208 Life and Immortality. 



plumage. So intent, however, was the mother-bird upon the 

 faithful discharge of her home-duties, that she heeded not the 

 stately sloop, then nearly completed, as it lay upon the 

 stocks close-by, with its hull looming up within twelve feet 

 of her home, darkened with the presence, and reverberating 

 with the noise of workmen, but continued to pass in and out 

 as though utterly unconscious of the so near approach of 

 danger. Audubon claims that the male deserts the female 

 when the period of sitting commences, and joins his sterner 

 brethren, who unite into flocks of considerable numbers, and 

 keep apart from their partners until the young are fully ma- 

 tured, when young and old of both sexes come together, and 

 thus remain until the return of another breeding-season. 



The female, it is evident from what has just been said, 

 assumes the entire charge of incubation. For more than 

 twenty-one days she is thus busied, with nothing, it would 

 seem, to relieve the monotony of her task. How often she 

 despairs and bewails the hardship of her lot, none can know. 

 It is the inexorable decree of fate that she should perform 

 the duties alone and unassisted, and most willingly she sub- 

 mits. But the ennui of the labor is, in a measure, forgotten 

 in the vision that hope holds out to her patience, for her per- 

 sistent assiduity is ultimately rewarded by a whole nest-full 

 of happy ducklings. While the hatching process is going 

 on the patient housewife only leaves the nest when pressed 

 by the pangs of hunger, and but for a short time. Before 

 leaving, however, she takes the precaution to see that her 

 creamy-white, elliptical treasures, to the number of ten or 

 thirteen eggs, are carefully covered with down. 



Like the young of our domesticated species, the little 

 Wood Ducks follow the mother almost as soon as they are 

 hatched, and gather whatever of vegetable and insect food 

 they happen to encounter. They are passionately fond of 

 the water, and best show their real character when gracefully 

 floating upon its glassy bosom, or diving into its azure 

 depths. At an early age they respond to the parent's call 



