lifting and falling, their bodies slanting and sweeping slowly, in short
circles.

The suddenness of their approach, their presence so far inland,
something unfamiliar and foreign in the way they had winged their
progress, for a moment held the group upon the terrace silent.

"They are gulls from the Sound," said Lowell.

"They are too large for gulls," returned Mortimer. "They might be wild
geese, but," he answered himself, in a puzzled voice, "it is too late;
and wild geese follow a leader."

As though they feared the birds might hear them and take alarm, the men,
unconsciously, had spoken in low tones.

"They move as though they were very tired," whispered Elsie Mortimer.

"I think," said Ainsley, "they have lost their way."

But even as he spoke, the birds, as though they had reached their goal,
spread their wings to the full length and sank to the shallow water at
the farthest margin of the lake.

As they fell the sun struck full upon them, turning their great pinions
into flashing white and silver.

"Oh!" cried the girl, "but they are beautiful!"

Between the house and the lake there was a ridge of rock higher than the