Just So Stories a pair of suspenders you must not forget the suspenders Best Beloved and a jack-knife one ship-wrecked Mariner who it is only fair to tell you is a man of infinite-resource and-sagacity So the Whale swam and swam to latitude Fifty North longitude Forty West as fast as he could swim and on a raft in the middle of the sea with nothing to wear except except a pair of blue canvas breeches a pair of suspenders you must particularly remember the suspenders Best Beloved and a jack-knife he found one single solitary shipwrecked Mariner trailing his toes in the water He had his Mummy’s leave to paddle or else he would never have done it because he was a man of infinite-resource and-sagacity Then the Whale opened his mouth back and back and back till it nearly touched his tail and he swallowed the shipwrecked Mariner and the raft he was sitting on and his blue canvas breeches and the suspenders which you must not forget and the jack-knife He swallowed them all down into his warm dark inside cupboards and then he smacked his lips so and turned round three times on his tail But as soon as the Mariner who was a man of infinite resource-and-sagacity found himself truly inside the Whale’s warm dark inside cupboards he stumped and he jumped and he thumped and he bumped and he pranced and he danced and he banged and he clanged and he hit
He stumped and he jumped and he thumped and he bumped
Just So Stories and he bit and he leaped and he creeped and he prowled and he howled and he hopped and he dropped and he cried and he sighed and he crawled and he bawled and he stepped and he lepped and he danced hornpipes where he shouldn’t and the Whale felt most unhappy indeed Have you forgotten the suspenders So he said to the Stute Fish This man is very nubbly and besides he is making me hiccup What shall I do Tell him to come out said the Stute Fish So the Whale called down his own throat to the ship wrecked Mariner Come out and behave yourself I’ve got the hiccups Nay nay said the Mariner Not so but far otherwise otherwise Take me to my natal-shore and the white-cliffs-of Albion and I’ll think about it And he began to dance more than ever You had better take him home said the Stute Fish to the Whale I ought to have warned you that he is a man of infinite-resource-and-sagacity So the Whale swam and swam and swam with both flippers and his tail as hard as he could for the hiccups and at last he saw the Mariner’s natal-shore and the white cliffs-of-Albion and he rushed halfway up the beach and opened his mouth wide and wide and wide and said Change here for Winchester Ashuelot Nashua Keene and stations on the Fitchburg Road and just as he said Fitch the Mariner walked out of his mouth But while
Now you know why you were not to forget the suspenders
