ing near us. Johnny narrowly examined the
blade, and was much disappointed at not finding "any blood on it."

Max now took an oar to steady his nerves by rowing, for, notwithstanding
his assumed composure and forced pleasantry, they had evidently been a
good deal shaken by his recent narrow escape.

By the time we came in sight of Sea-bird's Point, the increasing light,
and the rosy glow in the "dappled east," heralded the rising of the sun,
and announced that the heat and glare of the tropical day, were on the
point of succeeding the mild freshness of "incense-breathing morn." Nor
were other tokens wanting, that the reign of night was over. A strange
confusion of indistinct and broken sounds, issuing from myriads of nests
and perches all along the beach, showed that the various tribes of
sea-fowl were beginning to bestir themselves. A few slumbrous,
half-smothered sounds from scattered nests preluded the general concert,
and then the notes were taken up, and repeated by the entire feathered
population for miles along the shore, until the clamour seemed like that
of ten thousand awakening barn-yards. And now the scene began to be
enlivened by immense multitudes of birds, rising in the air, and
hovering in clouds over the lagoon. Some wheeled around us in their
spiral flight; others skimmed the water like swallows, dipping with
marvellous promptness after any ill-starred fish that ventured near the
surface; others again, rose high into the air, from whence, by their
incredible keenness of sight, they seemed readily to discern their prey,
when, poising themselves an instant on expanded wings, they would pounce
perpendicularly downward, and disappearing entirely in the water for an
instant, emerge, clutching securely a struggling victim. But in
carrying on this warfare upon the finny inhabitants of the lagoon the
feathered spoilers were not perfectly united and harmonious; and fierce
domestic contentions occasionally interrupted and diversified their
proceedings. A number of unprincipled man-of-war hawks, who preferred
gaining their livelihood by robbing their neighbours and associates, to
relying upon their own honest industry, would sail lazily around on
wide-spread pinions, watching with the air of unconcerned spectators the
methodical toil of the plodding gannets. But the instant that one of
the latter rose from a successful plunge, with a plump captive writhing
in his grasp, all appearance of indifference wou