CANVAS-BACK DUCK. 153 



Sheep Island Point, not ten minutes' distance from the 

 house, where there was an air hole. In this at the 

 moment of our arrival swam fifty or sixty ducks — 

 hooded mergansers, ruddies, mallards, whistlers, butter- 

 balls and perhaps a dozen canvas-backs. Three or four 

 hundred yards to the north was another small air hole, 

 perhaps four or five acres in extent, which was crowded 

 with canvas-backs. We sat down in the fringe of sedge 

 about 60 or 70 yards from the nearest air hole, which 

 had a length of perhaps 150 feet and a breadth of 100. 

 The live birds in this air hole would make good decoys, 

 and we hoped that if the fowl began to fly some of them 

 would alight near us. Two of the four men were pro- 

 vided with good field glasses. 



"We had not been waiting many minutes, when what 

 we had hoped for took place. A bunch of 200 birds rose 

 from the further air hole, and after swinging about a 

 few times, dropped down in the one close to us. These 

 were immediately followed by other bunches, and these 

 by others; so that often two or three fiocks would be 

 swinging about in the air at one time, and all of them 

 with our air hole as their objective point. They de- 

 scended into it by companies of fifties, hundreds and 

 two hundreds, and before long the open water was so 

 crowded with the fowl that it seemed as if it could hold 

 no more, and as if the birds that came next must neces- 

 sarily alight on the backs of their comrades. 



"Soon after the birds alighted they began to dive for 

 food, and, probably one-half of them being under water 

 at any one moment, room was made for other incom- 



