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"Trying to get some sleep Tortoises need a lot of sleep, you know"

Siine Brutha stared at the globe

-a sphere of radius r, which therefore had a volume V = (4/3)(pi) rrr, and surface area A = 4(pi) rr-

"Oh, od"

"What now?" said the voice of the tortoise

Didactylos's face turned towards Brutha, as clutching at his head

"What's a pi?"

Didactylos reached out a hand and steadied Brutha

"What's the matter?" said Om

"I don't know! It's just words! I don't knohat's in the books! I can't read!"

"Getting plenty of sleep is vital," said Oed to his knees in the rocking boat He felt like a householder co the old place full of strangers They were in every roo the space with their thereness

"The books are leaking!"

"I don't see how that can happen," said Didactylos "You said you just looked at them You didn't read them You don't knohat they mean"

"They knohat they mean!"

"Listen They're just books, of the nature of books," said Didactylos "They're not ical If you could knohat books contained just by looking at theenius"

"What's the matter with him?" said Simony

"He thinks he knows too ! Not really know," said Brutha "I just reinous support!"

"I can see that would be a worry," said Simony "Huh Priests? Mad, the lot of theinous means!"

"Skeletal connective tissue," said Didactylos "Think of bony and leathery at the same time"

Simony snorted "Well, well," he said, "we live and learn, just like you said"

"Some of us even do it the other way round," said Didactylos

"Is that supposed to ?"

"It's philosophy," said Didactylos "And sit down, boy You'rethe boat rock We're overloaded as it is"

"It's being buoyed upward by a force equal to the weight of the displaced fluid,"

"Hmm?"

"Except that I don't knohat buoyed means"

Urn looked up froain," he said "Just bale some water in here with your helain?"

"Well, we can start getting up steaa

"Y'know," said Didactylos, "there are different ways of learning things I'ere of Tsort asked ot any ti business I said to hi, sire,' and he said to s chopped off Use as ly direct approach, I always thought Not a man to mince words People, yes But not words"

"Why didn't he chop your legs off?" said Urn

"I built hiht that was just a , Urn So I found a dozen slaves who could read and they sat in his bedrooes to him while he slept"

"Did that work?"

"Don't know The third slave stuck a six-inch dagger in his ear Then after the revolution the new ruler let me out of prison and said I could leave the country if I pro on the way to the border But I don't believe there was anything wrong with the idea in principle"

Urn blew on the fire

"Takes a little while to heat up the water," he explained

Brutha lay back in the bow again If he concentrated, he could stop the knowledge flowing The thing to do was avoid looking at things Even a cloud-

-devised by natural philosophy as ashade on the surface of the world, thus preventing overheating-

-caused an intrusion Oht Brutha No The other way round Learning without knowing

Nine-tenths of O in the real world of the gods, which is a lot less interesting than the three-dimensional world inhabited by ht: we're a little boat She'll probably not even notice us There's the whole of the ocean She can't be everywhere

Of course, she's got many believers But we're only a little boat

He felt thearound the end of the screw Which was odd, because in the nors fishes were not known for their-

"Greetings," said the Queen of the Sea

"Ah"

"I see you're stillin there," said Om "No proble place between two people in the hu eods are never euardedly, "you are looking for your price"

"This vessel and everyone in it," said the Queen "But your believer can be saved, as is the custoood are they to you? One of theht at the end"

"That doesn't seem" Om hesitated "Fair?"

Now the Sea Queen paused

"What's fair?"

"Likeunderlying justice?" said Om He wondered why he said it

"Sounds a hurant you But what Ito deserve it"

"Deserve? They're huot to do with it?"

Ood This bothered him