Page:Poor Cecco - 1925.djvu/60

50 stand right on his head in the water, with only his tail sticking out and his yellow feet paddling away at a great rate; it was amazing how they did it, and it looked so easy! Even the baby ducks could do it, as cleverly as their elders.

It would be a fine thing to be a duck, Bulka thought, and stand on one’s head in the water, and almost before he knew it he was trying to do the same thing on shore. But it wasn’t so simple as it looked, perhaps because there was no water to keep him up, and the best he could do was to turn a sort of somersault and fall back each time on the mud.

“Here, what are you trying to do?” called the ducks. “You won’t catch any worms that way!”

“I’m not looking for worms,” said Bulka, feeling suddenly shy when he found they were all watching him, but keeping up his somersaults none the less, just to show them that he didn’t care. “I don’t like worms!”

“Don’t like worms?”’ cried the biggest duck, and all the little ones came crowding up at once to see this strange person who didn’t like worms.

“Your head is too big,” said one of the younger ducks after watching him for a moment attentively.

“Come out here,” called another, “and we’ll show you how to do it properly!”

“I don’t need showing,” said Bulka.

“Well, I call that a silly performance!” remarked the big duck after a while, and shaking her feathers she swam