the use of railway trains that have no place to go? What's the use of going to war if you haven't any foe?

  What's the use of splendid views for those that cannot see? What's the use of freedom's flag to folks that aren't free?

  What's the use of legs to those who have no wish to walk? What's the use of languages to those who cannot talk?

  What's the use of kings and queens that haven't any throne? What's the use of having pains unless you're going to groan?

  What's the use of anything, however grand and good, That doesn't ever, ever work the way it really should?"

  "Humph!" panted the Bellows, "you don't call that bright, do you?"

  "I do, indeed," said the Poker. "And I call it bright because I know it'sbright. It is so bright that not a magazine in all the world dare printit, because they'd never be able to do as well again, and people would saythe magazine wasn't as good as it used to be."

  "What nonsense," retorted the Bellows. "Why, I could blow a mile of poetrylike that in ten minutes:

  What's the use of churches big that haven't any steeples? What's the use of nations great that haven't any peoples?

  What's the use of oceans grand that haven't any beaches? What's the use of Delawares that haven't any peaches?

  What's the use--"

  "O, shut up Wheezy," interrupted the Poker angrily. "Of course you can goon like that forever, once somebody gives you the idea, but to have theidea in the beginning was the big thing. Columbus was a great man forcoming to America, but every foreigner who has come over since isn't, notby a long shot. As I say in my celebrated rhyme on "Greatness":

  The greatest man in all the world, by far the greatest one, Is he who goes ahead and does what no one else has done. But he must be the first if he would rank as some "potaters," For those who follow after him are merely imitators.

  "COLUMBUS WAS A GREAT MAN."]

  "Ha! ha! ha!" laughed the Bellows. "You are a great chap, Pokey--you, withyour poetry. I hope Tom isn't going to be affected by the lessons youteach. The idea of saying that a man is the greatest man in the worldbecause he does what no one else has done! I guess nobody's never eatenbricks up to now. Do you mean to say that if Tom here ate a brick he'd bethe greatest man in the world?"

  "No; he'd be a cannibal," put in the Righthandiron, desirous of stoppingthe quarrel between the rivals.

  "How do you make that out?" demanded the Bellows.

  "Because Tom is a brick himself," explained the Righthandiron; and justthen slap! bang! the party plunged head first into what appeared tobe--and in fact really was--a huge snowbank.

  "Hurrah! Here we are!" cried Lefty, gleefully.

  "Wh-where are we?" Tom sputtered, blowing the snow out of his mouth andshaking it from his coat and hair and ears.

  "Hi, there! Look out!" roared Righty, grabbing Tom by the coat sleeve andyanking him off to one side. A terrible swishing sound fell upon the lad'sears, and as he gazed doggedly about him to see what had caused it he sawa great golden toboggan whizzing down into the valley, and then slippingup the hill on the other side.

  "You had a narrow escape that time," said Righty, as they excitedlywatched the toboggan speeding on its way, and which, by the way, wasfilled with a lot of little youngsters no bigger than Tom himself,children of all colors, apparently, red, white and blue, green, yellow andblack. "If I hadn't yanked you away you'd have been run over."

  "But where are we?" Tom asked, bewildered by the experience.

  "We're on the Crescent Moon at last," said Lefty. "It's the boss tobogganslide of the universe."

  "A toboggan slide?" cried Tom.

  "The very same," said the Poker. "Didn't you know that this dazzlingwhiteness of the Crescent Moon is merely the reflection of the sun's lighton the purest of pure white snow? It's too high up for dust and dirt here,you see, and so the snow is always clean, and so, equally of course, isdazzling white."

  "But the tobogganing?" asked Tom.

  "It's like swinging and letting the old cat die," explained theRighthandiron. "You see, it's this shape," and he marked the crescent formof the moon on the snow and lettered the various points.

  "Now," he continued, "you start your toboggan at A and whizz down to C.When you get there you have gathered speed enough to take you up the hillto B. Then of its own weight the toboggan slides back to D, from which itagain moves forward to E, and so it keeps on sliding back and forth untilfinally it comes to a dead stop at C. Isn't that a fine arrangement?"

  "Magnificent," said Tom. "And do they call it tobogganing here?"

  "No," said Righty, "it's called oscillating, and the machine is known asthe oscycle"--

  "Don't confound it with the icicle," put in the Bellows.

  "Oh, I know what an icicle is," said Tom. "It's a spear of ice that hangsfrom a piazza roof."

  "That's what it is at home," said the Poker, "but not here, my lad. Herean icicle is a bicycle with runners instead of wheels."

  "But what makes it go?" demanded Tom.

  "Pedals, of course," returned the Poker. "You just tread away on thepedals, as if you were riding on a bicycle, and the chain sets a dozen icepicks revolving that shove you over the ice like the wind. Oh, it's greatsport!"

  "YOU SEE, IT'S THIS SHAPE."]

  Another rush and roar of a passing toboggan caused them to pause in theirconversation for a moment, and then Tom turned his attention to thediagram Righty had drawn on the snow.

  "Suppose you didn't stop at B and go back--what would happen?" he asked ashe considered the possible dangers of this wonderful new sport.

  "You'd fall over the edge, of course," said the Poker.

  "I see that," said Tom. "But if you fell over the edge what would becomeof you? Where would you land?"

  "If you had luck you wouldn't land anywhere," said Righty. "The chancesare, however, you'd fall back on the earth again. Maybe in Canada,possibly in China, perhaps in Egypt. It would all depend on the time ofnight."

  "And wouldn't you be killed?" Tom asked.

  "Not if you had your rubbers on," said Righty. "If you had your rubbers onit would only jar you slightly. You'd just hit the earth and then bounceback again, but there's no use of talking about that, because it n
everhappened but once. It happened to a chap named Blenkinson, who took anOscillator that hadn't any brake on it. He was one of those smart fellowsthat want to show how clever they are. He whizzed down one side and up theother, and pouf! First thing he knew he was flying off into space."

  "And what became of him?" demanded Tom.

  "He had the luck not to hit anything, but he suffered just the same," saidRighty. "He flew on until he got to a point where he was held fast up inthe air by the force of gravity of 1,600 different planets, and he's thereyet. At a distance he looks like another new star, but when you get closeto him he's nothing more than just a plain, everyday Smarty."

  "I should think he'd starve to death," said Tom, as he reflected on thehorrid fate of Blenkinson.

  "He would if he had any appetite," said the Bellows. "But he hasn't. He'sso worried all the time that he can't eat, so he gets along very wellwithout food."

  "Let's quit talking now," suggested the Poker, "and get a ride, eh?"

  "I'm ready," said Tom eagerly. "Where do we start?"

  "There's the station up on the hill. It's only about 700 miles. We canwalk it in a year," said Righty.

  "I move we take this cloud that's coming up," said the Bellows. "I'mwinded."

  Tom looked in the direction in which the Bellows had pointed, and, sureenough, there was a cloud coming slowly along, shaped very much like atrolley car, and on the front of it, as it drew nearer, the lad was soonable to discern the funny little figure of a Brownie acting as motorman.

  "Why, it's really a trolley!" he cried.

  "Why it's really a trolley!"]

  "Certainly it is!" laughed Righty. "Didn't you know that? When you havewatched the moon from your window at home and seen constant lines ofclouds passing up to it and stopping before its face night after nightwhat did you suppose they did it for? Fun? I guess not. They're cleverpeople up here, these moonfolk are, and they make use of everything going.They've taken these electric clouds and turned 'em into a sort of SkyTraction Company, and instead of letting 'em travel all around theuniverse doing nothing and raising thunder generally, some of the richerBrownies have formed a company to control them."

  By this time the cloud had reached the point where our little party stood,and the motorman, in response to the Bellows' signal, brought it to astandstill.

  "Step lively, please," the conductor cried from the rear end.

  Tom and the two Andirons and the Poker and Bellows clambered aboard.

  The conductor clanged a bell. The motorman turned his wheel and the cloudmoved rapidly on.

  And what a queer crowd of folks there were on board that strange trolleycloud. Tom had never seen such an interesting group before.