[rajnish manga]

Heidi meanwhile had unfastened her apron and rolling it carefully round the flowers laid it beside Peter’s wallet inside the hollow; she then sat down beside his outstretched figure and looked about her. The valley lay far below bathed in the morning sun. In front of her rose a broad snow-field, high against the dark-blue sky, while to the left was a huge pile of rocks on either side of which a bare lofty peak, that seemed to pierce the blue, looked frowningly down upon, her. The child sat without moving, her eyes taking in the whole scene, and all around was a great stillness, only broken by soft, light puffs of wind that swayed the light bells of the blue flowers, and the shining gold heads of the cistus, and set them nodding merrily on their slender stems. Peter had fallen asleep after his fatigue and the goats were climbing about among the bushes overhead. Heidi had never felt so happy in her life before. She drank in the golden sunlight, the fresh air, the sweet smell of the flowers, and wished for nothing better than to remain there forever.

So the time went on, while to Heidi, who had so often looked up from the valley at the mountains above, these seemed now to have faces, and to be looking down at her like old friends. Suddenly she heard a loud harsh cry overhead and lifting her eyes she saw a bird, larger than any she had ever seen before, with great, spreading wings, wheeling round and round in wide circles, and uttering a piercing, croaking kind of sound above her.

“Peter, Peter, wake up!” called out Heidi. “See, the great bird is there–look, look!”

Peter got up on hearing her call, and together they sat and watched the bird, which rose higher and higher in the blue air till it disappeared behind the grey mountain-tops.

“Where has it gone to?” asked Heidi, who had followed the bird’s movements with intense interest.

“Home to its nest,” said Peter.

“Is his home right up there? Oh, how nice to be up so high! why does he make that noise?”

“Because he can’t help it,” explained Peter.

“Let us climb up there and see where his nest is,” proposed Heidi.

“Oh! oh! oh!” exclaimed Peter, his disapproval of Heidi’s suggestion becoming more marked with each ejaculation, “why even the goats cannot climb as high as that, besides didn’t Uncle say that you were not to fall over the rocks?”