Puck Of Pook's Hill

'I don't believe they were Devils,' Dan whispered back.
'Eh?' said Sir Richard. 'Witta's father warned him they were unquestionable Devils. One must believe one's father, and not one's children. What were my Devils, then?'
Dan flushed all over. 'I - I only thought,' he stammered; 'I've got a book called The Gorilla Hunters - it's a continuation of Coral Island, sir - and it says there that the gorillas (they're big monkeys, you know) were always chewing iron up.'
'Not always,' said Una. 'Only twice.' They had been reading The Gorilla Hunters in the orchard.
'Well, anyhow, they always drummed on their chests, like Sir Richard's did, before they went for people. And they built houses in trees, too.'
'Ha!' Sir Richard opened his eyes. 'Houses like flat nests did our Devils make, where their imps lay and looked at us. I did not see them (I was sick after the fight), but Witta told me, and, lo, ye know it also? Wonderful! Were our Devils only nest-building apes? Is there no sorcery left in the world?'
'I don't know,' answered Dan, uncomfortably. 'I've seen a man take rabbits out of a hat, and he told us we could see how he did it, if we watched hard. And we did.'

'But we didn't,' said Una, sighing. 'Oh! there's Puck!'
The little fellow, brown and smiling, peered between two stems of an ash, nodded, and slid down the bank into the cool beside them.
'No sorcery, Sir Richard?' he laughed, and blew on a full dandelion head he had picked.
'They tell me that Witta's Wise Iron was a toy. The boy carries such an iron with him. They tell me our Devils were apes, called gorillas!' said Sir Richard, indignantly.
'That is the sorcery of books,' said Puck. 'I warned thee they were wise children. All people can be wise by reading of books.'

[Puck Of Pook's Hill by Rudyard Kipling]

[The Morning After (2004)]