James And The Giant Peach

Half of Earthworm lies out on top of the peach, looking like a “great, thick, juicy, pink sausage” (75) in full view of the circling seagulls. James crouches just inside the peach beside earthworm, holding the silk lasso, ready to catch the first bird. The Old-Green-Grasshopper and Ladybug are holding tight onto Earthworm’s tail, primed to pull him in on James’s command. Glow-worm is lighting the room below in which Miss Spider and Silkworm are frantically making silk, to the rough encouragement of Centipede, “Spin, Silkworm, spin, you great fat lazy brute! Faster, faster, or we’ll throw you to the sharks!” (76). They all work together, and within seconds, they catch their first seagull, followed by 100 more, and another hundred until they have 500 seagulls. Miss Spider and Silkworm cry out that they are running out of silk, just as the peach starts to lift. With 501 seagulls, the peach leaves the water but hovers just above the surface. Miss Spider and Silkworm push themselves a bit more and when the 502nd seagull is tethered the peach rises into the sky, “like some fabulous golden balloon” (79).

The happy travelers are ecstatic. Miss Spider, squealing with joy and relief, grabs Centipede and the two of them dance around the stem. Even Glow-worm makes a rare visit outside to see the marvelous view as they rise above the ocean. James worries about the damage the sharks have done to the peach, so Miss Spider lowers herself down to check out the bottom of their golden peach. To everyone’s surprise the peach is intact. Luckily, the sharks’ long noses and awkwardly placed mouths made it too difficult for them to bite the smooth round surface of the peach, despite their best efforts. James spots a big ship below them, so they all wave cheerfully to the people on board. James and his friends have no idea that they are waving to a very confused captain onboard The Queen Mary, sailing from England to America. Aboard the ship, the captain looks through his telescope at the unbelievable sight of giant insects and a small boy sailing through the sky on a huge peach, carried by tethered seagulls—so unbelievable in fact, that as he is relaying this information to his crew, they call the ships doctor to come for him. The peach vanishes into a cloud before another sailor has a chance to look through the telescope.

Up on the peach, the celebratory mood continues with the Old-Green-Grasshopper performing such beautiful music that it takes James’s breath away. James tells the Old-Green-Grasshopper it sounds like a real violin, to which the Old-Green-Grasshopper answers “My dear boy, I am a real violin!” (87) and goes on to explain all the different types of grasshoppers there are, “long-horned’ and “short-horned”, like himself. James receives an education about how grasshoppers, crickets, and katydid keep their ears on their stomachs and lower legs, much to the amusement of the of the other insects who fondly laugh about James’s lack of insect knowledge. Centipede starts to tease James about having “ridiculous” looking ears on the side of his head, but Earthworm quickly tells him to stop being rude. James asks Earthworm whether he makes music too, which starts a fascinating conversation with each insect explaining to James what they do.

Earthworm tells James about how he prepares the soil for farmers by eating and crumbling it up. Ladybug explains that farmers love her too, because she eats the insects that eat the crops. James asks whether her spots multiply as she gets older and she tells him that ladybugs are born with a set number of spots, and that she comes from the Nine Spotted Ladybug family. Fascinated, James moves onto Centipede, who is proud to just be a pest. Miss Spider sighs that spiders are misunderstood, despite catching flies and mosquitos all day. She sheds a tear as she sadly tells the group that last week, she watched Aunt Sponge flush her father down the plughole in the bath. To cheer everyone up, Centipede sings two songs, the first about Sponge getting flattened by the peach, followed by one about Spiker getting “ironed […] out on the lawn” (94). Miss Spider brightens and everyone claps, calling for more songs from the increasingly jubilant Centipede.