longed to be up and away. Also he wanted to 
be near a certain little gray duck he had been 
seeing of late. After fluttering and splashing 
around her for a time she seemed to see things 
pretty much as he wanted her to, and together 
one day they left the Valley of Abundance. 
Heading northward toward the tule lake he 
knew so well, they journeyed onward by stages 
and in due time gained its reedy shores. And 
there, should you care to go and search, you 
may find them any summer day. But as you 
were warned in the beginning, Baldpate talks 
very little of the language you can understand, 
so in the end you will have to take my word for 
it that all these things befell him during the 
first year of his youth. 
THE END 
237 
