“Yes, I know, but I can’t, though I once tried I made a pair of wings out of an old umbrella; they were so awkward, though, and would not work.
“But I meant,” continued Harry, “which way do you go?”
“Southward and southward and southward, and westward and westward and southward again.”
“What a funny road! I should get dead tired before I was halfway.”
“So do we: then we look about for a ship or a rock, if at sea, and alight to rest.”
“And aren’t you afraid the sailors may shoot you?”
“Oh no; for sailors do so love to see us on the yards. (How true! G.S.) They dearly love us. We remind them of England and their cottage homes and their wives and little ones, and of apple orchards and flowery meadows and crimson poppies in the fields of green waving corn, and all kinds of beautiful things.”
“No wonder they love you!”
“Yes; they do so love us; I’ve seen the tears start to the eyes of little sailor lads as they gazed at us. And I know the men tread more lightly on the deck for fear of scaring us away.”
“And when rested you just go on again?”