Page:The Swiss Family Robinson (Kingston).djvu/307

Rh “What!” I exclaimed, while my wife looked horrified at the news, conjuring up in her imagination hordes of savages who would soon come and lay waste Falconhurst and Tentholm as well as Woodlands. “How can that have happened? Did you discover the authors of all this mischief?”

“Oh,” said Jack, “it was easy to see that those dreadful monkeys had done it all. First they must have got into the yards and sheds, and hunted the fowls and creatures about; and then I daresay the cunning rascals put a little monkey in at some small opening, and bid him unfasten the shutters—you know what nimble fingers they have. Then of course the whole posse of them swarmed into our nice tidy cottage and skylarked with every single thing they could lay paws on, till perhaps they got hungry all at once, and bethought them of the ‘gensing,’ as you call it, out in the woods yonder, where we found them so busy refreshing themselves, the mischievous villains!

“While we were gazing at all this ruin in a sort of bewilderment,” pursued Fritz, “we heard a sound of rushing wings and strange ringing cries as of multitudes of birds passing high above us, and looking up we perceived them flying quickly in a wedge-shaped flock at a great height in the air. They began gradually to descend, taking the direction of the lake, and separated into a number of small detachments which followed in a long straight line, and at a slower rate, the movements of the leaders, who appeared to be examining the neighbourhood. We could now see what large birds they must be, but dared not show ourselves or follow them, lest they should take alarm.

“Presently, and with one accord, they quickened their motion, just as if the band had begun to play a quick march after a slow one, and rapidly descended to earth in a variety of lively ways and near enough for us to see that they must be cranes.

“Some alighted at once, while others hovered sportively over