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 day long . But the Fairy with the birch-rod will catch them all in time , and make them begin at one corner of their shops , and eat their way out at the other : by which time they will have got such stomach-aches as will cure them of poisoning little children . Next he saw all the little people in the world , writing all the little books in the world , about all the other little people in the world ; probably because they had no great people to write about : and if the names of the books were not Squeeky , nor the Pump - lighter , nor the Narrow Narrow World , nor the Hills of the Chattermuch , nor the Children 's Twaddeday , why then they were something else . And , all the rest of the little people in the world read the books , and thought themselves each as good as the President ; and perhaps they were right , for every one knows his own business best . But Tom thought he would sooner have a jolly good fairy tale , about Jack the Giant-killer or Beauty and the Beast , which taught him something that he did n't know already . And next he came to the centre of Creation -LRB- the hub , they call it there -RRB- , which lies in latitude 42.21 degrees south , and longitude 108.56 degrees east . And there he found all the wise people instructing mankind in the science of spirit-rapping , while their house was burning over their heads : and when Tom told them of the fire , they held an indignation meeting forthwith , and unanimously determined to hang Tom 's dog for coming into their country with gunpowder in his mouth . Tom could n't help saying that though they did fancy they had carried all the wit away with them out of Lincolnshire two hundred years ago , yet if they had had one such Lincolnshire nobleman among them as good old Lord Yarborough , he would have called for the fire-engines before he hanged other people 's dogs . But it was of no use , and the dog was hanged : and Tom could n't even have his carcase ; for they had abolished the have-his-carcase act in that country , for fear lest when rogues fell out , honest men should come by their own . And so they would have succeeded perfectly , as they always do , only that -LRB- as they also always do -RRB- they failed in one little particular , viz . that the dog would not die , being a water-dog , but bit their fingers so abominably that they were forced to let him go , and Tom likewise , as British subjects . Whereon they recommenced rapping for the spirits of their fathers ; and very much astonished the poor old spirits were when they came , and saw how , according to the laws of Mrs. Bedonebyasyoudid , their descendants had weakened their constitution by hard living . Then came Tom to the Island of Polupragmosyne -LRB- which some call Rogues ' Harbour ; but they are wrong ; for that is in the middle of Bramshill Bushes , and the county police have cleared it out long ago -RRB- . There every one knows his neighbour 's business better than his own ; and a very noisy place it is , as might be expected , considering that all the inhabitants are ex officio on the wrong side of the house in the `` Parliament of Man , and the Federation of the World ; '' and are always making wry mouths , and crying that the fairies ' grapes were sour . There Tom saw ploughs drawing horses , nails driving hammers , birds ' nests taking boys , books making authors , bulls keeping china-shops , monkeys shaving cats , dead dogs drilling live lions , blind brigadiers shelfed as principals of colleges , play-actors not in the least shelfed as popular preachers ; and , in short , every one set to do something which he had not learnt , because in what he had learnt , or pretended to learn , he had failed . There stands the Pantheon of the Great Unsuccessful , from the builders of the Tower of Babel to those of the Trafalgar Fountains ; in which politicians lecture on the constitutions which ought to have marched , conspirators on the revolutions which ought to have succeeded , economists on the schemes which ought to have made every one 's fortune , and projectors on the discoveries which ought to have set the Thames on fire .
There cobblers lecture on orthopedy -LRB- whatsoever that may be -RRB- because they can not sell their shoes ; and poets on AEsthetics -LRB- whatsoever that may be -RRB- XXXXX they can not sell their poetry .
For about because by of over that though to with