368 DUCK SHOOTING. 



circle of darkness around you, crosses the open sky 

 above in dim outline, doubles up at the report of your 

 gun, and sinks at your feet with a sullen whop, the 

 flight increases with every new beam of light that strug- 

 gles through the misty morning. They fall no longer 

 from above, as in the evening, and stream in from every 

 other quarter of the horizon about as much as from the 

 north. There is less rush and bustle, but they move 

 with steadier march. They are not shot by you in vol- 

 leys like projectiles from some uncontrollable impulse, 

 but they move with more majestic sweep and more as 

 if they had some inkling of what they were about. At 

 the first report of your gun the air throbs beneath the 

 beat of thousands of wings, and a wild medley of ener- 

 getic quacks, dolorous squeals, melodious honkings and 

 discordant cackling, as the myriads of ducks, geese and 

 brant still roosting in the ponds rise in a clamorous 

 mob. Again, for a few moments the tyro may lose his 

 wits as the vast horde breaks into a hundred divisions, 

 each circling perhaps a dozen times through the light- 

 ening sky and streaming over his head without remem- 

 bering or caring that it was from that spot that the fire 

 just spouted skyward. As the fire again leaps upward, 

 the circle of sky overhead is cleared for an instant, as 

 the ducks sheer and climb the air out of danger's reach ; 

 but in another moment it is thronged again with rush- 

 ing wings. Beware, now, how you waste your fire upon 

 this flock of teal just emerging into the gray, for you 

 can hear the mallard's heavy wings, a hundred strong, 

 beating the dark air close behind them. Beware how 



