And the big team swept down the slope, leaving a broad and shining furrow behind it. The two boys followed, one about twenty feet behind the other, and when the hindermost had come up to the work of him who was ahead, he skipped the planted part and went on ahead of his comrade twenty feet, thus alternating each with the other. They were cheerily at work when, apparently from under the feet of the forward yoke of oxen, a bird somewhat bigger than a robin flew up with shrieks of alarm and went fluttering off along the ground, tumbling in the grass as if desperately wounded and unable to fly. Sandy made a rush for the bird, which barely eluded his clutches once 113 or twice, and drew him on and on in a fruitless chase; for the timid creature soon recovered the use of its wings, and soaring aloft, disappeared in the depths of the sky.
“That’s the deceivingest bird I ever saw,” panted Sandy, out of breath with running, and looking shamefacedly at the corn that he had spilled in his haste to catch his prey. “Why, it acted just as if its right wing was broken, and then it flew off as sound as a nut, for all I could see.”
When the ploughmen met them, on the next turn of the team, Uncle Aleck said, “Did you catch the lapwing, you silly boy? That fellow fooled you nicely.”
“Lapwing?” said Sandy, puzzled. “What’s a lapwing?” But the ploughmen were already out of earshot.
“Oh, I know now,” said Oscar. “I’ve read of the lapwing; it is a bird so devoted to its young, or its nest, that when it fancies either in danger, it assumes all the distress of a wounded thing, and, fluttering along the ground, draws the sportsman away from the locality.”
“Right out of a book, Oscar!” cried Sandy. “And here’s its nest, as sure as I’m alive!” So saying, the lad stooped, and, parting the grass with his hands, disclosed a pretty nest sunk in the ground, holding five finely speckled eggs. The bird, so lately playing the cripple, cried and circled around the heads of the boys as they peered into the home of the lapwing. 114
“Well, here’s an actual settler that we must disturb, Sandy,” said Oscar; “for the plough will smash right through this nest on the very next turn. Suppose we take it up and put it somewhere else, out of harm’s way?”
“I’m willing,” assented Sandy; and the two boys, carefully extracting the nest from its place, carried it well over into the ploughed ground, where under the lee of a thick turf it was left in safety. But, as might have been expected, the parent lapwing never went near that nest again. The fright had been too great.
“What in the world are you two boys up to now?” shouted Uncle Aleck from the other side of the ploughing. “Do you call that dropping corn? Hurry and catch up with the team; you are ’way behind.”
“Great Scott!” cried Sandy; “I had clean forgotten the corn-dropping. A nice pair of farmers we are, Oscar!” and the lad, with might and main, began to close rapidly the long gap between him and the steadily moving ox-team.