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"I am a boy," said Tom, stoutly, "and I'm not a Dormouse." Both of the Andirons laughed heartily at this, and the Righthandiron, dancing a little jig, sang over and over again this couplet: "He can't be very smart, I wis, If he can't see that's what he is." "Get him a mirror," said the Lefthandiron.
"Hullo!" cried the Righthandiron. "Halloa!" called the Lefthandiron. "That's not my name," came the voice of the Poker from behind a cloud just above Tom's head. "But I know who you mean, so I answer Halloa yourself." "Where are you?" cried Lefty. "Here," called the Poker. "No, you're not," called Righty. "You're there. We are here."
"You see, my dear Tom," said the Lefthandiron in explanation, "the Giants had such confidence in us that they accepted as true anything we said, so that if we should happen to meet a hungry ogre and he should want to eat Ebenezer because he was a boy, all that would be necessary for us to do to save Ebenezer was to say, 'Hold on. He is not a boy.
"He was the most persistent lad That I have ever seen. He'd always say that bad was bad, That blue could not be green. "We couldn't get him to deny That white was always white, And though we'd try and try and try He'd say that he was right," interrupted the Lefthandiron. "And wasn't he?" asked Tom.
Why, you might just as well ask a dog what he barks with, or a lion what he eats his breakfast with and that would be as stupid as the Poker's poem on Sandwiches." "Did the Poker write a poem on Sandwiches?" asked Tom. "Eight of 'em," returned the Lefthandiron. "The first of them went this way: "He sat upon a lofty hill, And smoked his penny pipe.
"I don't see anything in that story to make me unhappy, even if I were a chum of Ebenezer's," said Tom, as the Andiron finished. "You don't? Don't you think it was sad that the Giant couldn't eat a boy who'd behave in that way?" asked Righty, with a scornful glance at Tom. "It was very sad, Tom," said the Lefthandiron. "So don't deny it especially if you want to go off on our trip to the stars."
The logs were burning fiercely and at first Tom thought that the words he heard spoken were nothing but their crackling and hissing, but in a minute he changed his mind about that for the very good reason that the "Lefthandiron" as Tom's uncle once called it winked his eye at Tom and said: "Hullo, Sleepyhead." Tom only returned the wink. He was too much surprised to say anything.
"No, I don't at all," said the Bellows. "I mean Cakery. A Cakery is a place where they sell cake, and when I say Cakery I mean what I say. Just because you call it Bakery doesn't prove anything." "We're out for pleasure, not for argument," growled the Lefthandiron. "Go on and say what you've got to say."
"Well," said the Lefthandiron, scratching his head softly, "we can fly up a little higher and sit down and watch the world go round; we can take the long jump, or we can visit Saturn." "What was the first?" asked Tom. "To fly up a little higher, where we can get a better view; to sit down there and watch the world go round. It is an excellent way to travel.
The Lefthandiron stopped short and Tom strained his ears to hear the Poker's song. For a moment he could hear nothing, but then a slight buzzing sound like the hum of a bee, came to his ears and in another minute he could distinguish the words of the song.
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