12-12-2012, 05:52 PM
Jonathan Livingston Seagull
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IT WAS MORNING, AND THE NEW SUN SPARKLED GOLD
across the ripples of a gentle sea.
A mile from shore a fishing boat chummed the water, and
the word for Breakfast Flock flashed through the air, till a
crowd of a thousand seagulls came to dodge and fight for bits
of food. It was another busy day beginning.
But way off alone, out by himself beyond boat and shore,
Jonathan Livingston Seagull was practising. A hundred feet in
the sky he lowered his webbed feet, lifted his beak, and strained
to hold a painful hard twisting curve through his wings. The
curve meant that he would fly slowly, and now he slowed until
the wind was a whisper in his face, until the ocean stood still
beneath him. He narrowed his eyes in fierce concentration,
held his breath, forced one ... single ... more ... inch ... of ...
curve ... Then his feathers ruffled, he stalled and fell.
Seagulls, as you know, never falter, never stall. To stall in the
air is for them disgrace and it is dishonour.
But Jonathan Livingston Seagull, unashamed, stretching his
wings again in that trembling hard curve - sl
SO THIS IS HEAVEN, HE THOUGHT, AND HE HAD TO SMILE
at himself. It was hardly respectful to analyse heaven in the
very moment that one flies up to enter it.
As he came from Earth now, above the clouds and in close
formation with the two brilliant gulls, he saw that his own
body was growing as bright as theirs. True, the same young
Jonathan Seagull was there that had always lived behind his
golden eyes, but the outer form had changed.
It felt like a seagull body, but already it flew far better than
his old one had ever flown. Why, with half the effort, he
thought, I’ll get twice the speed, twice the performance of my
best days on earth!
His feathers glowed brilliant white now, and his wings were
smooth and perfect as sheets of polished silver. He began,
delightedly, to learn about them, to press power into these
new wings.
JONATHAN CIRCLED SLOWLY OVER THE FAR CLIFFS,
watching. This rough young Fletcher Gull was very nearly a
perfect flight-student. He was strong and light and quick in the
air, but far and away more important, he had a blazing drive to
learn to fly.
Here he came this minute, a blurred grey shape roaring out
of a dive, flashing one hundred fifty miles per hour past his
instructor. He pulled abruptly into another try at a sixteenpoint
vertical slow roll, calling the points out loud.
“... eight ... nine ... ten ... see-Jonathan-I’m-runningout-
of-airspeed ... eleven ... I-want-good-sharp-stops-likeyours
... twelve ... but-blast-it-I-just-can’t-make ... thirteen
... these-last-three-points ... without ... fourtee ... aaakk!”
Fletcher’s whipstall at the top was all the worse for his rage
and fury at failing. He fell backward, tumbled, slammed
savagely into an inverted spin, and recovered at last, panting,
a hundred feet below his instructor’s level.
“You’re wasting your time with me, Jonathan! I’m too
dumb! I’m too stupid! I try and try, but I’ll never get it!”