The Silver Chair Chapter 3 Summary

The Sailing of the King

  • Jill and Scrubb don't really know where they are (even though Aslan has told Jill he was sending her to Narnia), but the scene is splendid. They see a royal ship waiting to sail.
  • The king is on board the vessel, and he is quite old (a white beard and everything).
  • Jill meets up with Scrubb and tells him that if he recognizes an old friend, he must speak to him immediately (this is the first of the four signs). But Scrubb doesn't recognize anyone.
  • After the king's ship casts off, Jill and Scrubb are accosted by a giant white owl. His name is Glimfeather, and he tells the children that they are at Cair Paravel (the king's castle) in Narnia.
  • Jill reveals that they have been sent by Aslan to help find the lost Prince, and Scrubb is surprised.
  • He's even more surprised, though, when he learns that the aged king was Caspian X, his great friend from The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.
  • Scrubb is upset because Caspian was still a boy when he last visited Narnia and remembers that time runs different in Narnia than on Earth.
  • Glimfeather brings the children to see Trumpkin, King Caspian's regent. After a difficult conversation (Trumpkin is a bit deaf), the children are sent off for a bath and supper.
  • When they meet up again, Eustace explains about Caspian, and Jill gets upset since this means Caspian was the old friend that Scrubb was supposed to greet. In other words, they've already muffed one of the four signs.
  • After Jill and Scrubb argue about who is responsible for the error, they go down to a splendid dinner and forget about their troubles for a while. Splendid dinners do that to us, too.
  • The children really feel that they will have a good night's sleep after all of their adventures—but this is not to be.