224 SPRING DUCK SHOOTING. 



exist. Soon the ducks began to fly, and then such sport as we had. 

 The king eider came first, then the common eider ; the former is 

 called the passing, the latter the laying, duck. The birds at first 

 fly in large flocks, often thousands in a flock, and generally the dif- 

 ferent species do not mingle. They have a certain course which 

 they pursue, and the shoals over which they fly are called the 

 "gunning points." Here the men and boys congregate, and, lying 

 low, behind some rock or cake of ice, await the flight. Some days 

 the birds fly thickly, others rarely any pass. The people see them 

 at a great distance, and often hear the beating of their wings before 

 they see them. The birds fly over or along the side of the station, 

 and the minute the head of the flock has passed the first or head 

 gunner, he rises or turns and fires when all hands do likewise, and 

 the slaughter begins. Often twenty or thirty birds are thus knocked 

 down by a party of two or three persons with double barrel guns. 



My first spring ducking was in the afternoon of Tuesday, the 1 2th 

 of April, when several of us drew one of the small, flat boats over 

 the ice to the clear water beyond, and, launching it, started for the 

 gunning point. We brought home a good bagful of birds that 

 night, and you may be sure that they were well served, and well 

 disposed of the next day. 



After a few days' work the house was prepared both outside and 

 inside for our comfortable abode. A coat of blubber — or the 

 remains of the livers of the codfish, after the oil has been boiled 

 and tried out of them — as a final touch was put on to the roof 

 with an old broom, and the whole declared to be water-tight, as a 

 hard rain soon proved it to be. We were now comfortably settled, 

 and viewed with satisfaction the progress made each day in the de- 

 struction of the bay ice, and the lessening of the snow on the hills 

 beyond and the ground about the island, by the rays of the sun 

 which gained strength each day as the season advanced. 



The men now turned their attention to the boats, and began 

 repairing them for immediate use when the ice should break up 

 enough to enable them to be launched. 



Monday the i8th. I visited the Indians this afternoon, and 



