Ah , now comes the most wonderful part of this wonderful story . Tom , when he woke , for of course he woke -- children always wake after they have slept exactly as long as is good for them -- found himself swimming about in the stream , being about four inches , or -- that I may be accurate -- 3.87902 inches long and having round the parotid region of his fauces a set of external gills -LRB- I hope you understand all the big words -RRB- just like those of a sucking eft , which he mistook for a lace frill , till he pulled at them , found he hurt himself , and made up his mind that they were part of himself , and best left alone . In fact , the fairies had turned him into a water-baby . A water-baby ? You never heard of a water-baby . Perhaps not . That is the very reason why this story was written . There are a great many things in the world which you never heard of ; and a great many more which nobody ever heard of ; and a great many things , too , which nobody will ever hear of , at least until the coming of the Cocqcigrues , when man shall be the measure of all things . `` But there are no such things as water-babies . '' How do you know that ? Have you been there to see ? And if you had been there to see , and had seen none , that would not prove that there were none . If Mr. Garth does not find a fox in Eversley Wood -- as folks sometimes fear he never will -- that does not prove that there are no such things as foxes . And as is Eversley Wood to all the woods in England , so are the waters we know to all the waters in the world . And no one has a right to say that no water - babies exist , till they have seen no water-babies existing ; which is quite a different thing , mind , from not seeing water-babies ; and a thing which nobody ever did , or perhaps ever will do . `` But surely if there were water-babies , somebody would have caught one at least ? '' Well . How do you know that somebody has not ? `` But they would have put it into spirits , or into the Illustrated News , or perhaps cut it into two halves , poor dear little thing , and sent one to Professor Owen , and one to Professor Huxley , to see what they would each say about it . '' Ah , my dear little man !
that does not follow XXXXX all , as you will see before the end of the story .
If about as at in into of that to until