"But I enjoyed the day exceedingly. The sea was never so lovely nor the sky either. When I was tired of watching the waves chase each other, I could look up and watch the clouds. They sailed over the blue sky so soft and white."
"There's no fun in just watching things," said the youngest of all the birds: "we went right up into the clouds and then deep down into the waves. How we splashed and dived and swam! When I fluttered my wings after a bath in silver spray, it seemed as if a shower of jewels dropped therefrom."
"How lovely!" exclaimed the little Chinese seabird. Then she remembered that if her brothers and sisters were to have just as good a time the next day, she must tell them a story—a true one.
So she did.
After she had finished speaking, there was a great fluttering of wings, and all her brothers and sisters rose in the air above her, ready for flight.
"To think," they chattered to one another, "that if we had remained an hour longer, those wicked boys would have come with lighted torches and caught us and dashed us to death against stones."
"Yes, and dressed us and salted us!"
