-- Q.E.D. Which may seem a roundabout reason ; and so , perhaps , it is : but you will have heard worse ones in your time , and from better men than you are . But one thing is certain ; that , when the good old doctor got his book written , he felt considerably relieved from Bumpsterhausen 's blue follicles , and a few things infinitely worse ; to wit , from pride and vain-glory , and from blindness and hardness of heart ; which are the true causes of Bumpsterhausen 's blue follicles , and of a good many other ugly things besides . Whereon the foul flood - water in his brains ran down , and cleared to a fine coffee colour , such as fish like to rise in , till very fine clean fresh-run fish did begin to rise in his brains ; and he caught two or three of them -LRB- which is exceedingly fine sport , for brain rivers -RRB- , and anatomised them carefully , and never mentioned what he found out from them , except to little children ; and became ever after a sadder and a wiser man ; which is a very good thing to become , my dear little boy , even though one has to pay a heavy price for the blessing . CHAPTER V `` Stern Lawgiver ! yet thou dost wear The Godhead 's most benignant grace ; Nor know we anything so fair As is the smile upon thy face : Flowers laugh before thee on their beds And fragrance in thy footing treads ; Thou dost preserve the stars from wrong ; And the most ancient heavens , through Thee , are fresh and strong . '' WORDSWORTH , Ode to Duty . What became of little Tom ? He slipped away off the rocks into the water , as I said before . But he could not help thinking of little Ellie . He did not remember who she was ; but he knew that she was a little girl , though she was a hundred times as big as he . That is not surprising : size has nothing to do with kindred . A tiny weed may be first cousin to a great tree ; and a little dog like Vick knows that Lioness is a dog too , though she is twenty times larger than herself . So Tom knew that Ellie was a little girl , and thought about her all that day , and longed to have had her to play with ; but he had very soon to think of something else . And here is the account of what happened to him , as it was published next morning , in the Water-proof Gazette , on the finest watered paper , for the use of the great fairy , Mrs. Bedonebyasyoudid , who reads the news very carefully every morning , and especially the police cases , as you will hear very soon . He was going along the rocks in three-fathom water , watching the pollock catch prawns , and the wrasses nibble barnacles off the rocks , shells and all , when he saw a round cage of green withes ; and inside it , looking very much ashamed of himself , sat his friend the lobster , twiddling his horns , instead of thumbs . `` What , have you been naughty , and have they put you in the lock - up ? '' asked Tom . The lobster felt a little indignant at such a notion , but he was too much depressed in spirits to argue ; so he only said , `` I ca n't get out . '' `` Why did you get in ? '' `` After that nasty piece of dead fish . ''
He had thought it looked and smelt very nice when he was outside , and so it did , for a lobster : but now he turned round and abused it because he was angry XXXXX himself .
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