ar as any gull need care to swim or
float.

All over and above the sea stretched Larie's fifth world--the air. When
his great day for flying came, he rose against the breeze, and his wings
took him into that high-away kingdom that lifted as far as any gull need
care to fly.

Now that Larie could both swim and fly, he was large, and acted in many
ways like an old gull; but the feathers of his body were not white, and
he did not wear over his back and the top of his spread wings a
pearl-gray mantle.

Nor was he given the garb of his father and mother for a traveling suit,
that winter when he went south with the others, to a place where the
Gulf Stream warmed the water whereon he swam and the air wherein he
flew.

But there came a time when Larie had put off the clothes of his youth
and donned the robe of a grown gull. And as he sailed in the breezes of
his fifth world, which blew over the cold sea, and across the island
with a carpet of green and rocks of red and green and gray,--for he was
again in the North,--he was beautiful to behold, the flight of a gull
being so wonderful that the heart of him who sees quickens with joy.

Larie was not alone. There were so many with him that, when they flew
together in the distance, they looked as thick as snowflakes in the air;
and when they screamed together, the din was so great that people who
were not used to hearing them put their hands over their ears.

And more than that, Larie was not alone; for there sailed near him in
the air and floated beside him in the sea another gull, at whom he did
not scream, but to whom he talked pleasantly, saying, "me-you," in a
musical tone that she understood.

[Illustration: _Floated beside him in the sea another gull, to whom he
talked pleasantly._]

Larie and his mate found much to do that spring. One game that never
failed to interest them was meeting the ships many, many waves out at
sea, and following them far on their way. For on the ships were men who
threw away food they could not use, and the gulls gathered in flocks to
scramble and fight for this. Children on board the ships laughed merrily
to see them, and tossed crackers and biscuits out for the fun of
watching the hungry-birds come close, to feed.

Many a feast, too, the fishermen gave the gulls, when they sorted the
contents of their nets and threw aside what they did not want.

Besides this, Larie and his mate and their comrades picnicked in high
glee at certain ha