SHOOTING MALLARDS FROM A SCULL BOAT. 65 
your gun is grabbed quick as thought, you draw your- 
self closely down in the bottom of the boat, and scarce- 
ly breathe. It’s all right! He hasn’t seen you; but 
comes slowly along, his great gray body, conspicuous in 
the light of the setting sun. Steadily and regularly, 
his wide wings work up and down. He’s over you! 
Coolly and calmly you rise to a sitting position. You 
draw aim on that black head, so plainly marked with a 
broad band of white; fire !and witha last expiring“honk,” 
a Canada goose lies dead before you. <A thrilling sense 
of pleasure darts through you ; the tired feeling is gone. 
You are filled with new vigor; for you feel that at the 
last moment, at the opportune time, you have crowned 
a perfect day’s sport with the most longed-for dessert. 
The sun has gone down, the twilight is beginning to 
appear in the East; the shooting has ceased, the sky is 
brilliantly reflected in the west by the slow retreating 
sun; then it grows dim, a gray film spreads all around 
us. We start for home. 
*¢ Now came still evening on, and twilight gray 
Had in her sombre livery all things clad; 
Silence accompanied, for beast and bird 
They to their grassy couch, these to their nests 
Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale.” 
The dark horizon is relieved of its blackness by the 
still darker line of the island trees. Stars begin to 
creep out from the distant sky, twinkling at you merri- 
ly; then one shoots swiftly with flashing tail across the 
bosom of the broad sky. The boat seems to almost fly 
past receding banks and trees. ~ We are now at the last 
-island, called the “Tow Head,” just four miles from 
home. Deep bluffs extend along both sides of the river, 
separating Iowa and Illinois. Fire off your gun! Why? 
5 z 
