Episode MMIV – Lesser Scabbee

These fowl which as well as the similar but less aggressive Great Scabbee were always about us, drawing blood with claw and sharp beak, as we crossed a narrow isthmus from an island of smokes to a wooded land where we might find materials to construct a vessel to carry us away from this accursed land and its smoking valleys and recalcitrant inhabitants who despite our profound sermons and promising declarations and our greatest entreaties, including the whip and the stake, both of which required terrible exertion on our part and were delivered with righteous zeal, not only failed to accept the reign of our Suzerain but rose up against us and took from us some of our most dedicated proselytizers. Nevertheless, careful drawings were made of these beasts by His Holy Excellency, The Royal Philosopher Natural, as evidence for Spontaneous Generation. © mmg 2007