THE WHITE FISHER 39 



lower mandible that looked as though it might hold a 

 gallon of water. We were close enough to see them very 

 clearly. I whispered^ ^What are they?'^ and John an- 

 swered, "Pelicans.'^^ We had a few times seen great white 

 birds fly silently over head, flapping very slowly yet show- 

 ing great strength and power of flight, and had been told 

 that they were pelicans. In fact, father and mother had 

 told us that in the early days, when they first settled in 

 Iowa, pelicans were common along the river ; but that was 

 in the days gone by, and only on rare occasions had any 

 one in years seen one in those parts, much less known 

 them to alight. True, only the year before we had been 

 surprized to see a flock of more than a hundred fly over, 

 and father had taken this occasion to tell us wonderful 

 stories of the days when pelicans used to nest on Holmes 

 Lake and keep the ducks and geese and even the swans 

 away from their neighborhood. 



We watched these birds for several minutes, forgetting 

 all about the wonderful opportunity of shooting them. 

 They evidently were hungry, and had alighted in this pond 

 because it was well stocked with minnows. At the lower 

 end there was a sort of slough through which at high water 

 the river ran across the field to the Crabapple pond a few 

 hundred yards below. This shallow neck narrowed down 

 almost to a point. Evidently those pelicans had not been 

 long on this pond, or else they had roosted there and, hav- 

 ing fed to the full the evening before, were just getting 

 ready for breakfast. At any rate, though they had heen 

 quietly floating on the water when we first saw them, an 

 old pelican suddenly raised his head, flapped his wings and 

 started swimming across the pond toward this shallow neck. 

 The other pelicans very quickly fell in line, swimming 



