One day when he was thus occupied, before making a fresh search for food for her, an answering pipe from the nest called him to her side. He guessed what it was, for hatching time was close at hand. When he reached the nest, he found that inside the first egg that had been laid a tiny echo of his own clear pipe was to be heard. Whether you or I could have heard it I cannot say; but to the keen ears of the parents it was audible enough, and made their hearts glow with the most delightful visions of the future. And this hidden chick was wonderfully lively and talkative, more so than any chick of theirs had been before he came out into the world. It was quite unusual for a Sandpiper, and both the parents looked a little serious. Nor was their anxiety allayed when the egg-shell broke, and a little black eye peered out full of life and mischief.

Then out came a head and neck, and then a sticky morsel of a mottled brown body, which almost at once got its legs out of the shell, and began to struggle out of the nest. Was ever such a thing known before? The old birds knew not whether to laugh or cry, but they hustled him back into the nest in double quick time, and made him lie down till the sun and air should have dried him up a little. Hard work the mother had of it for the next day or two to keep that little adventurer under her wing while the other eggs were being hatched. When he was hungry he would lie quiet under her wing; but no sooner had his father come with food for him than he would utter his little pipe and struggle up for another peep into the wide world. Terrible stories his mother told him of infant Sandpipers who had come to untimely ends from disobeying their parents.

One, she told him, had made off by himself one day while his mother was attending to his brothers and sisters, and before he had gone many yards along the pleasant green sward, a long red creature with horrible teeth and a tuft to his tail, had come creeping, creeping, through the grass, and suddenly jumped upon him. His mother heard his cries, and flew piping loudly to the spot; but it was too late, and she had to watch the cruel stoat bite off his head and suck his blood. Another made off towards the water and was crushed under foot by an angler who was backing from the river to land a fish, and never even knew what he had done. Another fell into a deep hole at nightfall and could not get out again, and was found starved and dead when morning came.

After each of these stories the little bird shuddered and crouched under his mother’s wing again: but the mastering desire to see the world always came back upon him, and great was the relief of the parents when the other eggs were hatched and education could begin. Then the nest was soon abandoned, and the little creatures trotted about with their mother; for they are not like the ugly nestlings that lie helpless and featherless in their nests for days and days, as human babies lie in their cradles for months. Life, and manners, and strength, and beauty, come almost at once on the young Sandpipers, as on the young pheasants and partridges and chickens. And their education is very easy, for they seem to know a good deal already about the things of the world into which they have only just begun to peep.

So one lovely day in June the whole family set out for the bank of the river, the young ones eager to learn, and the old ones only too anxious to teach. For what they had to learn was not merely how to find their food—that they would soon enough discover for themselves—but what to do in case of danger; and as they tripped along, the mother in her delicate grey dress, white below with darker throat and breast, and the young ones in mottled grey and brown, so that you could hardly tell them among the pebbles and their shadows, she gave them their first lesson, while the father flew down the river and back again to exercise his wings and to look for food.

They had not gone far when suddenly their mother cried “wheet whee-t” with an accent they already knew, and flew away from them, calling loudly as she went. The little ones, unable to fly, did the first thing that came into their heads (and it seemed to come into all their little heads at one moment), and dropped down among the pebbles motionless, with eyes shut. There they stayed some time, and the eldest, getting tired of this, at last opened a bright black eye, and turned it upwards. There, far up above them, hovering with poised wings, was a Kestrel clearly marked against the sky. The little black eye closed again, and there they waited without moving till at last the mother returned.

“Well done, my dears,” she said, “that was a good beginning; there was no great danger, for the Kestrel would hardly be looking for you among these stones; but do that as you did it then whenever I make that call to you; drop exactly where you may be, and shut your eyes. All together and side by side, if you are together when I call; and when I fly round above you, still calling, creep into any holes you see, or under a stone or a tuft of grass, and wait there till I come again. Now the hawk has gone, so we may go on to the water.”

There was no need to bid them go; had not the noise of that water been in their ears ever since they broke their shells, telling them all the secrets of their life? And had not their mother told them wonderful things of it—of the food about its banks, and on its stones, and in its shallows, the cool refreshing air that breathes from it, the lights and shadows that play on it, and above all, the endless music without which a Sandpiper could hardly live?

“You cannot fly yet,” she told them, “but we will go to the water’s edge, and then your father and I will show you how to enjoy it.” And as just then it came in sight, she opened her wings and flew out on it piping, while the little ones opened their wings too in vain, and hurried on to the edge, and watched her as she alit on a stone, and bowed gracefully to the dancing water. And they too bowed their tiny bodies and felt the deliciousness of living.

All that livelong day, a day no one of them ever forgot, they spent by the river side, dabbling their little dark-green legs in the water when an eddy sent it gently up to them, learning to find the sweetest and wholesomest insects lurking among the pebbles, with now and then a little worm, or caterpillar that had fallen from the bushes above: watching the trout turning up their golden sides in the dark water of the pool as they rose to the flies: practising their voices in a feeble piping, and always moving bodies and tails as they saw their parents do it.

They had very few alarms, but quite enough for practice in hiding. Once as they were following their mother by the very edge of the deep pool, a huge silver creature, flashing in the sunlight, leapt clean out of the water and fell in again with a splash. The little ones all dropped to ground and lay silent, but their mother never uttered a note, and they soon got up again. She told them it was only a salmon, who could not possibly do them any harm, and would not if he could; that she and their father were good friends with the salmon, and often sat on the big boulder under which he loved to lie; but that it was only a bowing acquaintance, because the salmon could not talk their language.

Once or twice an angler came along slowly, and then they had to drop while their parents flew up and down stream loudly calling; but there was always plenty of time for them to get into holes and corners safely, and the anglers passed on again without noticing either young or old. At last the light began to fade, the young ones were tired and sleepy—even the eldest, who had distinguished himself by trying to fly, and actually getting out on a stone half a foot from the shore, where he stood bowing with great pride till his father came and shoved him into the water to scramble ashore in a fright—and so this delightful day came to an end, and they all went back to the shelter where the nest was placed.

The next day was a Sunday, and they spent half the morning in great happiness without seeing a single fisherman. But after all they were to learn this day that life has its troubles: for a huge heron took it into his head to fish while human beings could not, and alighted at the water’s edge within a dozen yards of the spot where they were already motionless in obedience to their mother’s signal pipe. And there the great bird kept standing on one leg for a full hour, and would not move a muscle, except when now and then he darted his long bill into the water, and then heaved it up into the air with a trout struggling at the end of it. At last, as his back was turned to them, their parents whistled them away, and they crept back to the nest in deep disappointment.

“Why should we be afraid of that creature?” asked the eldest: “he eats fish, not Sandpipers.”

“Let him see you, my child,” said the father, “and he’ll snap you up with that long bill of his as quick as a trout can snap a fly. There was a wild duck up the stream which had a nice little family just learning to swim, when down came a heron before they could hide themselves—and indeed they can’t hide themselves so well, poor things, as you have learnt to—and he just took those ducklings one after another, and made such a good meal of them that he went away without stopping to fish, and the poor parents had to make another nest and go through their work all over again.”

So they had to stop at home while the heron was there, and it was past midday when at last he flew away. Then out they came again, and were making their way with glad hearts down to the water, when the warning “wheet-whee-et” was heard very loud indeed. Down they all went, in a row together, on the bit of shaly bank where they were running at the moment. And now they knew that there was indeed danger; for the old birds flew piping wildly up and down as they had never yet heard them, and close by they could hear some great creature trampling about all around, and searching every bit of stone and grass and bush. Once they felt its shadow come over them, and could hear it breathing within a yard or two of them. Then it went away, letting the sun come on them again; but their parents kept up their wild piping, and they knew that the danger was still there. Then more searching and shuffling and routing, and once more the shadow came upon them, and the footsteps crunched the shale on which they lay. And now, as ill-luck would have it, the eldest opened one black eye and looked out of the corner of it. In another moment he felt himself seized in a mighty grasp, but not ungently, and lifted high into the air, while in wildest consternation the old birds flew close around him.

It was a terrible moment, but the little bird was plucky, and something in the way he was held told him that he was not going to be eaten. He opened both eyes, and saw one of those human anglers, without his rod. The great animal handled him gently, stroked his plumage, and looked him all over, and then put him softly down beside his brothers and sisters, who were still motionless but palpitating. He stood there for a minute or two gazing at them, no doubt in wonder and admiration, and then hastened away towards the farmhouse under the hill. The little birds began to move again.

“Whisht, wheet, wheet,” cried their mother; “it’s not all over yet. He wouldn’t have gone so fast if he hadn’t meant to come back again. Get into holes and corners, quick!”

“I don’t mind if he does come back again,” said the eldest. “He didn’t hurt me. His great claw was warm and comfortable, and he stroked my down the right way. I looked up and saw his great eye: it was like the salmon’s, only pleasanter.”

“Holes and corners, quick, quick, quick, wheet, whee-et,” cried both parents again in dismay at the folly of their eldest; and all four crept up the shaly ledge and hid themselves under tufts of grass and bits of stick. It was none too soon, for the footsteps were now heard again, and the creaking of a gate as the angler got over it. And this time he was not alone; another human creature was with him. They came up to the spot, glanced at the frightened parents with admiration, and then looked for the young ones.

“Well, this is provoking,” said the one who had been there before; “if they haven’t gone and hid themselves away! Here have I dragged you from your comfortable pipe for nothing at all! They’re not far off, though, or the old birds would not be here.” And stooping down, he examined the ground carefully.

At that moment that perverse eldest chick, conscious that his right leg was sticking out into the sunshine, instinctively drew it in under him, and doing so, he again caught the angler’s eye. And he had to be pulled out of his hiding-place with rather more force than he liked. The angler put him into his friend’s hands, and for a moment the audacious chick was frightened. But he was soon down in his cover again safe and sound; and then the rest were found and admired, and the big creatures turned to go away.

“Wait a minute, though,” said the angler, pausing; “let us sit down a bit and see what they will do. My dears,” (addressing the old birds,) “you must put up with a little more anxiety, and then you shall be happy for ever afterwards, if you can.” So the two human beings sat down on the stones and watched, while the old birds flew round piping, perching here and there and bowing, and giving them such pictures of grace and beauty as they were not likely soon to see again. And neither of them can ever forget the charm of that quarter of an hour; the music of the river, the fragrance of the scented fern, the outlines of the rocky hills against the sky, and the gentle grace of the pair of little grey fairies that flew around them piping, less timid now that they saw no chance of harm to their brood.

At last, urged by some signal from the parents, the little birds all came out of their holes and corners, and trotted along one after another, the eldest leading, right under the very eyes of the two men. Piping faintly as if to call attention to their beauty, and moving tails and bodies like their parents, they passed along the shaly bank till they reached the roots of an old battered thorn-bush, where they disappeared into a hole and were seen no more by the human eyes.

After this adventure the old Sandpipers had a long talk. All had gone well so far; but it would not do to run these risks any longer if they could help it. And not without some misgivings as to the difficulty of the task, they determined to get the young ones across the river without delay; for on the further side some jutting rocks made it impossible for anglers to pass, and they were seldom seen there.

So next morning at break of day the little family was called down to the water’s edge, and told that they must do exactly as they were bid, and not be frightened. The father crouched down among the pebbles, and the mother bade the eldest chick mount upon his back, and stick his three long toes, whose claws were already beginning to get strong, fast into the soft and yielding plumage. This he did in a moment, and the next one found him shooting across the narrow head of the pool, with its rush of tumbled water, and landed safely at the foot of the rock. It was a delightful sensation, and as the father opened his wings and sped back again to fetch the others, the little one opened his too, and felt almost as if he could do it by himself. Then one after another the three younger ones were carried over, piping faintly from fear, and clinging for their lives to their perilous perch. And lastly came the mother with kind words of praise for all, and they set out to enjoy themselves for a whole long day of peace and plenty.

And indeed in peace and plenty they passed many days without further troubles or adventures, while the little wings began to put out their quill feathers, and the little voices to gain in strength and tone. And all this time the sun shone and the river sang a quiet song, as it slowly sank for want of rain, leaving new and varied margins of sand and pebbles for the Sandpipers to search for food.

But one morning the sun did not greet them as usual with his warmth; the sky was grey and streaky, and seemed to hang lower over the hills than when it was all clear blue. At first all was still and silent, but presently a gust of wind came up the river, and then another as suddenly came down, worrying the early angler on the opposite bank, and teasing the little Sandpipers as it blew their soft plumage the wrong way. And then a large white bird sailed gracefully up the valley, balancing itself against the wind, to the great admiration of the chicks.

“That is a Seagull, children,” said the mother, “and you will see plenty of them when you cross the sea to the warm southern lands for the winter. And he is telling us that there is a storm coming—listen!”