“Are Geese Ducks?” asked Dodo, and then laughed with the others at the question.

“Not precisely—­no more than rats are mice,” said the Doctor; “but both Ducks and Geese belong to the same family.”

“And what are the others—­the Loons and Grubs—­are they wading or swimming birds?” “Grebes, not grubs,” laughed the Doctor.  “Loons and Grebes are swimming birds, like Ducks or Gulls, but both belong to quite a different order from any of the others and each of them belongs to a family of its own.  They can barely move at all on land, and spend all their lives on the water, excepting in the nesting season, when they make curious floating nests of dead herbage in reedy marshes.  Their logs are placed in such a backward position that they can sit upright in the water and swim as if they were walking, only keeping the tip of the bill above the surface.”

“How can they get away if any one hunts them?” asked Rap.

“They can dive at the flash of a gun and swim long distances under water.  Our familiar Pied-billed Grebe or Dabchick disappears so suddenly, that ‘Water Witch’ is one of its common names.”

“What a lot of birds there are to watch for this fall!” said Nat very anxiously.  “I only wish I knew how much more time we shall have before father and mother come for us.”

[Illustration:  Loon.]

“Why, there is one of the men from the Farm with a team,” said Rap, as they tacked close to the beach half an hour later.  “He is waving a letter or something, I think.”

It did not take the party long to land, or the Doctor to read his letter, which said that Nat’s and Dodo’s parents were coming to the Farm in a couple of days.

“So we must go home to-morrow,” said the Doctor.

“I want to see mother awfully much,” said Dodo, “and father too; but don’t you think if you told them bird stories, Uncle Roy, you might be able to coax them to make you a long visit before they take us home?”

“I think father would rather go up to the logging camp, and see the coons that Rap says they catch there in the fall; there are red foxes, too, he says, and little fur beasts.”

The Doctor did not give them a very satisfactory answer; but if they had looked they would have seen a merry twinkle in his eye.  And Dodo, who had learned not to tease during her happy summer, nestled up to Olive and said, “I smell a secret somewhere, but I can wait; for I know that hereabouts secrets are always nice surprises.”

When five more tables had been written—­the last ones Uncle Roy gave the children this summer—­they were like this: 

The Canada Goose

Length three feet or more.

Body brown above, gray below, with black head, neck, tail, and long feathers of the wings, the tail white at the roots above and below, the head with a large white patch like a napkin folded under the chin.