Doctor Dolittle’s Caravan E-Book

Hugh Lofting

• Herausgeber: Classica Libris
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Beschreibung

Doctor Dolittle’s Circus is in a bad way and so the Doctor searches for a special new animal to add to the Circus’ attractions. His discovery of Pippinella, a canary with the most beautiful voice he’s ever heard, seems to solve the problems at first. But Dab-Dab the duck is still unhappy, and longs to return to her home in Puddleby-on-the-Marsh…

Leseprobe

Hugh Lofting

DOCTOR DOLITTLE’S CARAVAN

Copyright

First published in 1926

Copyright © 2019 Classica Libris

PART ONE

Chapter 1

THE ANIMAL SHOP

This book of the memoirs of Doctor Dolittle has been called the Caravan because it is in part a continuation of the Circus and the adventures that he met with in his career as a showman. Moreover, on his arrival in London the headquarters of the Dolittle household became the Doctor’s caravan on Greenheath (just outside the city), where his surgery and animal clinic continued their good work. And this too made that name for the book seem proper and in place.

It will be remembered that shortly after John Dolittle was elected as the new manager of the circus he had received a special invitation from some theatre owners in London to come and put on a show for them. And while he was still taking the circus to small towns and working to get enough cash in hand to put the circus on its feet again, he was continually trying to think up some good and original show to put on in London.

He was most anxious that his company’s first appearance in the big city should be a success. The staff of the Dolittle Circus now consisted of Matthew Mugg, assistant manager; Hercules the strong man; the Pinto brothers, trapeze artists; Hop the clown; Henry Crockett, the Punch-and-Judy man; Theodosia Mugg, mistress of the wardrobes; and Fred, a new menagerie keeper whom the Doctor had recently hired. Then of course there were the animals: the lion, the leopard, and the elephant—the big animals that constituted the important part of the menagerie; several smaller beasts, such as the opossum (known as the “hurri-gurri”); the pushmi-pullyu; the snakes; the Doctor’s own animal household (Jip the dog, Gub-Gub the pig, Too-Too the owl, Dab-Dab the duck, and the white mouse); and a few other oddments.

The way the Doctor finally hit upon an idea for an unusual show for London was rather curious. Like many important things, it began from a small chance happening.

One evening, when the show had moved to a moderate-sized market town, the Doctor went for a walk with Matthew Mugg and Jip. They had been busy all day getting the circus set up and the Doctor had not yet had an opportunity to see the town. After going through the main streets, they came to an inn that had tables and chairs set outside before the door. It was a warm evening and the Doctor and Matthew sat down at the inn tables to drink a glass of ale.

While they were resting and watching the quiet life of the town, the song of a bird reached their ears. It was extraordinarily beautiful, at times tremendously powerful, at others soft and low and mysterious—but always changing. The singer, whoever he was, never repeated himself.

The Doctor had written books on bird songs and he was interested.

“Do you hear that, Matthew?” he asked.

“Great, ain’t it?” said the cat’s-meat man. “Must be a nightingale—up on them big elms by the church there.”

“No,” said the Doctor, “that’s no nightingale. That’s a canary. He is singing scraps of a nightingale’s song which he has picked up—and parts of many others, too. But he has a canary’s voice, for all that. Listen: now he’s imitating a thrush.”

They sat a while longer and the bird ran through a wonderful range of imitations.

“You know, Matthew,” said the Doctor, “I think I’d like to have a canary in the wagon. They’re awfully good company. I’ve never bought one because I hate to see birds in cages. But with those who are born in captivity I suppose it’s really all right. Let’s go down the street and see if we can get a glimpse of this songster.”

So after the Doctor had paid for the ale they left the tables and walked along toward the church. But before they reached it they saw there were several shops to pass. Presently the Doctor stopped.

“Look, Matthew,” said he. “One of those shops is an animal shop. That’s where the canary is. I hate animal shops; the poor creatures usually look so neglected. The proprietors always keep too many—more than they can look after properly. And they usually smell so stuffy and close—the shops, I mean. I never go into them now. I don’t even pass one if I can help it.”

“Why?” asked Matthew.

“Well,” said the Doctor, “ever since I became sort of known among the animals, the poor beasts all talk to me as soon as I go in, begging me to buy them—birds and rabbits and guinea pigs and everything. I think I’ll turn back and go around another way, so I won’t have to pass the window.”

But just as the Doctor was about to return toward the inn the beautiful voice of the song bird burst out again and he hesitated.

“He’s marvellous,” said John Dolittle, “simply superb!”

“Why not hurry by with just one eye open?” said Matthew. “Maybe you could spot the bird without stopping.”

“All right,” said the Doctor. And putting on a brisk pace, he strode toward the shop. In passing it he just gave one glance in at the window and hurried on.

“Well,” asked Matthew, as the Doctor paused on the other side, “did you see which bird it was?”

“Yes,” said John Dolittle. “It’s that green canary near the door, the one in the small wooden cage, marked three shillings. Listen, Matthew, go in and buy him for me. I can afford that much, I think. I dare not go myself. Everything in the place will clamour at me at once. I have an idea those white rabbits recognized me already. You go for me… Don’t forget—the green canary in the wooden cage near the door, marked three shillings. Here’s the money.”

So Matthew Mugg went into the store with the three shillings, while the Doctor waited outside the window of the shop next door.

The cat’s-meat man wasn’t gone very long—and when he returned he had no canary with him.

“You made a mistake, Doctor,” said he. “The bird you spoke of is a hen and they don’t sing. The one we heard is a bright yellow cock, right outside the shop. They want two pounds ten for him. He’s a prize bird, they say, and the best singer they ever had.”

“How extraordinary!” said the Doctor. “Are you sure?”

And, forgetting his intention of not being seen by the animals in the shop, he moved up to the window and pointed again to the green canary.

“That’s the bird I meant,” he said. “Did you ask about that one? Oh, Lord! Now I’ve done it. She has recognized me.”

The green canary near the door end of the window, seeing the famous Doctor pointing to her, evidently expected him to buy her. She was already making signs to him through the glass and jumping about her cage with joy.

The Doctor, quite unable to afford two pounds ten for the other bird, was beginning to move away. But the expression on the little green canary’s face as she realized he didn’t mean to buy her after all was pitiful to see.

John Dolittle had not walked with Matthew more than a hundred yards down the street before he stopped again.

“It’s no use,” said he. “I’ll have to buy her, I suppose—even if she can’t sing. That’s always the way if I go near an animal shop. I always have to buy the most wretched and most useless thing they have there. Go back and get her.”

Once more the cat’s-meat man went into the shop and presently returned with a small cage covered over with brown paper.

“We must hurry, Matthew,” said the Doctor. “It’s nearly teatime and Theodosia always finds it hard to attend to it without our help.”

On reaching the circus the Doctor was immediately called away on important business connected with the show. He asked Matthew to take the canary to the wagon, and he was himself occupied with one thing and another until suppertime.

And even when he finally returned to his wagon his mind was so taken up with the things of the day that he had forgotten for the moment all about the canary he had bought. He sank wearily into a chair as he entered and Too-Too, the owl who kept the circus’s accounts, immediately engaged him in a financial conversation.

But the dull discussion of money and figures had hardly begun before the Doctor’s attention was distracted by a very agreeable sound. It was the voice of a bird warbling ever so softly.

“Great heavens!” the Doctor whispered. “Where’s that coming from?”

The sound grew and grew—the most beautiful singing that John Dolittle had ever heard, even superior to that which he had listened to outside the inn. To ordinary ears it would have been wonderful enough, but to the Doctor, who understood canary language and could follow the words of the song being sung, it was an experience to be remembered.

It was a long poem, telling of many things—of many lands and many loves, of little adventures and great adventures, and the melody, now sad, now gay—now fierce, now soft, was more wonderful than the finest nightingale singing at his best.

“Where is it coming from?” the Doctor repeated, completely mystified.

“From that covered cage up on the shelf,” said Too-Too.

“Great heavens!” the Doctor cried. “The bird I bought this afternoon!”

He sprang up and tore the wrapping paper aside. The song ceased. The little green canary peered out at him through the torn hole.

“I thought you were a hen,” said the Doctor.

“So I am,” said the bird.

“But you sing!”

“Well, why not?”

“But hen canaries don’t sing.”

The little green bird laughed a long, trilling, condescending sort of laugh.

“That old story—it’s so amusing!” she said. “It was invented by the cocks, you know—the conceited males. The hens have by far the better voices. But the cocks don’t like us to sing. They peck us if we do. Some years ago a movement was started—‘Singing for Women,’ it was called. Some of us hens got together to assert our rights. But there were an awful lot of old-fashioned ones—old maids, you know—who still thought it was unmaidenly to sing. They said that a hen’s place was on the nest—that singing was for men only. So the movement failed. That’s why people still believe that hens can’t sing.”

“But you didn’t sing in the shop?” said the Doctor.

“Neither would you—in that shop,” said the canary. “The smell of the place was enough to choke you.”

“Well, why did you sing now?”

“Because I realized, after the man you sent came in a second time, that you had wanted to buy that stupid yellow cock who had been bawling out of tune all afternoon. I knew, of course, that you only sent the man back to get me out of kindness. So I thought I’d like to repay you by showing you what we women can do in the musical line.”

“Marvellous!” said the Doctor. “You certainly make that other fellow sound like a second-rate singer. You are a contralto, I see.”

“A mezzo-contralto,” the canary corrected. “But I can go right up through the highest soprano range when I want to.”

“What is your name?” asked the Doctor.

“Pippinella,” the bird replied.

“What was that you were singing just now?”

“I was singing you the story of my life.”

“But it was in verse.”

“Yes, I made it into poetry—just to amuse myself. We cage birds have a lot of spare time on our hands, when there are no eggs to sit on or young ones to feed.”

“Humph!” said the Doctor. “You are a great artist—a poet and a singer.”

“And a musician!” said the canary quietly. “The composition is entirely my own. You noticed I used none of the ordinary bird songs—except the love song of the greenfinch at the part where I am telling of my faithless husband running off to America and leaving me weeping by the shore.”

Dab-Dab at this moment came in to announce that supper was ready, but to Gub-Gub the pig’s disgust the Doctor brushed everything aside in the excitement of a new interest. Diving into an old portfolio, he brought out a blank musical manuscript book in which he sometimes wrote down pieces for the flute, his own favourite instrument.

“Excuse me,” he said to the canary, “but would you mind starting the story of your life all over again? It interests me immensely.”

“Certainly,” said the little bird. “Have my drinking trough filled with water, will you please? It got emptied with the shaking coming here. I like to moisten my throat occasionally when I am singing long songs.”

“Of course, of course!” said the Doctor, falling over Gub-Gub in his haste to provide the singer with what she wanted. “There! Now, would you mind singing very slowly? Because I want to take down the musical notation and the time is a little complicated. Also, I notice you change the key quite often. The words I won’t bother with, for the present, because I couldn’t write both at once. I will ask you to give me them again, if you will, later. All right. I’m ready whenever you are.”

Chapter 2

THE WHITE PERSIAN

Then the Doctor sat down and wrote page after page of music while the green canary sang him the story of her life. It was a long song, lasting at least half an hour. And during the course of it Gub-Gub interrupted more than once with his pathetic:

“But, Doctor, the supper’s getting cold!”

When she had finished John Dolittle carefully put away the book he had been writing in, thanked the canary, and prepared to have supper.

“Would you care to come out of your cage and join us?” he asked.

“Have you any cats?”

“No,” said the Doctor. “I don’t keep any cats in the wagon.”

“Oh, all right,” said the canary. “Then if you’ll open my door, I’ll come out.”

“But you could easily get away from a cat, couldn’t you,” asked Jip, “with wings to fly?”

“I could if I was expecting it or knew where it was,” said the canary, flying down onto the table and picking up a crumb beside the Doctor’s plate. “Cats are most dangerous when you can’t see them. They are the only really skilful hunters.”

“Huh!” grunted Jip. “Dogs are pretty good, you know.”

“Excuse me,” said the canary, “but dogs are mere duffers when compared with cats in the hunting game—I’m sorry to hurt your feelings, but duffers is the only word I can use. You are all very fine at following and tracking—even better than cats at that. But for getting your quarry by the use of your wits—well, there! Did you ever see a dog sit and watch a hole in the ground for hours and hours on end, silent and still as a stone—waiting, waiting for some wretched little mouse or other creature to come out? Did you ever know a dog with the patience to do that? No. Your dog, when he finds a hole, barks and yelps and scratches at it—and of course the rat, or whatever it is, doesn’t dream of coming out. No, speaking as a bird, I’d sooner be shut in a roomful of dogs than have a single cat in the house.”

“Did you ever have any unpleasant experience with them?” asked the Doctor.

“Myself, no,” said the canary. “But that was solely because of someone else’s experience with one. It taught me a lesson. I lived once in the same house with a parrot. One day the woman who owned us got a fine, silky, white Persian. She was a lovely creature—to look at. The old parrot said to me the morning the cat came, ‘She looks like a decent sort.’

“‘Pol,’ said I, ‘cats are cats. Don’t trust her—never trust a cat.’”

“I wonder if that’s what makes them the way they are,” said the Doctor, “—the fact that no one ever trusts them. It’s a terrible strain on anybody’s character.”

“Fiddlesticks!” said the canary. “Our woman trusted this cat—even left her in the room with us at night. My cage was hung high up on a chain, so I wasn’t afraid of her reaching in to me with her claws. But poor old Pol, one of the most decent old cronies that ever sat on a perch, he had no cage at all—just one of those fool stands they make for parrots—a crossbar perch and a long chain on his ankle. He wouldn’t believe that this sweet creature in white was dangerous, until one day she tried to climb up the pole of his stand and get at him. Well, a parrot’s a pretty good fighter when the fight’s a fair one, and he gave her more than she bargained for. She retired from the fray with a piece bitten out of her ear.

“‘Now, will you believe me?’ I said. ‘And, listen—she’s going to get you yet—if there’s any way to do it that she and the devil can think up between them. Whatever you do, don’t go to sleep while she is in the room. She’s scared of you now, while you’re facing her. But she won’t be scared of you as soon as you’re off your guard. One spring and a bite on the neck from her and Polly won’t want any more crackers. Remember—don’t go to sleep when she is in the room.’”

The green canary paused a moment in her story to hop across the table and take a drink out of Gub-Gub’s milk bowl—which greatly astonished that member of the household. Then she cleaned her bill against the cruet stand and proceeded:

“I couldn’t tell you how many times I saved that foolish parrot’s life. An easy-going bird, he loved regularity. He was a bachelor, making a great ceremony of all the little habits of his daily round. And he just couldn’t bear to have anything interfere with them. He would be ruffled and sulky for days if the maid missed giving him his bath on Saturday afternoon or his piece of orange peel at Sunday breakfast. One of his little customs was to take a nap every day after lunch. I warned him over and over again that this was dangerous unless the doors and windows were shut and the cat outside. But the force of habit, years and years of bachelor regularity, were too strong for him. And I believe he would have taken that nap if the room had been full of cats.”

The canary picked up another crumb, munched it thoughtfully and went on:

“I often think there was something fine about that parrot’s independence. He had principles and nothing was allowed to change them. In the meantime that horrible cat was waiting for her chance. Often and often when Pol was dozing off I’d see her come sneaking toward his stand along the floor or creep across a table near enough to spring from. Then I’d give a terrific loud whistle and the parrot would wake up. And the cat would slink away, looking daggers at me for spoiling her game.

“As for the mistress we had, it never entered her empty head that the cat was a dangerous customer. One day a friend of hers asked if she wasn’t afraid to leave the beast around when she had no cage over the parrot.

“‘Oh, tut, tut!’ said she. ‘Pussums wouldn’t hurt my nice Polly, would ums, Pussums?’

“And then that silky hypocrite would rub her neck against the old lady’s dress and purr as though butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth.

“Well, I did my best. But the day came when even I was outwitted by the she-devil in white. The old lady had gone to visit friends in the country and let the maid take the day off while she was away. Both the parrot and I were given double rations of seed and water, the house was locked, and the keys put under the mat. The door of the parlour, where we were always kept, was closed, and I thanked my stars that for this day, anyhow, my friend should be safe.

“About noon a thunderstorm came up and the wind howled around the house dismally. And presently I saw the door of our room blow open. It had not been properly latched—just closed carelessly.

“‘Don’t go to sleep, Pol,’ I said. ‘That cat may come in any moment!’

“Well, for a long time she didn’t. And after an hour I decided that the cat must have been shut in another room somewhere and that it was all right and I needn’t worry. After his lunch Pol went sound asleep; and presently, feeling sort of drowsy myself, I too took a nap.

“I dreamed all sorts of awful things—monstrous cats leaping through the air, parrots defending themselves with swords and pitchforks—all manner of terrible stuff. At the most tragic moment in the worst dream I thought I heard a thud on the floor and suddenly woke up, wide awake, the way one does with nightmares. And there on the floor lay Pol, stone dead, and squatting on the carpet on the far side of him, staring up at me with a devilish smirk of glee on her horrible face, sat the white cat!”

The canary shivered a little and rubbed her bill with her right foot, as though to wipe away the memory of a bad dream.

“I was too horrified to say a word,” she presently continued, “and I began to wonder whether the abominable wretch would eat my poor dead friend. But not a bit of it. She didn’t want him for food at all. She got three square meals a day from the old lady, the daintiest morsels in the house. She just wanted to kill—to kill for the fun of killing. For three months she had watched and waited and calculated. And in the end she had won. With another grin of triumph in my direction, she slowly turned about, left the body where it lay, and stalked toward the door.

“‘Well,’ I thought to myself, ‘there’s one thing: she can’t escape the blame. At least the old lady will know her now for what she is, the murderess!’

“And then a curious thing happened. It reminded me of something my mother used to believe—that cats are helped by the devil. ‘It would be impossible for them to be so fiendishly clever without,’ she used to say. ‘Never try to match your wits against a cat! They are helped by the devil.’

“I had never believed it, myself. But that afternoon I came very near believing it. Now, mark you, with that door blown open, anyone would know that it was the cat who had come in and killed the parrot, wouldn’t they? But with that door shut—the way the old lady had thought she left it—and the cat outside of the room—no one could possibly suspect ‘sweet pussums.’ So then I felt quite certain that this time the cat was going to get in a good, stiff row. Now comes the queer business; no sooner had she passed into the hall outside than the wind began again, howling and moaning about the house. And, to my horror, I saw the door slowly closing. Faster and faster it swung forward, and then with a bang that shook the house from cellar to garret, it slammed shut. The last glimpse I got of the hall outside showed me ‘sweet pussums’ squatting on the floor, still grinning at me in triumph. After that, I think you will admit, it was pardonable to believe that she was helped by the devil. For, mind you, if the wind had come two minutes earlier it would have shut her inside the room, instead of out.

“Of course, when the old lady came home she just couldn’t understand it. There lay the parrot on the floor, his neck broken (the cat had done it very neatly and cleverly—just one spring, a bite, and a twist); the windows were shut; the door was shut.

“Finally that stupid old woman said that perhaps boys had got in, probably down the chimney, wrung the parrot’s neck and escaped, leaving no tracks. The mystery was never solved. She was frightfully upset, weeping all over the place—after it was too late.

“‘Oh, well,’ she sobbed, ‘anyhow, I have my canary left—and my sweet pussums.’

“And then that she-devil came up to her, purring, to be petted, and the old woman gave her a saucer of milk! No, never, never trust a cat.”

“They’re funny creatures,” said the Doctor. “There’s no gainsaying that. And their curious habit of killing even when they’re not hungry is very hard to explain. Still, it’s in their nature, I suppose, and one should never judge anyone without making allowances for the nature he was born with. You have been through some very interesting experiences, I see. When you were singing me the story of your life I was so busy getting the music down that I couldn’t pay much attention to the words. After we have finished supper, would you mind telling it to me over again?”

“Why, certainly,” said the canary. “I’ll tell it to you conversationally—without music.”

“Yes, I think that would be better,” said the Doctor. “You can then put in all your adventures in detail, without bothering to make the lines scan and rhyme. Gub-Gub, as soon as you have finished that plateful of beechnuts we will let Dab-Dab clear away.”

Chapter 3

AN ANIMAL BIOGRAPHY

It was thus through the coming of the little green canary that the Doctor wrote the first of his animal biographies. He had frequently considered doing this before. He claimed that in many instances the lives of animals were undoubtedly more interesting—if only they were properly written—than the lives of some of our so-called great men. He had even thought of writing a series, or a set, of books called Great Animals of the Nineteenth Century, or something like that. But so far he had not met many whose memories were good enough to remember all the things in their lives that make a biography interesting.

Gub-Gub, disappointed that no statue had been erected to him in Manchester, had often begged the Doctor to write his life for him, feeling certain that of course everybody would want to read it. But John Dolittle and his pets knew Gub-Gub’s life by heart already. And, while the Doctor felt that it would make good comic reading, Gub-Gub himself refused to have it written that way, now that he was a famous actor.

“I want a dignified biography,” said he. “I may be funny on the stage—very funny. But in my biography I must be dignified.”

“Pignified, you mean,” growled Jip. “Your biography would be just one large meal after another—with stomach-aches for adventures. Myself, I’d sooner read the life of a nice, round, smooth stone.”

So this branch of the Doctor’s natural history writing had remained untouched till the appearance of Pippinella, the canary who came to join his family circle under such curious circumstances. Pippinella, the Doctor often said, was a born biographer, for she had a marvellous memory for the little things that made a story interesting and real. And John Dolittle, in the preface to this the first of his Private Memoirs of Distinguished Animals was careful to say that the entire book was Pippinella’s own, he merely having translated it from Canary into English.

Those who read it declared it most interesting. But, like so many of the Doctor’s works, it is now out of print and copies of it are almost impossible to obtain. One of the reasons for this was that the ordinary booksellers wouldn’t keep it. “Pooh!” they said. “The Life of a Canary! What kind of a life could that be—sitting in a cage all day?”

And as a consequence of their stupidity the book was only sold at the taxidermists’ shops, naturalists’ supply stores and odd places like that. Probably that is why copies are so hard to find to-day. In its final completed form, under the title of The Life of Coloratura Pippinella, Contralto Canary, the story contained much of the bird’s life that was lived after she joined the Dolittle household. Moreover, the Doctor went through the manuscript with the authoress several times and got her to tell him more about many little incidents and details which he thought would be of interest to the general public. All this went to make it quite a long book. I have not space to set it down for you here just as the Doctor wrote it, but I will tell it you in part, at all events, as Pippinella herself related it to John Dolittle and his family circle.

“People,” Pippinella began, when Gub-Gub had finally ceased fidgeting, “might think that the biography of a cage canary would be a very dull monotonous story. But, as a matter of fact, the lives of cage-birds are often far more varied and interesting than those of wild ones. I have heard the lives of several wild birds, and they were mostly exceedingly dull and monotonous.

“Very well, then, I will begin at the beginning,” Pippinella began, “I was born in an aviary, a private one, occupied by our family and a few others. My father was a bright lemon-yellow Harz Mountains canary and my mother was a greenfinch of very good family. My brothers and sisters—there were six of us altogether, three boys and three girls—were about the same as me to look at, sort of olive-green and yellow mixed up. Of course, until our eyes were open the thing that concerned us chiefly was getting enough food. Good parents—and ours were the most conscientious couple you ever saw—give their children when they are first hatched about fourteen meals a day.”

“Huh!” muttered Gub-Gub. “That’s more than I ever got.”

“Sh!” said the Doctor. “Don’t interrupt.”

“Pardon me, Pippinella,” said John Dolittle, “but that is a point that has often interested me. How do young birds know, before their eyes are open, when their parents are bringing food? I’ve noticed that they all open their mouths every time the older birds come back to the nest.”

“We tell it, I imagine, by the vibration. Our parents stepping on to the edge of the nest is something that we get to recognize very early. And then, although our eyes are closed, we see the shadow that our parents make leaning over the nest coming in between us and the sunlight.”

“Thank you,” said the Doctor, making a note. “Please continue.”