214 The Island of

with vegetable marrow in place of the
ordinary kind; and by sprinkling a little
turnip-seed along his back I succeeded in
obtaining this row of turnips. I had now
completed my sheep; but what I desired
was an animal always ready for the table.

“By planting the legs in a hot-bed (in
the case of the boiled legs it was, of course,
a hot-water bed), and keeping them in
this situation for a considerable time, I ob-
tained a gentle but prolonged heat which
gradually and by quite natural means cooked
the legs to a turn; and this heat, spreading
genially over the whole body, also cooked
the turnips. In the case of lambs I have a
line of green peas and mint along the back.
When I require more sheep, I just sow some
seed from the turnips on this one’s back.

“That bird you see kneading itself is the
dough-do. It is now sufficiently kneaded ;
and you perceive another bird, with a tail
like a paste-roller, advancing? That is the
rolling-pin-tail ; and I invented it to roll the
dough-do.

“ That bird over there whose tail branches