The Sword in the Stone. T. H. White

you have usually seen. Under this horizon of air you will have to imagine another horizon under water, spherical and practically upside down – for the surface of the water acted partly as a mirror to what was below it. It is difficult to imagine. What makes it a great deal more difficult to imagine is that everything which human beings would consider to be above the water level was fringed with all the colours of the spectrum. For instance, if you had happened to be fishing for the Wart, he would have seen you, at the rim of the tea saucer which was the upper air to him, not as one person waving a fishing-rod, but as seven people, whose outlines were red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet, all waving the same rod whose colours were as varied. In fact, you would have been a rainbow man to him, a beacon of flashing and radiating colours, which ran into one another and had rays all about. You would have been burnt upon the water like Cleopatra in the poem by Herédia. The reference may possibly be to Shakespeare.

      The next most lovely thing was that the Wart had no weight. He was not earth-bound any more and did not have to plod along on a flat surface, pressed down by gravity and the weight of the atmosphere. He could do what men have always wanted to do, that is, fly. There is practically no difference between flying in the water and flying in the air. The best of it was that he did not have to fly in a machine, by pulling levers and sitting still, but could do it with his own body. It was like the dreams people have.

      Just as they were going to swim off their tour of inspection, a timid young roach appeared from between two waving bottle brushes of mare’s tail and hung about, looking quite pale with agitation. It looked at them with big apprehensive eyes and evidently wanted something, but could not make up its mind.

      “Approach,” said Merlyn gravely.

      At this the roach rushed up like a hen, burst into tears and began stammering its message.

      “If you p-p-p-please, Doctor,” stammered the poor creature, gabbling so that they could scarcely understand what it said, “we have such a d-dretful case of s-s-s-something or other in our family, and we w-w-w-wondered if you could s-s-s-spare the time? It’s our d-d-d-dear Mamma, who w-w-w-will swim a-a-a-all the time upside d-d-d-down, and she d-d-d-does look so horrible and s-s-s-speaks so strange, that we r-r-r-really thought she ought to have a d-d-d-doctor, if it w-w-w-wouldn’t be too much? C-C-C-Clara says to say so sir, if you s-s-s-see w-w-w-what I m-m-m-mean?”

      Here the little roach began fizzing so much, what with its stammer and its tearful disposition, that it became perfectly inarticulate and could only stare at Merlyn with big mournful eyes.

      “Never mind, my little man,” said Merlyn. “There, there, lead me to your poor Mamma, and we shall see what we can do.”

      They all three swam off into the murk under the draw-bridge upon their errand of mercy.

      “Very Russian, these roach,” whispered Merlyn to the Wart, behind his fin. “It’s probably only a case of nervous hysteria, a matter for the psychologist rather than the physician.”

      The roach’s Mamma was lying on her back as he had described. She was squinting horribly, had folded her fins upon her chest, and every now and then she blew a bubble. All her children were gathered round her in a circle, and every time she blew a bubble they all nudged each other and gasped. She had a seraphic smile upon her face.

      “Well, well, well,” said Merlyn, putting on his best bedside manner, “and how is Mrs Roach today?”

      He patted all the young roaches on the head and advanced with stately motions towards his patient. It should perhaps be mentioned that Merlyn was a ponderous, deep-beamed fish of about five pounds, red-leather coloured, with small scales, adipose in his fins, rather slimy, and having a bright marigold eye – a respectable figure.

      Mrs Roach held out a languid fin, sighed emphatically and said, “Ah, Doctor, so you’ve come at last?”

      “Hum,” said Merlyn, in his deepest tones.

      Then he told everybody to close their eyes – the Wart peeped – and began to swim round the invalid in a slow and stately dance. As he danced he sang. His song was this:

      Therapeutic,

      Elephantic,

      Diagnosis,

      Boom!

      Pancreatic,

      Microstatic,

      Anti-toxic,

      Doom!

      With normal catabolism,

      Gabbleism and babbleism,

      Snip, Snap, Snorum

      Cut out his abdonorum.

      Dyspepsia,

      Anaemia,

      Toxaemia,

      One, two, three,

      And out goes He,

      With a fol-de-rol-derido for the Five Guinea Fee.

      At the end of his song he was swimming round his patient so close that he actually touched her, stroking his brown smooth-scaled flanks against her more rattly pale ones. Perhaps he was healing her with slime – for all fishes are said to go to the Tench for medicine – or perhaps it was by touch or massage or hypnotism. In any case, Mrs Roach suddenly stopped squinting, turned the right way up, and said, “Oh, Doctor, dear Doctor, I feel I could eat a little lob-worm now.”

      “No lob-worm,” said Merlyn, “not for two days. I shall give you a prescription for a strong broth of algae every two hours, Mrs Roach. We must build up your strength you know. After all, Rome wasn’t built in a day.”

      Then he patted all the little roaches once more, told them to grow up into brave little fish, and swam off with an air of great importance into the gloom. As he swam, he puffed his mouth in and out.

      “What did you mean by that about Rome?” asked the Wart, when they were out of earshot.

      “Heaven knows,” said the tench.

      They swam along, Merlyn occasionally advising him to put his back into it when he forgot, and all the strange under-water world began to dawn about them, deliciously cool after the heat of the upper air. The great forests of the weed were delicately traced, and in them there hung motionless many schools of sticklebacks learning to do their physical exercises in strict unison. On the word One they all lay still: at Two they faced about: at Three they all shot together into a cone, whose apex was a bit of something to eat. Water snails slowly ambled about on the stems of the lilies or under their leaves, while fresh-water mussels lay on the bottom doing nothing in particular. Their flesh was salmon pink, like a very good strawberry cream ice. The small congregations of perch – it was a strange thing, but all the bigger fish seemed to have hidden themselves – had delicate circulations, so that they blushed or grew pale as easily as a lady in a Victorian novel. Only their blush was a deep olive colour, and it was the blush of rage. Whenever Merlyn and his companion swam past them, they raised their spiky dorsal fins in menace, and only lowered them when they saw that Merlyn was a tench. The black bars on their sides made them look as if they had been grilled; and these also could become darker or lighter. Once the two travellers passed under a swan. The white creature floated above like a zeppelin, all indistinct except what was under the water. The latter part was quite clear and showed that the swan was floating slightly on one side with one leg cocked up over its back.

      “Look,” said the Wart, “it’s the poor swan with the deformed leg. It can only paddle with one leg, and the other side of it is all hunched.”

      “Nonsense,” said the swan snappily, putting its head into the water and giving them a frown with its black nares. “Swans like to rest in this position, and you can keep your fishy sympathy to yourself, so there.” It continued to glare at them from up above, like a white snake suddenly let down through the ceiling, until they were out of sight.

      “You swim along,” said the tench in gloomy tones, “as if there was nothing to be afraid of in the world.