BIRDS OF MINNESOTA. 269 



about it. He undertook to shoot them indiscriminately, 

 "guilty or not guilty." But they were too shrewd for him, as 

 some one or more on guard would give a warning note, just as 

 he had got nearly ready to give them a broadside of double B 

 shot. An unused shanty stood in the center of the field, and 

 as he could always approach them much more nearly when 

 with no gun, he arose very early in the morning, before day- 

 light, and put his double-barrelled gun in there and returned 

 home. After his breakfast was over, he walked very deliber- 

 ately across the field and into his shanty with very little atten- 

 tion from the crows. 



Lighting his pipe, he sat down to let them forget his going 

 in there, and after waiting some time he peeped out of a hole to 

 see if they had not resumed their botanical investigations, as he 

 facetiously called their depredations. To his surprise, not a 

 crow was to be seen on his corn, but they were all perched at 

 respectful distances watching the shanty. He staid until noon 

 in vain, and went to his dinner thinking how he was to deceive 

 them. A thought struck him. So after dinner he took one of 

 his hired men with him into the shanty, and after staying 

 awhile sent him out to his work in another part of the farm, 

 and waited for the crows, believing the departure of the man 

 would throw them off their guard, but all in vain. The next 

 day he took two men in, and after a short time one went away, 

 and a while after the second followed, and he thought "now I 

 surely will beat them," but not a crow came, till discouraged 

 he went home. Thinking the matter over in the night he 

 decided that as he had begun on that line he would see how 

 many the crows could count, and in the morning called in one 

 more man. One after another took their departure, the last 

 one wearing away an outside garment he had worn in himself. 

 To his great delight, very soon after the third man left the 

 crows began to light down in great numbers and in good range. 

 After all were down, and feeding, he suddenly flung open the 

 door, and as they rose, he gave them first one barrel and then 

 the other, and made the biggest crow shot on California 

 records, winging, killing and otherwise disabling something 

 over a score of birds. To his joy he found that by going into 

 that shanty every day with some of his men, without remain- 

 ing at all, not a Crow would light on his corn, but the first 

 day he failed to go there they poured down upon it as if no 

 such catastrophe had ever decimated their ranks. That farmer 

 says he knows that a Crow can count three. 



