by hundreds on the broiling ledges of the low tufa-cliffs;
and then all, sitting on the sandy turf, defiant of galliwasps and
jackspaniards, and all the weapons of the insect host, partook of the
equal banquet, while old blue land-crabs sat in their house-doors and
brandished their fists in defiance at the invaders, and solemn cranes
stood in the water on the shoals with their heads on one side, and
meditated how long it was since they had seen bipeds without feathers
breaking the solitude of their isle.
And Frank wandered up and down, silent, but rather in wonder than
in sadness, while great Amyas walked after him, his mouth full
of junipa-apples, and enacted the part of showman, with a sort of
patronizing air, as one who had seen the wonders already, and was above
being astonished at them.
"New, new; everything new!" said Frank, meditatively. "Oh, awful
feeling! All things changed around us, even to the tiniest fly and
flower; yet we the same, the same forever!"
Amyas, to whom such utterances were altogether sibylline and
unintelligible, answered by:
"Look, Frank, that's a colibri. You 've heard of colibris?"
Frank looked at the living gem, which hung, loud humming, over some
fantastic bloom, and then dashed away, seemingly to call its mate, and
whirred and danced with it round and round the flower-starred bushes,
flashing fresh rainbows at every shifting of the lights.
Frank watched solemnly awhile, and then:
"Qualis Natura formatrix, si talis formata? Oh my God, how fair must be
Thy real world, if even Thy phantoms are so fair!"
"Phantoms?" asked Amyas, uneasily. "That's no ghost, Frank, but a jolly
little honey-sucker, with a wee wife, and children no bigger than peas,
but yet solid greedy little fellows enough, I'll warrant."
"Not phantoms in thy sense, good fellow, but in the sense of those who
know the worthlessness of all below."
"I'll tell you what, brother Frank, you are a great deal wiser than me,
I know; but I can't abide to see you turn up your nose as it were at
God's good earth. See now, God made all these things; and never a man,
perhaps, set eyes on them till fifty years agone; and yet they were as
pretty as they are now, ever since the making of the world. And why
do you think God could have put them here, then, but to please
Himself"--and Amyas took off his hat--"with the sight of them? Now, I
say, brother Frank, what's good enough to please God, is good enough to
please you and
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