The Teething Vortex...

25 safar 1328 A.H.

...left our dog, Hot-Swabbing-Peter, a German Setter-Punter (not Pointer) mix, with some Brobdinag in him, with a bleeding tail.

It came from the sand in the shape of a sand-storm, but had surely teeth, and what teeth! The vortex, or, properly, Vortex, deposited sand in our nostrils, mud in our pants, and hate in our hearts. We began to suspect one another of thievery and overly-harsh-scolding...

The fantastic geography of the White Apple lands still amazes Small Lt. Shamz ali Khan but no longer amazes, surprises, or even particularly registers with Large Lt. Shamz bin Mirza (from the Indus-city Port-Of-Peacocks, whereat we conceived first to seek the Gyrosphyrinx, one day, after not-crashing not-here, but after landing somewhere else, preferably Lemuria).

We tried to catch the vortex but could not. Leading us to suspect treachery. After having Large Obul cane some of the men I'd yet to meet (Mysterious Shamz, Grotesque Boy Whose Name I Don't Know, and Old Aziz, for three), we did root out an apple-thief (G.B.W.N.I.D.K., naturalich, as the barbarians say).

But no vortex.