You see it was this way: Johnny and Peter had thought that of course
the sweet singers were birds. They hadn't dreamed of anything else. So
of course they went looking for birds. When they reached the Smiling
Pool, the voices came right out of the water. Johnny knew that some
birds, like many of the cousins of Mrs. Quack, can stay under water a
long time, and so he didn't know but some other birds might.

Jerry Muskrat was always watching for Johnny, whenever he came to the
Smiling Pool, and his eyes would twinkle as he would gravely say:

"Hello, Johnny Chuck! Have you seen the birds sing under water yet?"

Johnny would smile good-naturedly and reply: "Not yet, Jerry Muskrat.
Won't you point them out to me?"

Then Jerry would reply:

"Two eyes you have, bright as can be;
Perhaps some day you'll learn to see."

Then Johnny Chuck would sit as still as ever he knew how, and watch
and watch the Smiling Pool, but not a bird did he see in the water,
though the singers were still there. One day a sudden thought popped
into his head. Perhaps those singers were not birds at all! Why hadn't
he thought of that before? Perhaps it was because he was looking so
hard for birds that he hadn't seen anything else. Johnny began to
look, not for anything in particular, but to see everything that he
could.