16 
THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 
dry. There they were having a very fine 
time drying themselves and brushing the 
sand off their feathers. 
Tommie Specks was making himself quite 
mean, as he often did, by strutting about 
and showing off his splendid bathing suit 
and his wonderful broad-rimmed glasses. 
“See! See!” he seemed to exclaim, as 
through his glasses he looked in an over- 
proud way at the newly arrived Gray Goose 
children. “Look! Look! What very plain¬ 
looking folks they are!” Now, of course, 
this made the other bird folks very much 
ashamed, for they liked the odd little 
strangers. As for the Goose children, they 
did not enjoy being made fun of. Then 
suddenly there marched in among them 
another stranger, who was to receive some 
of Tommie Speck’s joking comments. 
Tommie just stood and stared at the 
strange bird for a full moment before he 
was able to say a word. Such an odd bird 
this stranger was, anyway! He was almost 
as tall as the rocks beside which they were 
