exactly landed as yet, they were soon going to. For their
raft, floating downstream, had, as Sue expressed it, "bunked" on the
shore of a patch of land in the middle of the stream, forming an island.

As you learned in school, an island is a "body of land entirely
surrounded by water." That's what the place was where Bunny and Sue had
come. Water was all around the little patch of land, on which grew
several trees.

"All ashore!" cried Bunny again, as he had often heard his father or
Bunker Blue call when the fishing boats reached the dock. "All ashore!"

"Are we going to stay here long?" asked Sue, as she got up and brushed
the crumbs of bread and cake from her lap.

"Yes," Bunny answered, "we'll stay here all day and all night. We'll
make believe we're regular pirates!"

"Oh, we can't stay all _night_!" objected Sue.

"Well, we'll stay all day, anyhow," Bunny said. "And we'll go home when
it gets dark, and to-morrow we'll come back and stay all night."

"That'll be fun," agreed Sue. "Now we'll go on the island."

As yet the children were not off the raft. Their make-believe boat had
grounded on one of the sandy stretches that marked the shore of the
island, and there it stayed. Bunny took the mooring rope and made it
fast to a tree stump on shore. He did not want the raft to float away
as, more than once, some of his father's boats had floated off from the
dock.

Then Bunny and Sue, taking the bag of lunch with them, went on
shore--that is on the island. It was a pleasant place, with trees and
bushes to make shade, and with birds to sing to them.

"There doesn't anybody live here, I guess," Sue said, as they walked
about, looking on every side.

"Nobody ever lives on an island 'cepting pirates," Bunny said; "and
we're them."

"Maybe there are other pirates here," suggested Sue.

"If there are we'll fight 'em!" Bunny said.

"Oh!" exclaimed his sister, "mother wouldn't like to have us fight."

"Only make-believe," explained Bunny.

"Oh, make-believe is all right," Sue agreed.

Carrying their bag of lunch, the children wandered here and there over
the island. It was larger than they at first supposed, and Bunny was
glad of this. It was very still and quiet there, the ripple of the
water, the wind in the trees, and the birds making the only sounds.

"I guess daddy and mother are away off, aren't they?" asked Sue, after a
while.

"Miles and miles," Bunny answered. "Aren't you glad, Sue?"

"Ye--yes,