But if they see
by your looks that you have discovered them, they leave their eggs or
young, and, like a good many other birds, pretend that they are sorely
wounded, fluttering and rolling over on the ground and gasping as if
dying, to draw you away. When pursued we were surprised to find that
just when we were on the point of overtaking them they were always
able to flutter a few yards farther, until they had led us about a
quarter of a mile from the nest; then, suddenly getting well, they
quietly flew home by a roundabout way to their precious babies or
eggs, o'er a' the ills of life victorious, bad boys among the worst.
The Yankee took particular pleasure in encouraging us to pursue them.
Everything about us was so novel and wonderful that we could hardly
believe our senses except when hungry or while father was thrashing
us. When we first saw Fountain Lake Meadow, on a sultry evening,
sprinkled with millions of lightning-bugs throbbing with light, the
effect was so strange and beautiful that it seemed far too marvelous
to be real.
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