Eskimo island and Penguin land

Front matter

M-YV

Eskimo Island and

Penguin Land

BOOK ONE Page

THE BABY LAUGHING LOON, THE PUFFINS AND

THE HUNTER. 7

TOMMIE SPECKS, GRAY GEESE AND THE CRANE. 15

PIRATES SPOIL THE PUFFIN CONCERT. 53

LITTLE BABY LAUGHING LOON LEARNS TO PLAY

SUBMARINE . 61

PHILANDER GRAY GOOSE AND DUNGEMESS CRAB 70

LITTLE BABY LAUGHING LOON MEETS LITTLE

BROWN SEAL.104

CONTENTS

BOOK TWO Page

STORMY PETREL LOST. 14

STORMY AT THE BIG CANAL. 18

GOING SOUTH INTO THE COLD. 26

TO CATCH SHEATHBILL. 85

OLD GIANT WHALE.112

SAFE AT HOME.118

TO MIGRATE HOME.123

In they plunged.

(From Philander Gray Goose and Dungemess Crab)

THE BABY LAUGHING LOON, THE PUFFINS AND THE HUNTER

Were Little Baby Laughing Loon here, she could tell us in her way that on the sunny slopes of Eskimo Island there are the most wonderful wild-flower gardens that almost anyone ever saw! In this far northern country where there are months and months of night all in one long period of time, with 7 no sun at all, and where it is so cold that the icicles on the eaves do not drip for eight months long! This doesn’t seem possible, to many of us. But it is true just the same, for Little Baby Laughing Loon saw them as she went for a walk on the hillside. It seems that when the sun did come out he must have felt sorry for the poor cold world and just as fast as he could spare the time he stayed longer and longer until at last he just didn’t go to bed at all, but just stayed around and warmed up the earth and melted the snow and had the flower beds all ready; and before one would ever think it possible there they were—thousands and thousands of flowers; red and blue and pink and crimson, tossing their heads merrily in the sunshine! There never was a wild prairie full of cowslips and buttercups, shooting stars and lady slippers, that could compare with it, nor was any deep wooded garden full of anemonies and spring beauties its equal.

THE PUFFINS AND THE HUNTER

This day Baby Loon walked among them they had just washed their faces in a fresh cloud bank, and my! how finely they did nod their heads!

“Good morning, good morning, every¬ body!” exclaimed Baby in bird talk, as she trudged along. “How are you all today?” She couldn’t call them all by name, for no white man had seen them all to give them names, and the Eskimo people use many names for their own children. Baby didn’t mind that. She just trotted along happily, while hundreds of Puffins whirled by just over her head, practicing a song for their next grand concert.

While Baby Loon was among the flowers something strange happened on Eskimo Island that very day. The Puffin chorus were flying through the air having a fine time while they practiced the new chorus. If anyone on the hill above had been watching very, very closely they would have noticed that every now and then, as the Puffins skimmed along close to the ground, some of them closest to the ground stopped suddenly as if they had struck something. They seemed to flutter there for a moment and then all together, three or four, or as many as ten of them, would go flop! to the ground, and though they seemed to be struggling to rise, they didn’t leave the ground. Now, that would have looked very strange to the watcher. If he knew Little Baby Laughing Loon very well and had liked her as well as we would be certain to do, he would have hurried to her down there among the flowers and told her what he had seen and warned her not to go any farther. But the watcher was not there, so Little Baby Laughing Loon walked on and on, still nodding to the flowers and saying, “Good morning, good morning, everybody! How are you today?” Every now and then down would go more of the little Puffin folks, only to struggle and rise and to fall.

So Baby marched sturdily on and on until at last she was quite above the flower beds and was thinking of going back, when Zing!

THE PUFFINS AND THE HUNTER something tumbled down on her head! It didn’t seem very heavy. Perhaps it was just a clump of flowers that had been blown there by the wind. That was the way Baby thought about it, and she wasn’t very much frightened at first; yet when she started to rise she found she couldn’t, for though the thing was not heavy, it seemed bound tight to the ground and she could not budge. Then she was frightened! She twisted her head about and looked around her. Right close to her was one of the gay little Puffin singers. He was bound to the earth, too.

“Hello,” said Baby in bird talk. “What has happened to us?”

“It’s Omnok, the Eskimo hunter s terrible net!” exclaimed the little Puffin sadly. “I didn’t see it till it was too late. I ran right into it, and so did some of the others. It flopped right down upon us and here we are. By and by Omnok will come around and put us in a close, evil-smelling sack, and then tomorrow he will make food of us for his family. I suppose we shouldn’t blame him, for if he did not hunt and fish his family would starve, for this country will not raise corn and potatoes, wheat and sugar cane, as other lands. It will raise only flowers.”

“Can’t we get away?” asked Baby hope¬ fully. “I’m going to try, anyway.”

“You might just as well while you may,” said the little singer. “The net is very strong.”

Indeed, Baby found this quite true, for it was made of fine threads of sealskin. She struggled and struggled toward the edge of the net, and at last she was one mesh nearer the edge. She kept struggling and again was two meshes nearer, then three, then four, and very soon she was very near the edge; right alongside, in fact. The outside strand of the net was very much larger than the others, and stretched very, very tight. Struggle as she might, she could not even so much as get her head under it.

“It is too bad!” said the little singer.

Can't we get away?

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But Baby Loon did not give up. She just lay there quite still, and when Omnok the hunter came along you might have thought she was a stone or a block of drift¬ wood. Omnok came closer and closer. Every now and then he lifted the net and took a Puffin from beneath it. Then he would come a little closer to Baby and stop again. He was getting very, very close. We can be sure that he hadn’t seen Baby or he wouldn’t have done as he did. For he lifted the net to take a Puffin out and raised it quite high for a second. A second was enough, for Zip! out whirled Baby Laughing Loon and away she flew like a streak.

“Ah-ne-ca!” exclaimed Omnok. “I have lost the best one of all. She would have made me a good meal all by herself. I wonder how she came so close to the edge of the net?” Baby Laughing Loon knew how she came there and she was glad. She had done the best she could under the worst circumstances, but she was very, very sorry for her friends, the little Puffin singers.

TOMMIE SPECKS, GRAY GEESE AND THE CRANE

There was a great company of the young bird people gathered on the Eskimo Island beach that day. There was Little Baby Laughing Loon with her brother and sister; there were Tommie Specks and his sister of the Eider Duck family, and there were the six Gray Goose children who had re¬ cently come to the island. They had all played until they were quite tired out; then they had found a sheltered place between two rocks where the sun peeped warmly through, and where the sand was warm and IS dry. There they were having a very fine time drying themselves and brushing the sand off their feathers.

Tommie Specks was making himself quite mean, as he often did, by strutting about and showing off his splendid bathing suit and his wonderful broad-rimmed glasses. “See! See!” he seemed to exclaim, as through his glasses he looked in an over-proud way at the newly arrived Gray Goose children. “Look! Look! What very plain¬ looking folks they are!” Now, of course, this made the other bird folks very much ashamed, for they liked the odd little strangers. As for the Goose children, they did not enjoy being made fun of. Then suddenly there marched in among them another stranger, who was to receive some of Tommie Speck’s joking comments.

Tommie just stood and stared at the strange bird for a full moment before he was able to say a word. Such an odd bird this stranger was, anyway! He was almost as tall as the rocks beside which they were resting, and as for being slim, it was true there wasn’t a bird among them who was half as high as this stranger, for, of course, it is well known how plump young Duck folks and young Gray Goose folks are, and Little Baby Laughing Loon was of just the same kind. But as for this stranger—why, if they had known anything about living skeletons they would have called him that at the first glance.

“Look!” exclaimed Tommie, but that was as far as he could go because of his aston¬ ishment.

The .stranger was as awkward as he looked, every bit of it! When he stooped to get a better look at the other bird folks he really looked as if he might fall over; and to make matters more strange, he drew one of his long legs up under his ragged coat, which was not a bathing suit at all, but a kind of a great storm coat. They all thought he would surely fall over, but he didn’t. He just stood there on one foot and

GRAY GEESE AND THE CRANE swallowed his Adam’s apple one or two times, then he said:

“My name’s Dannie Whooping Crane. Want to hear me whoop?’’

He didn’t wait for them to say yes or no, but just opened his mouth and gave six of the loudest whoops one ever heard: “Hoop! Hoop! Who-oop! Who-o-op! Who-oo-oop! Who-ooo-ooop! ’ ’

“Well! Well!’’ exclaimed Tommie. His spectacles were on crosswise, but he was so excited that he did not know it.

The stranger swallowed his Adam’s apple four more times, then he stood there awk¬ wardly as could be, and nobody seemed able to say one word.

Just then another stranger came around the corner who was not half as welcome as Dannie Whooping Crane. A black, black nose, very sharp and very keen, was fol¬ lowed by two cruel eyes and some sharp and terrible teeth. Old Black Fox was standing grinning an ugly grin at all the little folks, and here they were shut in on all sides by the rocks except on the side where he stood! The birds did not know what to do. If they started to fly he would snap them up by the heels and toss them right over his back. If they tried to reach the ocean, right there he was ready to seize them by the neck! Here was a terrible situation, indeed! Tommie Specks didn’t seem to know any more what to do than the rest. Indeed, he tried to hide behind Little Baby Laughing Loon. Little Baby Laughing Loon and the new Goose children were afraid, but they stood right in their places and tried to act not a bit frightened.

Dannie Whooping Crane hadn’t moved, either. He hadn’t even put his other foot on the ground. The one which was down didn’t tremble the least bit, either. For quite a while Black Fox didn’t seem to notice him. Perhaps he took his leg for a bit of driftwood sticking up in the sand. But when Dannie made a little gurgling sound in his throat, Black Fox looked up surprised, and when he saw who it was he

Black Fox didn’t seem to notice him.

seemed more surprised than ever. Indeed, strange to tell, he seemed to remember that he had important business on some other part of the island, for he turned right about and trotted away!

For two or three moments nobody said a word. At last Tommie Specks stepped out from behind Little Baby Laughing Loon, and, looking through his glasses, said, “Well, well, what were you all frightened at? You didn’t think he’d dare attack all of us at once? Not, while I was around he wouldn’t.”

But all the bird folks were looking up at Dannie Whooping Crane, who had not yet put his other foot down on the sand. He didn’t say a word, but just looked at some clams on a rock which the little bird folks had been trying to eat, but couldn’t, because their shells were too hard. Then he stooped over and gave a clam one crack with his long beak, and the clam burst right in two!

“Well! Well! What a strong beak!” ex¬ claimed Tommie Specks, edging toward the

GRAY GEESE AND THE CRANE water. In a moment he splashed into the sea and disappeared ’round the corner.

Dannie Whooping Crane just looked and cracked another clam. He cracked them and cracked them till there were quite enough for the whole company; then he went stalking away over a sand pile.

“A very fine fellow!” exclaimed one of the Gray Goose children.

“Not a bit proud, though he is so strong!” said Tommie Specks’ sister, who was not pleased that day at her over-proud brother, and quite pleased with the actions of the tall young bird stranger.

That night, as she slept, Little Baby Laughing Loon dreamed that she was a big Black Fox and that Dannie Whooping Crane was trying to peck her eyes out with his long, strong beak.

“Hurrah! The day’s just right for a swim!’’ cheered Tommy Specks, as he turned a somersault from a rock into the sea. Tommy was dressed in his bathing suit, and a wonderful bathing suit it was, too. It looked like the downy edge of a silvery cloud sewed to a bit of the deep blue sky. And his cap was more wonderful still —the deep blue of a sea cave and the golden green of the sunset. Astride his nose were the widest rimmed spectacles that ever a boy gloried in. It was these spectacles, worn by all the men of his family, which gave the Specks their name. For Tommy was the youngest son of Madam Specks of the Spectacled Eider Duck family.

“Yes,” Tommy’s mother agreed; “the day is just right, and you may take your sister for a romp on the waves.”

Now, a romp on the waves on such a day was as much fun as a Fourth of July picnic, for there had been a great storm on the Arctic Sea and now the waves were rolling gloriously. Away scampered the children, and Mother Specks settled herself down on her nest for the day.

Mother Specks, however, had been alone a very short time when she, too, became restless. There was no reason at all why she might not go for a little swim herself to catch a red-faced shrimp or two for her breakfast. Her eggs would not get cold, for had she not torn her heavy winter coat into little downy bits and covered her eggs deep, deep with it? And so, giving her nest a little tuck here and there, she glided down to the water’s edge and was soon enjoying a fine plunge.

As Mother Specks made her third dive, who should come along but Miss Swan?

Miss Swan had not yet gone to housekeep¬ ing. Her mother thought her too young for that. But she was very large, much larger than Mother Specks, and far too sedate and graceful to play with the smaller youngsters.

“Good morning,” she said, bending her graceful neck in a stately bow. “How are your eggs?”

“Doing nicely, indeed,” replied Mother Specks, bowing as gracefully as she could; “I have them well covered and am going for a bit of a swim.”

“You won’t leave them long, will you?” inquired Miss Swan anxiously. “I beg your pardon—I recall now that the Family of Specks have a very deft way of covering your eggs. It is too bad that we have never learned it..’

“Oh, yes, they will do very well for an hour or so,’’ said Mother Specks, pleased at the compliment. “How is your mother? As beautiful and graceful as ever?’’

So Mrs. Specks and Miss Swan were enjoying each other’s company very much when someone presently came in sight round the point. Indeed, it was no other than our old friend Little Red Fox! He and his mother had followed Big White Bear across the ice during the winter and had come over to Eskimo Island to live. The bird folks didn’t welcome them very heartily.

Mother Specks watched Little Red Fox very sharply as he drew near her nest.

“He looks like a very dangerous fellow,” said Miss Swan. “I shouldn’t wonder one bit if he were a meddlesome thief.”

“Some of his folks are,” replied Mrs. Specks mildly, “but he is young. Let’s not judge him too harshly.’’

When Little Red Fox discovered that wonderful downy nest, he was delighted. Never before had he seen anything that looked so comfortable. He was tired, and here was the very place for a good rest. Ah-ha! when he touched the nest with the tip of his toe, how warm it felt! What a wonderful find it was. If he had not been so tired he might have smelled the eggs at once and got himself into trouble; but as it was, he just curled up in the nest in a little ball and in second was fast asleep.

Mrs. Specks and Miss Swan had been watching him closely all this time.

“If I were you, I should go right up there and make him leave,’’ declared Miss Swan decidedly.

“Oh, I think that is hardly necessary,’’ said Mother Specks cheerfully. “He won’t do any harm, he’s such a little fellow; and besides,’’ she added, “if he keeps the eggs warm, I shan’t have to, and can stay for a longer swim.”

Miss Swan said no more, but felt very much worried over the eggs. It nearly spoiled her visit, for in spite of herself she kept looking up to the place where Little Red Fox was sleeping on Mother Specks’ nest.

“Oh, Mrs. Specks!” she called at last.

Little Red Fox, wakened very much re¬ freshed from his nap in the cozy nest, and the same mischievous Little Red Fox of old, had smelled the eggs under the fine covering and was tossing that splendid cov¬ ering to the winds fast as his nimble toes could fly!

With wild screams, Mother Specks dashed through the water and up over the sand as fast as her trembling legs could carry her. Her screams, however, were as much lost on Little Red Fox as if he had been deaf. Mrs. Specks’ legs were trembling, not from fear, but from anger, as Little Red Fox found out soon enough. And as there isn’t

In a minute Little Red Fox was racing away.

any one in the world who can box ears better than Mother Specks when she gets started, she made good work of it. In a minute Little Red Fox was racing away home, wondering if his head were really broken.

Poor Mother Specks! She hurriedly gath¬ ered up all the pieces of her warm winter coat that she could find, but they had been blown far and wide, and most of them had tumbled into the sea and been carried away. There were hardly enough left to cover the eggs and not nearly enough to keep them really warm.

“Serves me right!” she sighed at last, as she settled down once more on her nest. “I should not have trusted someone else to do my work. Now I shall have to miss all my fine swims till these eggs are hatched, and like as not I’ll go hungry many times besides.”

Miss Swan, as she swam away, thought about Mrs. Specks’ disturbed nest. Then she sailed away quickly for home to see how her own patient mother was getting along with her housekeeping.

While Mother Specks was having her pleasant chat with Miss Swan and her dis¬ tressing experience with that young rascal, Little Red Fox, her children were having fun out on the great rolling sea, sliding down this wave and that one.

Down in the valley, between two waves, they had discovered a little playmate. Miss Puffin was her name. She was a very plain little body, with a dull drab bathing suit and a very large nose, but she soon proved 32 to be as friendly as she was plain, and the three were having a joyous time coasting on the waves.

“Listen!” said little Miss Puffin suddenly, as she reached the bottom of a wave. “I think I hear voices.”

Miss Specks listened sharply. It might be the voices of Ivory Sea Gull and his pirate crowd, she thought.

“Yes, I hear them, too,” she said, “many, many little voices. They must be down in the sea.”

True enough, as they looked into the blue water, they saw hundreds of little people swimming about, all talking as loudly as they could, and all talking at once. It was the Tomcod family, gathered for a reunion.

“Hush!” cautioned Miss Puffin. “They are talking about where they will hold their celebration.”

They held their breath, listening, and this is what they heard: “I think under the great brown rock is the place.”

“No, no, you’re wrong, all wrong! Over on the sand bar’s the place.”

“No! No! What do you fellows know about it? Over in the seaweed grove’s the very place! There we have shade and plenty of sand grass.”

“You’re all wrong—” and so on and on they went, all talking at once, just because they had no leader.

“What a silly, foolish crowd they are!” said Miss Specks. “I feel sorry for them. People like that very often get into a great deal of trouble because they have no one to lead them.”

The Tomcod reunion party soon drifted out of sight and the three friends went on with their play. They had just reached the crest of a splendid wave when the water suddenly turned dark, as if a cloud were passing over the sky. They looked up, but there wasn’t a cloud to be seen and they were wondering what had happened, when up spouted a great rush of water from the

/ just had to sprout that water out.

sea, tossing them high in the air and fright¬ ening them nearly out of their wits.

“What’s that!’’ screamed Miss Specks in terror, as she tumbled back into the ocean with her bathing suit sadly mussed.

“Pardon me!’’ came a great, heavy voice. There, with his head out of the water, was the biggest fish they had ever seen—the biggest, indeed, that anybody in all the world has even seen. “I didn’t mean to disturb you,” apologized Old Giant Whale. “But you see I just had to spout that water out, and I didn’t know you were there.’’

“Oh, I see,” said Miss Specks, with a sigh of relief; “you had to breathe, so you came up and spouted all the air out of your lungs at once and that is what gave us such a tumble.”

“That’s just where you’re wrong, and a lot of other people are wrong, too,” Old Giant Whale corrected her. “1 don’t spout when I breathe. It is only when I need more room in my banquet hall that I spout the water out. Now, just a moment ago, for instance, the Tomcod family reunion party came along and were all mixed up about where they should hold their reunion. I just opened up the door to my banquet hall and said, ‘Please, folks, won’t you step inside?’ and inside they stepped. Then, of course, I had to spout out the water so there’d be room for them all.”

“My!” said Miss Specks, after a moment’s thought, “I think I’d rather not go to a reunion in your banquet hall!”

“There isn’t much danger of it,” Old Giant Whale reassured her, with a ponderous wink of his oily eye. “Folks with good parents and advisers seldom rent it, and I am told you have a very wise mother.”

“You’re quite right—she’s a very wise mother, indeed,” said Miss Specks proudly, “and I must be going back to her very soon, for it is nearly time for lunch.”

With that, Miss Specks returned to her friends for one more good romp. She could not help thinking, however, of the unfortu¬ nate plight of the Tomcod reunion party, and wondering whether Old Giant Whale would ever open the door of his banquet hall and let them out. Somehow she felt quite sure that he never would.

After Old Giant Whale disappeared under the water, Miss Specks and her brother Tommy and their friend Miss Puffin invented a new game. It was called “dive deeper than you can.” Miss Puffin couldn’t play it nearly as well as the other two, for they were the most skillful divers among all the families who had their homes on Eskimo Island. But she was a cheerful body and did the best she could. She seemed to enjoy the sport quite as much as her friends.

Tommy could dive straight down and pick up a shrimp twenty feet below the surface of the water, and his sister could do almost as well, sometimes quite as well, so among them they had a great time.

As the two young ladies were preparing for their final dive before going home, one which they were quite sure was going to be the very best yet, Tommy’s eyes seemed suddenly to pop out of his head, and with a gulp he cried, “Old Sea Serpent!” diving with a mighty splash.

“Sea Serpent!” echoed Miss Specks, fol¬ lowing him.

“Sea Serpent,” murmured Miss Puffin, almost too scared to move, but diving after them at last.

It is told that of all the folks that are sup¬ posed to live in the great, broad ocean, Old Sea Serpent is the most to be feared. Old Giant Whale, who can turn a boat upside down in a jiffy; Tusks the Walrus, who can tear up a boat with his great powerful tusks; Mr. Shark, with his rows and rows of terrible teeth—none of these is so terrible as Old Sea Serpent. Nobody has ever really caught any member of Old Sea Serpent’s fam¬ ily, but many and many a seaman sailing the silent sea, has declared he has caught sight of him, and we may feel certain it is just because he has never been caught that Old Sea Serpent seems so terrible. All the little sea folk are as much afraid of him as sailors are, and the hearts of our three young bird friends were beating very, very fast at the thought of meeting this dreadful monster face to face. True, no one but Tommy had seen him, but Tommy had looked so scared that the others had never thought of doubting that he had actually glimpsed the sea fellow.

They couldn’t stay under water very long, however, for the sea bird folk can’t hold their breath nearly so long as Little Brown Seal or Tusks the Walrus. And of course they couldn’t talk, either. They could only make signs and talk with their eyes. As soon as

Miss Specks had recovered a little from her fright she began to doubt whether, after all, Old Sea Serpent really was about. Presently she said with her eyes, “I’m going to get my breath and see if he is really there.”

Up she went. And down she came again with only half a breath of air, her eyes bulg¬ ing just as Tommy’s had done and saying much more plainly than words: “Yes indeed! It is Old Sea Serpent, his very own self!”

What were those three timid little people to do? There they were, down under the sea and not able to breathe at all, and yet afraid of their lives up where there was plenty of air! But Little Miss Puffin was a very strong hearted young person, so she finally decided to go up and see for herself. Back she came, too, with the very same story to tell.

“Yes indeed!” she said in the sign language, “I saw him too. There were his great, white fearful fangs and his awful mouth; and there was one hump, two humps, three humps on his back, and then there was his awful tail.”

By this time they just had to have some air, so they decided to all go to the surface together. If they had to be eaten, they might as well be eaten all at once. So up the three went, and down they dove again, just as frightened as ever.

“Did you see him?” Miss Specks signaled.

“Yes, indeed!” said Tommy. “And there were four humps on his back!”

“Four humps!” signaled Miss Puffin. “I saw only three.”