The Water-Babies

Name: The Water-Babies
Author: Charles Kingsley

A Critical Edition of the 1863 Novel

The Water-BabiesChapter VII · Part 10

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English Edition · Branch 80 of 111

Chapter VII · Part 10

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The Water-Babies

p. 80

For so it happened to Tom likewise. He was very sorely tried; for though, by keeping the dog to heels (or rather to toes, for he had to walk backward), he could see pretty well which way the dog was hunting, yet it was much slower work to go backwards than to go forwards. But, what was more trying still, no sooner had he got out of Peacepool, than there came running to him all the conjurers, fortune-tellers, astrologers, prophesiers, projectors, prestigiators, as many as were in those parts (and there are too many of them everywhere), Old Mother Shipton on her broomstick, with Merlin, Thomas the Rhymer, Gerbertus, Rabanus Maurus, Nostradamus, Zadkiel, Raphael, Moore, Old Nixon, and a good many in black coats and white ties who might have known better, considering in what century they were born, all bawling and screaming at him, “Look ahead, only look ahead; and we will show you what man never saw before, and right away to the end of the world!”

But I am proud to say that, though Tom had not been to Cambridge—for, if he had, he would have certainly been senior wrangler—he was such a little dogged, hard, gnarly, foursquare brick of an English boy, that he never turned his head round once all the way from Peacepool to the Other-end-of-Nowhere: but kept his eye on the dog, and let him pick out the scent, hot or cold, straight or crooked, wet or dry, up hill or down dale; by which means he never made a single mistake, and saw all the wonderful and hitherto by-no-mortal-man-imagined things, which it is my duty to relate to you in the next chapter.

288.Source editor’s annotationA crowd of seers. Mother Shipton was a legendary prophetess of Knaresborough in Yorkshire, said to have died in 1561; her prophecies were first printed in 1641, and an edition of 1862 added a forged couplet dating the end of the world to 1881, as its author, Charles Hindley, admitted in 1873. Merlin is the wizard-seer of Arthurian legend, whose prophecies Geoffrey of Monmouth published in the 1130s. Thomas the Rhymer, Thomas of Erceldoune, a thirteenth-century Scot, was said in ballad to have been carried off to Elfland and given the gift of prophecy. Gerbert of Aurillac, Pope Sylvester II (died 1003), was said by William of Malmesbury to have learned magic and made a brazen head that answered his questions. Rabanus Maurus (c. 780-856), archbishop of Mainz, was a learned encyclopaedist who also wrote on the magic arts.

289.Source editor’s annotationThe French physician and astrologer Nostradamus (1503-1566) published his rhymed Prophéties in 1555. The others made popular almanacs. Zadkiel was the pen name of Richard James Morrison (1795-1874), a retired naval lieutenant, whose almanac began in 1831; in 1863 he won twenty shillings in a libel action against Admiral Sir Edward Belcher, who had called him a crystal-globe seer who gulled the nobility. Raphael was Robert Cross Smith (1795-1832), whose Prophetic Messenger went on under his name after his death. Moore is Old Moore’s Almanack, begun by Francis Moore in 1697. Old Nixon is Robert Nixon, a legendary Cheshire prophet, an illiterate boy whose rhymes circulated from the early eighteenth century. The prophets in black coats and white neckcloths are clergymen, such as the Scottish minister John Cumming (1807-1881) of Crown Court Church, Covent Garden, whose popular books expected the end of the world between 1848 and 1867.

290.Source editor’s annotationThe man placed first in the Cambridge Mathematical Tripos, the most famous competitive examination in England.

291.Source editor’s annotationA brick is slang for a good, dependable fellow. Foursquare, solid and steady on every side, echoes the Greek poet Simonides’ ideal man, “In hands and feet and mind foursquare”, quoted in Plato’s Protagoras (339b), the dialogue that also tells the fable of Prometheus and Epimetheus. Gnarly means knotted and tough, like old wood.

About This Reading Edition

Charles Kingsley’s fairy tale follows Tom, a mistreated chimney-sweep, into a new life in river and sea. The complete story combines adventure, natural history, moral education, and Victorian satire. This annotated English edition includes the dedication, all eight chapters, the Moral, an introduction and reading guide, 348 explanatory notes, and the full commentary and textual apparatus.

Historical Text

The story first appeared in Macmillan’s Magazine in 1862–63 and as a Macmillan book in 1863. This edition follows Standard Ebooks’ transcription of the 1922 printing, with six readings restored from the first edition. The Note on the Text explains its spelling, punctuation, and corrections. Chapters, poems, songs, and indented catalogues retain their supplied arrangement; page numbers belong to the Diotimos reader.

About This Edition

Diotimos Editions prepared the introduction, reading guide, key words, character descriptions, notes, and commentary for this English edition. The explanatory notes accompany the passages they illuminate. Later sections include an Afterword, a chapter outline, critical reception, further reading, and textual and source notes. The complete supplied text is preserved, with reader branches ending at paragraph boundaries and the original chapter sequence intact.

Rights

Charles Kingsley’s historical text is in the public domain. The introduction, notes, and apparatus are © 2026 Diotimos Editions. Standard Ebooks supplies the copy-text transcription under CC0, and the linked historical printings identify its witnesses. The six restored readings and other editorial decisions are documented in the Note on the Text and Textual Notes. This edition is published with the site owner’s authorization.