“But I did, uncle,” I said dolefully, “and missed it.”
“Where was it when you fired?”
“Down among those trees, uncle. I let it go too far.”
“Why, you hit it, Nat! There’s Ebo.”
I looked, and to my intense delight there was our black companion holding up the bird in triumph. He had seen it fall when I shot, marked it down, and found it amongst the dense undergrowth, placing it before us with hardly a feather disarranged.
It was a splendid bird, the last we shot in New Guinea, and over three feet long, its tail being two and of a lovely bluish tint. If looked at from one side it was bronze, from the other green, just as the light fell, while from its sides sprung magnificent plumes of rich blue and green. They were not long, filmy plumes like those of the great bird of paradise, but short, each widening towards the end, and standing up like a couple of fans above the wings.
It was a feast to gaze upon so lovely an object of creation, and I felt more proud of having secured that specimen than of any bird I had shot before.
“Well, Nat the Naturalist,” cried my uncle, when he had carefully hung the bird by its beak from a stick, “I think I did right in bringing you with me.”
“I am glad you think so, uncle,” I said.
“I mean it, my boy, for you have been invaluable to me. It was worth all the risk of coming to this savage place to get such a bird as that.”