and it tried to drop Tom : but he held on tight to its claws , thinking himself safer where he was . So Tom told him who he was , and what his errand was . And the thing winked its one eye , and sneered : `` I am too old to be taken in in that way . You are come after gold - - I know you are . '' `` Gold ! What is gold ? '' And really Tom did not know ; but the suspicious old bogy would not believe him . But after a while Tom began to understand a little . For , as the vapours came up out of the hole , the bogy smelt them with his nostrils , and combed them and sorted them with his combs ; and then , when they steamed up through them against his wings , they were changed into showers and streams of metal . From one wing fell gold-dust , and from another silver , and from another copper , and from another tin , and from another lead , and so on , and sank into the soft mud , into veins and cracks , and hardened there . Whereby it comes to pass that the rocks are full of metal . But , all of a sudden , somebody shut off the steam below , and the hole was left empty in an instant : and then down rushed the water into the hole , in such a whirlpool that the bogy spun round and round as fast as a teetotum . But that was all in his day 's work , like a fair fall with the hounds ; so all he did was to say to Tom - `` Now is your time , youngster , to get down , if you are in earnest , which I do n't believe . '' `` You 'll soon see , '' said Tom ; and away he went , as bold as Baron Munchausen , and shot down the rushing cataract like a salmon at Ballisodare . And , when he got to the bottom , he swam till he was washed on shore safe upon the Other-end-of-Nowhere ; and he found it , to his surprise , as most other people do , much more like This-End-of - Somewhere than he had been in the habit of expecting And first he went through Waste-paper-land , where all the stupid books lie in heaps , up hill and down dale , like leaves in a winter wood ; and there he saw people digging and grubbing among them , to make worse books out of bad ones , and thrashing chaff to save the dust of it ; and a very good trade they drove thereby , especially among children . Then he went by the sea of slops , to the mountain of messes , and the territory of tuck , where the ground was very sticky , for it was all made of bad toffee -LRB- not Everton toffee , of course -RRB- , and full of deep cracks and holes choked with wind-fallen fruit , and green goose-berries , and sloes , and crabs , and whinberries , and hips and haws , and all the nasty things which little children will eat , if they can get them . But the fairies hide them out of the way in that country as fast as they can , and very hard work they have , and of very little use it is . For as fast as they hide away the old trash , foolish and wicked people make fresh trash full of lime and poisonous paints , and actually go and steal receipts out of old Madame Science 's big book to invent poisons for little children , and sell them at wakes and fairs and tuck-shops . Very well . Let them go on .
Dr. Letheby and Dr. Hassall can not catch them , though they are setting traps for them all XXXXX long .
Ballisodare Other-end-of-Nowhere This-End-of Tom cataract day gold-dust haws sloes whinberries