Page:Bill the minder.djvu/114

 GOOD AUNT GALLADIA lost crane. Carefully following the direction I had observed the bird to take when it broke away from its chain, I travelled for weeks and weeks, without seeing any sign of it. In time, without even a nibble, the first kernel was dissolved and worn away by the wind and rain, and, in like manner the same fate overcame the second, with which I baited my hook; then the third, then the fourth, and then the fifth.

'Still keeping the same direction, by this time I had arrived at the very edge of the world, beyond which there is nothing but sea and sky. Believing that the poor creature had flown out over this lonely sea, and hoping that it might return when it realised that there was no land beyond, I determined to wait on the desolate shore.

'I now erected my pole on the sands, after once more baiting my hook, this time with a piece of my last kernel, having taken the precaution of cutting it into six pieces. I now waited patiently, week after week, subsisting on the oysters, the starfish, and the edible crustaceans, that wandered tamely about the shore. Months now passed by, and, one by one, the five pieces of my last yap kernel had followed the other five kernels with which I had set out from home. I am not easily beaten, however, and though many months had passed by without my meeting with any success, I would not give in, but husbanded my last piece of bait with the greatest care. I cut a chip of wood from my angling pole, and shaped it in the form 74