234 KRIDER'S SPORTING ANECDOTES. 



heads, black-heads, and a few hald-pates, inter- 

 mingled with the nobler variety. The outside 

 duck at the tail of the rank was a veteran can- 

 vass-back, facetiously called the toller. 



The rank being now complete and made to 

 mimic life to admiration by the action of the 

 ripples, as each duck rode knowingly to its 

 anchor, and the frame in which the box was 

 set flush with the water's edge, yet preserved 

 from filling by the floating wings fore and aft, 

 and at the sides, of course, the box being deep 

 enough to receive the body of a man laid at 

 length, must be sunk some eighteen inches be- 

 low the surface, and the shooter 'himself, in his 

 watery ambuscade, perfectly invisible to the 

 passing ducks, except from the air immediately 

 over his head. The water being moderately 

 smooth, the guards were then turned down flat 

 with the deck, and while the boats pulled back 

 to the scow, which immediately lifted her an- 

 chor, the shooter loaded his three guns, and 

 placing them in the box with their muzzles rest- 

 ing on its edge, took a last look at his decoys ; 

 then observing daylight breaking in the east, he 

 laid himself flat on his back on the board, and 

 shut out from every object and every sound, save 

 the pale, dull sky and the slight, rippling plash 



