CHAPTER ELEVEN
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THE DUFFLEPUDS MADE HAPPY Lucy followed the great Lion out into the passage and at once she saw ing towards them an old man, barefoot, dressed in a red robe. His white hair was ed with achaplet of oak leaves, his beard fell to his girdle, and he supported himself with a curiously carved staff. When he saw Aslan he bowed low and said, "Wele, Sir, to the least of your houses.”
"Do you grow weary, 9９liｂ?Coriakin, of ruling such foolish subjects as I have given you here?”
"No," said the Magi, "they are very stupid but there is no real harm in them. I begin to grow rather fond of the creatures. Sometimes, perhaps, I am a little impatient, waiting for the day when they be governed by wisdom instead of this rough magic.”
"All in good time, Coriakin," said Aslan.
"Yes, all in very good time, Sir," was the answer. "Do you io show yourself to them?”
"Nay," said the Lion, with a little half-growl that meant (Lucy thought) the same as a laugh. "I should frighten them out of their senses. Many stars will grow old and e to take their rest in islands before your people are ripe for that. And today before su I must visit Trumpkin the Dwarf where he sits in the castle of Cair Paravel ting the days till his master Caspian es home. I will tell him all your story, Lucy. Do not look so sad. We shall meet soon again.”
"Please, Aslan," said Lucy, "what do you call soon?”
"I call all times soon," said Aslan; and instantly he was vanished away and Lucy was aloh the Magi.
"Gone!" said he, "and you and I quite crestfallen. Its always like that, you t keep him; its not as if he were a tame lion. And how did you enjoy my book?”
"Parts of it very mudeed," said Lucy. "Did you know I was there all the time?”
"Well, of course I knew when I let the Duffers make themselves invisible that you would be ing along presently to take the spell off. I wasnt quite sure of the exact day. And I wasnt especially och this m. You see they had made me invisible too and being invisible always makes me so sleepy. Heigh-ho - there Im yawning again. Are you hungry?”
"Well, perhaps I am a little," said Lucy. "Ive no idea what the time is.”
"e," said the Magi. "All times may be soon to Aslan; but in my home all hungry times are one oclock.”
He led her a little way down the passage and opened a door. Passing in, Lucy found herself in a pleasant room full of sunlight and flowers. The table was bare when they
entered, but it was of course a magic table, and at a word from the old man the tablecloth, silver, plates, glasses and food appeared.
"I hope that is-what you would like," said he. "I have tried to give you food more like the food of your own land than perhaps you have had lately.”
"Its lovely," said Lucy, and so it was; ae, piping hot, cold lamb and green peas, a strawberry ice, lemonsquash to drink with the meal and a cup of chocolate to follow.
But the magi himself drank only wine and ate only bread. There was nothing alarming about him, and Lud he were soon chatting away like old friends.
"When will the spell work?" asked Lucy. "Will the Duffers be visible again at once?”
"Oh yes, theyre visible now. But theyre probably all asleep still; they always take a rest in the middle of the day.”
"And now that theyre visible, are you going to let them off being ugly? Will you make them as they were before?”
"Well, thats rather a delicate question," said the Magi. "You see, its only they wh<mark></mark>o think they were so o look at before. They say theyve been uglified, but that isnt what I called it. Many people might say the ge was for the better.”
"Are they awfully ceited?”
"They are. Or at least the Chief Duffer is, aaught all the rest to be. They always believe every word he says.”
"Wed noticed that," said Lucy.
"Yes - wed get oer without him, in a way. Of course I could turn him into something else, or even put a spell on him which would make them not believe a word he said. But I dont like to do that. Its better for them to admire him than to admire nobody.”
"Dont they admire you?" asked Lucy.
"Oh, not me," said the Magi. "They wouldnt admire me.”
"What was it you uglified them for - I mean, what they call uglified?”
"Well, they wouldnt do what they were told. Their work is to mind the garden and raise food - not for me, as they imagine, but for themselves. They wouldnt do it at all if I didnt make them. And of course farden you want water. There is a beautiful spring about half a mile a the hill. And from that spring there flows a stream whies right past the garden. All I asked them to do was to take their water from the stream instead ing up to the spring with their buckets two or three times a day and tiring themselves
out besides spilling half of it on the way back. But they would. In the end they refused point blank.”
"Are they as stupid as all that?" asked Lucy.
The Magi sighed. "You wouldnt believe the troubles Ive had with them. A few months ago they were all for washing up the plates and knives before dihey said it saved time afterwards. Ive caught them planting boiled potatoes to save cooking them when they were dug up. One day the cat got into the dairy and twenty of them were at work moving all the milk out; no ohought of moving the cat. But I see youve finished. Lets go and look at the Duffers now they be looked at.”
They went into another room which was full of polished instruments hard to uand - such as Astrolabes, Orreries, oscopes, Poesimeters, buses and Theodolinds - and here, when they had e to the window, the Magi said, "There. There are your Duffers.”
"I dont see anybody," said Lucy. "And what are those mushroom things?”
The things she poi were dotted all over the level grass. They were certainly very like mushrooms, but far too big - the stalks about three feet high and the umbrellas about the same length from edge to edge. When she looked carefully she noticed too that the stalks joihe umbrellas not in the middle but at one side which gave an unbalanced look to them. And there was something - a sort of little bundle - lying on the grass at the foot of each stalk. In fact the longer she gazed at them the less like mushrooms they appeared. The umbrella part was not really round as she had thought at first. It was lohan it was broad, and it wide one end. There were a great many of them, fifty or more.
The clock struck three.
Instantly a most extraordinary thing happened. Each of the "mushrooms" suddenly turned upside-down. The little bundles which had lain at the bottom of the stalks were heads and bodies. The stalks themselves were legs. But not two legs to each body. Each body had a sihick leg right u (not to one side like the leg of a one- legged man) and at the end of it, a single enormous foot-a broadtoed foot with the toes curling up a little so that it looked rather like a small oe. She saw in a moment why they had looked like mushrooms. They had been lying flat on their backs each with its single leg straight up in the air and its enormous foot spread out above it. She learned afterwards that this was their ordinary way of resting; for the foot kept off both rain and sun and for a Monopod to lie us own foot is almost as good as being in a tent.
"Oh, the fuhe funnies," cried Lucy, bursting into laughter. "Did you make them like that?”
"Yes, yes. I made the Duffers into Monopods," said the Magi. He too was laughing till the tears ran down his cheeks. "But watch," he added.
It was worth watg. Of course these little one-footed men couldnt walk or run as we do. They got about by jumping, like fleas s. And what jumps they made! as if each big foot were a mass of springs. And with what a bouhey came down; that was what made the thumping noise which had so puzzled Lucy yesterday. For now they were jumping in all dires and calling out to one another, "Hey, lads! Were visible again.”
"Visible we are," said one in a tasselled red cap who was obviously the Chief Monopod.
"And what I say is, when chaps are visible, why, they see one another.”
"Ah, there it is, there it is, Chief," cried all the others. "Theres the point. No ones got a clearer head than you. You couldnt have made it plainer.”
"She caught the old man napping, that little girl did," said the Chief Monopod. "Weve beaten him this time.”
"Just what we were, going to say ourselves," chimed the chorus. "Yoing strohaoday, Chief. Keep it up, keep it up.”
"But do they dare to talk about you like that?" said Lucy. "They seemed to be so afraid of you yesterday. Dont they know you might be listening?”
"Thats one of the funny things about the Duffers," said the Magi. "One mihey talk as if I rahing and overheard e>.</a>verything and was extremely dangerous. The moment they think they take me in by tricks that a baby would see through - bless them!”
"Will they have to be turned bato their proper shapes?" asked Lucy. "Oh, I do hope it wouldnt be unkind to leave them as they are. Do they really mind very much? They seem pretty happy. I say - look at that jump. What were they like before?”
"on little dwarfs," said he. "Nothing like so nice as the sort you have in Narnia.”
"It would be a pity to ge them back," said Lucy. "Theyre so funny: and theyre rather nice. Do you think it would make any difference if I told them that?”
"Im sure it would - if you could get it into their heads.”
"Will you e with me and try?”
"No, no. Youll get on far better without me.”
"Thanks awfully for the lunch," said Lud turned quickly away. She ran dowairs which she had e up so nervously that m and oned into Edmund at
the bottom. All the others were there with him waiting, and Lucys sce smote her when she saw their anxious faces and realized how long she had fotten them.
"Its all right," she shouted. "Everythings all right. The Magis a brick - and Ive seen Him - Aslan.”
After that she went from them like the wind and out into the garden. Here the earth was shaking with the jumps and the air ringing with the shouts of the Monopods. Both were redoubled when they caught sight of her.
"Here she es, here she es," they cried. "Three cheers for the little girl. Ah! She put it across the old gentleman properly, she did.”
"And were extremely regrettable," said the Chief Monopod, "that we t give you the pleasure of seeing us as we were before we were uglified, for you wouldnt believe the difference, and thats the truth, for theres no denying were mortal ugly now, so we wont deceive you.”
"Eh, that we are, Chief, that we are," echoed the others, boung like so many toy balloons. "Youve said it, youve said it.”
"But I dont think you are at all," said Lucy, shouting to make herself heard. "I think you look very nice.”
"Hear her, hear her," said the Monopods. "True for you, Missie. Very nice we look. You couldnt find a handsomer lot." They said this without any surprise and did not seem to notice that they had ged their minds.
"Shes a-saying," remarked the Chief Monopod, "as how we looked very nice before we were uglified.”
"True for you, Chief, true for you," ted the others. "Thats what she says. We heard her ourselves.”
"I did not," bawled Lucy. "I said youre very niow.”
"So she did, so she did," said the Chief Monopod, "said we were very hen.”
"Hear em both, hear em both," said the Monopods. "Theres a pair for you. Always right.
They couldnt have put it better.”
"But were saying just the opposite," said Lucy, stamping her foot with impatience.
"So you are, to be sure, so you are," said the Monopods. "Nothing like an opposite. Keep it up, both of you.”
"Youre enough to drive anyone mad," said Lucy, and gave it up. But the Monopods seemed perfectly tented, and she decided that on the whole the versation had been a success.
And before everyoo bed that evening something else happened which made them even more satisfied with their one-legged dition. Caspian and all the Narnia back as soon as possible to the shore to give their o Rhind the others on board the Dawn Treader, who were by now very anxious. And, of course, the Monopods went with them, boung like footballs and agreeing with one another in loud voices till Eustace said, "I wish the Magi would make them inaudible instead of invisible." (He was soon sorry he had spoken because then he had to explain that an inaudible thing is something you t hear, and though he took a lot of trouble he never felt sure that the Monopods had really uood, and what especially annoyed him was that they said in the end, "Eh, he t put things the way our Chief does. But youll learn, young man.
Hark to him. Hell show you how to say things. Theres a speaker for you!") When they reached the bay, Reepicheep had a brilliant idea. He had his little coracle lowered and paddled himself about in it till the Monopods were thhly ied. He then stood up in it and said, "Worthy and intelligent Monopods, you do not need boats. Each of you has a foot that will do instead. Just jump as lightly as you on the water and see what happens.”
The Chief Monopod hung bad warhe others that theyd find the water powerful wet, but one or two of the younger oried it almost at once; and then a few others followed their example, and at last the whole lot did the same. It worked perfectly. The huge single foot of a Monopod acted as a natural raft or boat, and when Reepicheep had taught them how to cut rude paddles for themselves, they all paddled about the bay and round the Dawn Treader, looking for all the world like a fleet of little oes with a fat dwarf standing up ireme stern of each. And they had races, and bottles of wine were lowered down to them from the ship as prizes, and the sailors stood leaning over the ships sides and laughed till their own sides ached.
The Duffers were also very pleased with their new name of Monopods, which seemed to them a magnifit hough they never got it right. "Thats what we are," they bellowed, "Moneypuds, Pomonods, Poddymons. Just what it was oips of our too call ourselves." But they soon got it mixed up with their old name of Duffers and finally settled down to calling themselves the Dufflepuds; and that is what they will probably be called for turies.
That evening all the Narnians dined upstairs with the Magi, and Luoticed how different the whole top floor looked now that she was no longer afraid of it. The mysterious signs on the doors were still mysterious but now looked as if they had kind and cheerful meanings, and even the bearded mirror now seemed funny rather than frightening. At dinner everyone had by magic what everyone liked best to eat and drink, and after dihe Magi did a very useful aiful pieagic. He laid two blank sheets of part oable and asked Drinian to give him a at of their voyage up to date: and as Drinian spoke, everything he described came out on the
part in fine clear liill at last each sheet lendid map of the Eastern O<cite></cite>, showing Galma, Terebinthia, the Seven Isles, the Lone Islands, Dragon Island, Burnt Island, Deathwater, and the land of the Duffers itself, all exactly the right sizes and in the right positions. They were the first maps ever made of those seas aer than any that have been made sihout magic. For on these, though the towns and mountains looked at first just as they would on an ordinary map, when the Magi lent them a magnifying glass you saw that they were perfect little pictures of the real things, so that you could see the very castle and slave market and streets in Narrowhaven, all very clear though very distant, like things seen through the wrong end of a telescope. The only drawback was that the coastline of most of the islands was inplete, for the map showed only what Drinianhad seen with his own eyes. When they were fihe.
Magi kept one himself and presehe other to Caspian: it still hangs in his Chamber of Instruments at Cair Paravel. But the Magi could tell them nothing about seas or lands further east. He did, however, tell them that about seven years before a Narnian ship had put in at his waters and that she had on board the lords Revilian, Argoz, Mavramorn and Rhoop: so they judged that the golden man they had seen lying ihwater must be the Lord Restimar.
day, the Magi magically mehe stern of the Dawn Treader where it had been damaged by the Sear Serpent and loaded her with useful gifts. There was a most friendly parting, and when she sailed, two hours after noon, all the Dufflepuds paddled out with her to the harbour mouth, and cheered until she was out of sound of their cheering.
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