"Bell told me the other day that sitting birds have no scent," said Dick. "Is that true?"
"I am not quite sure, but I am inclined to think that they have not so strong a scent as at other times. This same robin which I have just been telling you about built in a hedge-bank close by a house, and cats were always prowling about, and I have seen puss walk right above the nest while the old bird was on. If birds would only have the sense to shut their eyes, we would often pass them over, but it is easy to see them with their eyes twinkling like diamonds."
"How pretty that clump of forget-me-nots is on the opposite bank! They seem to smile at you with their blue eyes," said Dick, who was keenly alive to all that was beautiful. "But what is that flower a little lower down, right in the water, with thick juicy stems and blue flowers. Is that a forget-me-not?"
"No, it is a brooklime, but it is one of the speedwells. There are more than a dozen sorts of speedwells, but the forget-me-not is the prettiest. Another name for the forget-me-not is water-scorpion, but it is too ugly a name for so pretty a plant," said Jimmy, full of his recent learning.
Redbreast and Egg.
"Here comes a breeze at last," cried Frank, as their blue flag fluttered, and the reeds in the surrounding marsh bent their heads together and sighed. "Shall we explore Ranworth Broad?"
"Yes, but let us take Hoveton Great Broad first, and then we can go to Ranworth as we come back," answered Jimmy.
So they hoisted sail, and glided up stream with a freshening breeze, while swallows dipped in the river and whirled about them as they passed. While they were sailing steadily along with a breeze on their starboard beam, the flag became fouled in the block through which the halyard of the mainmast was rove, and Jimmy was sent up to put matters right. He clambered up the mast as nimbly as a monkey, and shook loose the flag from its ignominious position. When he had finished this he looked about him, and from his greater height he could see much further than his companions, whose view was limited by the tall reeds which shut in almost every portion of the rivers and broads. The boys did not know that they were near any of the latter, but Jimmy saw on their left hand a sheet of water sparkling in the sun and studded with many reedy islands. He cried out,—