Marsh Tit and Egg.
He accordingly climbed up the tree, and found that he could not reach the nest, which was too far down in the slit. By dint, however, of sitting on one of the forks, and pushing with all his might at the other, he succeeded in opening the crack wide enough for him to insert his hand and reach the nest. It contained eight eggs, white spotted with red. He took four of them, and sitting in the fork of the tree, he blew them and put them in his box. Then he thought of descending, and attempted to jump to the ground. To his astonishment he found himself brought up sharp, and then he saw that his trousers had caught in the slit, and that a large portion of the slack of them behind was firmly wedged in; and there he hung with his legs dangling in the air with ludicrous helplessness. He tried to haul himself up again, but he was in such an awkward position that he could not do it. He tried to open the crack with his hands, but with the weight of his body on the one side instead of in the middle, this could not be done. In despair he let go with his hands, in the hope that his trousers would tear and that he would fall to the ground; but they were too stout for that, and he only narrowly escaped turning topsy turvy and hanging in a worse position. Then he fell to laughing vigorously at the comical scrape he had got into. He did not laugh long, however, for he was very uncomfortable, and kick and struggle as he would, he could not get free. Then he felt more inclined to cry than he ever had done in his life before. It was so very humiliating to be hung up there like a cockchafer at the end of a pin. When he found he could not get down by himself he began to shout for help.
"Dick, Dick, Dick!" but no Dick came. The fact was that Dick who had been unsuccessful in his chase after the butterfly, had returned to the spot from whence he started, and then not seeing Jimmy about, he concluded that he had gone back to the others—and all the time Jimmy was still up in the tree shouting lustily. Dick heard an inarticulate shouting, but never for one moment imagined it came from Jimmy. When, however, he saw that Jimmy was not with the others, he thought of the shouting; and they all went in search of the missing one, and when they found him they went into such fits of laughter that for some time no one could help him.
"Oh dear, Jimmy, you will be the death of me! This is worse than the big toe affair," said Frank.
"I say," said Jimmy, "don't tell anyone at home about this, there's a good fellow."
"All right, I won't."
Frank had agreed to row in the race, and while Jimmy and Dick sailed the yacht up to Norwich, he went for a racing spin in the four-oar, and found that he was in much better condition than he had thought.
When they reached Norwich they found some letters awaiting them. Frank after reading his, said,—