410 DUCK-DECOYS. 



Many birds manifest almost reasoning powers in elud- 

 ing pursuit, or turning attention from their nests and 

 young; but few perhaps more than the Duck tribe, of 

 which the following may be adduced as an instance, from 

 Captain Back's Narrative of his Arctic Land Expedition, 

 p. 249. One of his companions, Mr. King, having killed 

 a female Duck, fired again, and, as he thought, disabled 

 its companion, a fine Drake. Accordingly, leaving the 

 dead bird, which he had the mortification of seeing, in a 

 few minutes afterwards, carried off by one of the white- 

 headed Eagles, he waded into the water after the Drake, 

 which, far from being fluttered or alarmed, remained 

 motionless, as if waiting to be taken up. Still, as he 

 neared it, it glided easily away through innumerable little 

 nooks and windings. Several times he extended his arm 

 to catch it; and having at last with great patience man- 

 aged to coop it up in a corner, from whence there ap- 

 peared to be no escape, he was triumphantly bending 

 down to take it, when, to his utter astonishment, after 

 two or three flounders, it looked around, cried " quack," 

 and then flew off so strongly that he was convinced he 

 never hit it at all. The object of the Drake had 

 clearly been to draw Mr. King away from his compa- 

 nion, of whose fate it was unconscious; indeed, so 

 attached are these birds at certain seasons, that it is no 

 uncommon circumstance, when one has been shot, for 

 the other, especially the male, to linger about its strug- 

 gling partner, exhibiting the greatest distress, until either 

 killed or frightened away. 



