Professor Branestawm is always at work in his "Inventory" creating bizarre inventions, all of which either malfunction or work in unanticipated ways, and which lead him into incredible adventures, often accompanied by his friend Colonel Dedshott of the Catapult Cavaliers (soldiers who use catapults as their only weapon), and his housekeeper Mrs Flittersnoop. He lives in Great Pagwell, which is apparently surrounded by other Pagwells (Little Pagwell, Pagwell Heights, Pagwell Gardens, Lower Pagwell, Upper Pagwell, Pagwell Green, Pagwell Centre, Pagwell Market, Pagwell Docks etc.). In "The Professor Borrows a Book", he manages to lose fourteen different copies of the same book from fourteen different public libraries, and has to cycle frantically between fourteen different Pagwells to renew his books to avoid being fined. In "The Fair at Pagwell Green", the Professor is mistaken for a waxwork, only because of Colonel Dedshott. The Colonel thought the waxwork to be a frozen professor, so he and Mrs Flittersnoop heated it, melting the waxwork. Meanwhile, the Professor was covered along with all the waxworks when he was lost in thought. He suddenly stopped thinking and when trying to get out of the fair, was thought to be a living waxwork.