aid he.

"'They are!' I cried, enthusiastically.

"'But I am not looking for fossils,' observed the professor, mildly.

"This was a facer. I looked at Daisy Holroyd. She bit her lip and
fixed her eyes on the sea. Her eyes were wonderful eyes.

"'Did you think I was digging for fossils in a salt meadow?' queried
the professor. 'You can have read very little about the subject. I am
digging for something quite different.'

"I was silent. I knew that my face was flushed. I longed to say,
'Well, what the devil are you digging for?' but I only stared into the
hole as though hypnotized.

"'Captain McPeek and Frisby ought to be here,' he said, looking first
at Daisy and then across the meadows.

"I ached to ask him why he had subpoenaed Captain McPeek and Frisby.

"'They are coming,' said Daisy, shading her eyes. 'Do you see the
speck on the meadows?'

"'It may be a mud-hen,' said the professor.

"'Miss Holroyd is right,' I said. 'A wagon and team and two men are
coming from the north. There's a dog beside the wagon--it's that
miserable yellow dog of Frisby's.'

"'Good gracious!' cried the professor, 'you don't mean to tell me that
you see all that at such a distance?'

"'Why not?' I said.

"'I see nothing,' he insisted.

"'You will see that I'm right, presently,' I laughed.

"The professor removed his blue goggles and rubbed them, glancing
obliquely at me.

"'Haven't you heard what extraordinary eyesight duck-shooters have?'
said his daughter, looking back at her father. 'Jack says that he can
tell exactly what kind of a duck is flying before most people could
see anything at all in the sky.'

"'It's true,' I said; 'it comes to anybody, I fancy, who has had
practice.'

"The professor regarded me with a new interest. There was inspiration
in his eyes. He turned towards the ocean. For a long time he stared at
the tossing waves on the beach, then he looked far out to where the
horizon met the sea.

"'Are there any ducks out there?' he asked, at last.

"'Yes,' said I, scanning the sea, 'there are.'

"He produced a pair of binoculars from his coat-tail pocket, adjusted
them, and raised them to his eyes.

"'H'm! What sort of ducks?'

"I looked more carefully, holding both hands over my forehead.

"'Surf-ducks and widgeon. There is one bufflehead among them--no, two;
the rest are coots,' I replied.

"'This,' cried the professor, 'is most astonishing. I have good eyes,
but I can't see a blessed thing