THE FIVE WORLDS OF LARIE 



world — the sea. When his great day for swimming 

 came, he shpped off into the water; and after that it was 

 his, whenever he wished — his to swim or float upon, the 

 wide-away ocean reaching as far as any gull need care to 

 swim or float. 



All over and above the sea stretched Larie's fifth 

 world — the air. When his great day for flying came, he 

 rose against the breeze, and his wings took him into that 

 high-away kingdom that lifted as far as any gull need 

 care to fly. 



Now that Larie could both swim and fly, he was large, 

 and acted in many ways like an old gull ; but the feathers 

 of his body were not white, and he did not wear over his 

 back and the top of his spread wings a pearl-gray mantle. 



Nor was he given the garb of his father and mother 

 for a traveling suit, that winter when he went south with 

 the others, to a place where the Gulf Stream warmed the 

 water whereon he swam and the air wherein he flew. 



But there came a time when Larie had put off the 

 clothes of his youth and donned the robe of a grown gull. 

 And as he sailed in the breezes of his fifth world, which 

 blew over the cold sea, and across the island with a car- 

 pet of green and rocks of red and green and gray, — for 

 he was again in the North, — he was beautiful to be- 

 hold, the flight of a gull being so wonderful that the 

 heart of him who sees quickens with joy. 



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