SUPPER. 263 



great northern rivers, and there it lived on seed and 

 succulent grasses, and when it made its first migration 

 southward, it stopped at the wild rice fields that fringe 

 the shores of the big lakes, at Sodus, on Sandusky Bay, 

 the Thousand Islands, or the morasses of the Calumet 

 River, in Indiana, and then for a day or so at the celery 

 beds of the Chesapeake and Delaware, and then on the 

 rice-fields of the Carolina or Georgia planter. It is so con- 

 ditioned that its breast is flat, and its back is white with 

 underlying fat, and by the color of its feet you can say it 

 is its first winter out. Treat such a duck gently, cook him 

 as you would roast an apple, and with no more sauce, and 

 when he is done, not crisped like a roast pig, but gently 

 done, bear him away from the fire tenderly as you would 

 a baby, carry him lovingly as the Doctor carried the two 

 that we had cooked, and flank him with nothinjr dis- 

 cordant and gross, but with some game bird, and nothing 

 better than an English snipe, and then thank the Lord 

 who giveth us our meat in due season, for never since 

 man had dominion over the fowls of the air has there 

 been cooked a daintier dish. 



Two ducks and five snipe would probably be to five 

 persons the same inconvenient animal that a goose is said 

 to be to one — too much for that one, and not enough for 

 two ; but then when the day has been spent in hunting 

 in the open air, it is another matter — so we j)ronounced 

 the ducks the best ever killed in Florida, and ate them 

 all. 



" But what of the omelette ?" I hear you ask. 



