CANADA GOOSE. 261 



blazing away from the ambuscade at the noble 

 ducks of the Chesapeake ; or lying in the Sus- 

 quehanna, with Port Deposit and its heights in 

 sight, listening to the lip-lap of the slight surge 

 at our ears or, perhaps, watching the curious 

 little water- witch,* as she suddenly emerged 

 among the stools, swimming warily round and 

 round the battery, as if sent out on a reconnoi- 

 tering excursion from a rank of canvass-backs, 

 which rode the ripples at a distance off Mount 

 Ararat ;f but for all this, we shall never know 

 again the supreme delight with which we bent 

 to our oars among the drifting masses of ice and 

 snow, and listened to the " bald, disjointed chat" 

 of the paddler, on some sunny, mid-winter's 

 morn; or suspended stroke as his experienced 

 eye caught some dark object on the ice, which 

 the glass revealed to be a flock of sprig-tails 

 basking in the sun ; or examined the guns, and 

 laid us down to drift on in silent expectancy 

 only broken by the wary whispers of our com- 

 panion the caw of some hungry crow, or the 

 thump of a passing cake on the skiff's bow ; or 

 started up at his signal to deal death and con- 

 sternation among the affrighted objects of our 



* Pied-bill Dob-chick Podiceps Carolinensis. 

 f A height so called near Port Deposit. 



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