hiding up
here this summer, trying fancy stunts. Look at that dip, Longley.
That was a corker, now, I'm telling you. Do you know who that fellow
is, my boy; the one handling the levers of that sparkling biplane out
yonder?"

Larry and Elephant glanced at each other and grinned. Then the little
fellow threw out his chest, after a pompous way he had, and observed:

"Sure we do, mister. That's a chum of ours. His name is Frank Bird,
and he knows more about aeroplanes in a minute than the rest of us do
in a year. His cousin, Andy, is along with him. They stick together
through thick and thin."

"Bird!" remarked the other, watching the agile movements of the biplane
eagerly, as Larry could not but note. "A very suggestive name for a
flier, too."

"That's right," burst out Larry. "Frank always said he was just forced
to take to being an aeronaut. He says it's just as natural for birds
to take to the air, as it is for ducks to swim in the water."

"Bird?" the other went on, turning to his companion. "Seems to me,
Longley, there used to be a professor by that name in one of our
colleges, who went daft on the subject of flying."

"You're right, Marsh; and he lost his life down at Panama; tried to
cross the isthmus in a dirigible, and was never heard from again."

"Oh! but you're wrong, sir!" exclaimed Elephant, eagerly. "He was
saved through those two boys in their monoplane, and is alive and well
in Bloomsbury right now. It's a great story, and all to the good for
the Bird boys."

"I'd like to hear it some time or other," replied the gentleman called
Mr. Marsh by his companion who was serving as chauffeur. "But it seems
to me these young fellows must be unusually bright boys to do what
they're doing right now."

"That's easy for Frank and Andy Bird, sir," declared Larry. "Why,
they've got a shop that they keep under lock and key, where they spend
most of their time when they ain't flying. That biplane is what they
made last winter--got some of the parts, and did the rest themselves.
And it would be just like Frank to have invented some clever stunt
that's going to just revolutionize flying."

Again a quick look passed between the two tourists, but the boys simply
considered that it implied wonder at such youthful ingenuity.

"They must be smart boys, surely," remarked Mr. Marsh, again turning
his head to look out over the lake. "And you say they even have a
shop, where they work out these wonderf