“Come,” said Flip, “don’t be so crusty. You have no cause to be angry with Pipi. I remember very well, when we were among those cruel Italians, how Pipi saved your life: I saw it with my own eyes. You were in an olive-tree by a stone wall, and on the top of the wall sat a boy with a bow and arrows, aiming at you; Pipi gave you our alarm-note, and when you took no notice he flew right at you and made you move. The boy shot the arrow, but seeing two birds he luckily missed both.” “Well,” said Twinkle, “didn’t I say I could hardly eat because of Pipi’s death? Now I am going to tell how it was. You know how even in our first journey we were specially warned about those lighthouses, which we always so much want to go to: I really don’t know how it is, but somehow one does want dreadfully to go and see what that light is. Pipi was always excited about it; he declared he would find out some day what they are, and now he has found out with a vengeance. Poor old Pipi! He and I and one or two more were together the greater part of the way, but it was very hard to stick to one another. We had better have put off our crossing a day or two. The wind changed to the south-east, and that is very disagreeable; it comes behind you, and forces you on whether you will or no, and it gets in among the feathers and ruffles them about, and lays bare your skin, and blows the breath out of your body, and bangs you about this way and that--I can feel it now,” said Twinkle, in an injured tone, as he turned round his head and smoothed his feathers with an air of great feeling and commiseration for himself. “Now I didn’t ask him to tell about himself,” thought Flip. “Here he is safe and sound anyhow.” But he held his tongue, and Twinkle went on:-- “After we had got half-way across, a sudden blast of wind broke up our company, and for some time I was quite alone in the darkness. Every now and then I could hear the voices of our comrades, and they must have been close to me, for the wind howled so, that it would have been impossible to catch them at any distance. I was high up, as we all had been, but now it began to rain, and I flew lower down, to see if there was any island or object on which I could rest and get shelter; but that was hard work, I can tell you, for the wind seemed to come from below whenever I opened my wings wide, and gave me such a lifting that I was quite giddy.” “Go on, please,” said Flip, as the other paused again to recall his own discomfort. Flip felt much inclined to make unpleasant remarks, but swallowed them down with a juicy green fly, which he found at that moment. All this time they had been quietly working about the willows, and eating what they found; for willow-warblers are seldom still, and can talk very well as they search for their food.