AN EXPERIMENT BY THE DUCKS. 77 



streets in that part of the town, on their way home from 

 Westminster Abbey, where they had been spending an 

 hour wandering about through the aisles, and transepts, 

 and chapels, looking at the monuments and other curious 

 things to be seen there, Lawrence stopped, and, pointing 

 to a side street, said, 



"I am going to turn off here and go into the park. 

 There is an experiment that I am going to have performed 

 there for you." 



" Who is going to perform it ?" asked John. 



"A couple of ducks," said Lawrence, gravely. 



John laughed, but he turned very readily in the direc- 

 tion which Lawrence indicated. 



They soon entered the park by a ponderous iron gate, 

 and, after walking a little way over a broad gravel walk 

 well filled with parties of ladies and gentlemen, and boys 

 and girls, going to and fro, and separated on each side 

 from the shrubberies, and lawns, and beds of flowers by an 

 open iron fence, they came to a suspension bridge lead- 

 ing over a narrow portion of the lake. They crossed 

 this bridge, and then, after proceeding a little farther, 

 they found a row of chairs, which were placed by the 

 side of the walk and facing the water. They took their 

 seats in two of these chairs, and looked out upon the little 

 lake. 



Immediately before them, across the walk, was a band 

 of green, with large trees here and there upon it, so near, 

 however, that their branches intermingled. Under these 

 trees there was a view of the water, with ducks swimming 

 here and there over the surface of it. The sheet of water 

 was not very wide, and beyond it, the farther shore was 

 covered with groves of trees and thickets of shrubbery. 



"Well," said John, as soon as they were seated and had 

 viewed the landscape before them for a moment, "and 



