DECOYS FOR WILD F()^yL. 207 



The Pernambuco gander, for it was not a goose, 

 attaclied himself to me, and after a time became 

 perfectly tame ; and the gander held me in high 

 repute as the only creature that could talk to him, 

 by imitating his call, among the ducks with wdiom 

 he was associated. This bird lived with me about 

 nine or ten years, and then died. While speaking 

 of the attachment of a gander, my foes cannot 

 call him ^^a goose for his pains"; but I wish 

 some of the featherless bipeds of my acquaintance 

 would obtain ganders and geese of that kind, for 

 fowl capable of greater domestication I never saw. 



The round pond, after being thus dealt with, 

 was enlarged, and now it is the key to the whole 

 decoy. Never shot in, and never disturbed, and, 

 since the Franco-Prussian war, for my amuse- 

 ment, and to the muttered consternation of the 

 ignorant boors, and in an ornithological attempt 

 to glorify the greatest nation now known, I have 

 taught the throng of birds in that pond, whenever 

 I call on them from a distance to do so, to give 

 " three cheers for the Prussians." They never fail 

 to reply, and the shrill Avhistle of the Pernambuco 

 gander used to lead them all, like a toast-master 

 calling on a company ^^to charge tlieir glasses." 



