200 GAME-BIRDS AT HOME, 



white and black follows it at the report of a 

 second barrel. A third barrel rings over the 

 bay ; another brant halts in its course and sinks 

 with heavily laboring wing nearly to the water, 

 twists sidewise with a jerk as a fourth barrel 

 bellows into the confusion, then seaward it 

 stretches its white-collared, neck and, skimming 

 the water, fades away in a rapid alternation of 

 black and white. 



Before the last flock is out of sight another 

 dark line rises over the sand-spit where the surf is 

 grumbling. The brant we first saw in the bay 

 were but a small portion of all that frequent it. 

 Most of them are out at sea during the flow of 

 the tide, feeding in the beds of kelp, and at the 

 ebb they return. Now rising, now lowering, 

 but swift and straight in a long wedge-shaped 

 column, the black ranks come on. Down the 

 center of the bight where our blind is placed 

 they fly until within some four hundred yards, 

 when the head of the column turns a little, and 

 directly toward the decoys the whole mass bends 

 its way. The air sings beneath their stiffening 

 wings, then comes the sharp, rushing sound as 

 the birds set them to alight, then the splash of 



