Gull Dick 



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DICK was a herring-gull that first began 

 to be noticed around the lightship which 

 warns vessels away from Brenton's 

 Reef, a ledge of dangerous rocks two miles 

 off the harbor of Newport, Rhode Island, 

 a place of perils that will long be remembered by 

 the gallant story of " Grace Darling " (Ida 

 Lewis), who lived there in the little lighthouse 

 she made famous. 



As the lightship rolls and sways and tosses 

 in the midst of never-quiet surges, her crew in 

 their loneliness observe keenly many things that 

 on land would escape their attention. It was 

 thus that Dick came to be noticed one day 

 among a flock of lively companions wheeling 

 and curveting over the waves that rose and fell 

 upon the cruel ledges noticed day after day, 

 because he seemed so much older and more fee- 

 ble than his younger and gayer companions. 



