Ah! kind friend, you showed us the sincerest of flatteries, that of
imitation. You left a comfortable home for chance quarters and uncertain
fare, that you might be one of us, an outcast among outcasts. Now we
must part, for our home will spare us no longer, as neither will yours
spare you. And so the last good-bye is said, and you are limping away to
your hills again, with dejection expressed in every fibre of your frame,
from the drooping ears to the last hair on your tail.
All is over, and the place is very silent, except for the clink of
hammers where they are breaking down our wooden walls, and, seaward, the
cry and splash of gull and tern dipping for their prey in the shoal of
herring-fry which is wandering about the bay. Close inshore a porpoise
is wallowing, like the jolly sea-pig that he is, in his berth of
glistening water. The wild creatures seem to have grown tamer since
there are no strollers to keep them aloof. This morning, as we passed
his pool, the stately heron let us come within twenty yards of him before
he got leisurely upon the wing.
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