232 OUT WITH THE BIRDS 



well, but more often he missed her by a mile. 

 The instant he saw her bob up again, he started 

 toward her, threw himself down in a crawling 

 attitude with outstretched neck, and then 

 shouted shrilly, "Peep-peep-peep-peep — " ad 

 infinitum, or till his breath gave out; it was a 

 most monotonous rattle, but so full of beseech- 

 ing that one who did not know better would 

 think that he had not been given a morsel for a 

 week. 



Out on the open lake, just above the shim- 

 mering of the low sun upon the sparkling rip- 

 ples, an animated mass of flapping objects 

 loomed up suddenly, rose and fell for a few mo- 

 ments, then settled upon the water — a flock of 

 some twenty white pelicans getting located in 

 their night quarters. Two weeks earlier they had 

 come down from their summer colony to the 

 northward, a proud rank fully a hundred and 

 fifty strong, and now broken in smaller detach- 

 ments, they were scattered about the lake and 

 sloughs of the vicinity. Each day they fed about 

 the sloughs, though what the huge fishermen got 

 in return for prodding away at the water with 

 their big beaks was something of a mystery ; and 

 each evening they returned to the open lake for 



