twisted his legs
about a young birch, and put his arms round it. He was after a big
one, he informed Corp, though he might as well have been fishing in a
treatise on the art of angling.

Corp exchanged pleasantries with him; told him that Tommy was Captain
Ure, and that he was his faithful servant Alexander Bett, both of
Edinburgh. Since the birth of his child, Corp had become something of
a humourist. Tommy was not listening. As he lolled in the sun he was
turning, without his knowledge, into one of the other Tommies. Let us
watch the process.

He had found a half-fledged mavis lying dead in the grass. Remember
also how the larks had sung after rain.

Tommy lost sight and sound of Corp and the boy. What he seemed to see
was a baby lark that had got out of its nest sideways, a fall of half
a foot only, but a dreadful drop for a baby. "You can get back this
way," its mother said, and showed it the way, which was quite easy,
but when the baby tried to leap, it fell on its back. Then the mother
marked out lines on the ground, from one to the other of which it was
to practise hopping, and soon it could hop beautifully so long as its
mother was there to say every moment, "How beautifully you hop!" "Now
teach me to hop up," the little lark said, meaning that it wanted to
fly; and the mother tried to do that also, but in vain; she could soar
up, up, up bravely, but could not explain how she did it. This
distressed her very much, and she thought hard about how she had
learned to fly long ago last year, but all she could recall for
certain was that you suddenly do it. "Wait till the sun comes out
after rain," she said, half remembering. "What is sun? What is rain?"
the little bird asked. "If you cannot teach me to fly, teach me to
sing." "When the sun comes out after rain," the mother replied, "then
you will know how to sing." The rain came, and glued the little bird's
wings together. "I shall never be able to fly nor to sing," it wailed.
Then, of a sudden, it had to blink its eyes; for a glorious light had
spread over the world, catching every leaf and twig and blade of grass
in tears, and putting a smile into every tear. The baby bird's breast
swelled, it did not know why; and it fluttered from the ground, it did
not know how. "The sun has come out after the rain," it trilled.
"Thank you, sun; thank you, thank you! Oh, mother, did you hear me? I
can sing!" And it floated up, up, up, crying, "Thank you, thank you,
thank you