A TASTE OF MAINE BIRCH 107 



party a breech- loading rifle, which weapon is per- 

 haps an appreciable moment of time quicker than 

 the ordinary muzzle-loader, and this the poor loon 

 could not or did not dodge. He had not timed 

 himself to that species of firearms, and when, with 

 his fellow, he swam about within rifle range of our 

 camp, letting ofl" volleys of his wild, ironical ha-ha, 

 he little suspected the dangerous gun that was 

 matched against him. As the rifle cracked, both 

 loons made the gesture of diving, but only one of 

 them disappeared beneath the water; and when he 

 came to the surface in a few moments, a hundred 

 or more yards away, and saw his companion did 

 not follow, but was floating on the water where he 

 had last seen him, he took the alarm and sped away 

 in the distance. The bird I had killed was a mag- 

 nificent specimen, and I looked him over with great 

 interest. His glossy checkered coat, his banded 

 neck, his snow-white breast, his powerful lance- 

 shaped beak, his red eyes, his black, thin, slender, 

 marvelously delicate feet and legs, issuing from his 

 muscular thighs, and looking as if they had never 

 touched the ground, his strong wings well forward, 

 while his legs were quite at the apex, and the neat, 

 elegant model of the entire bird, speed and quick- 

 ness and strength stamped upon every feature, — 

 all delighted and lingered in the eye. The loon 

 appears like anything but a silly bird, unless you 

 see him in some collection, or in the shop of the 

 taxidermist, where he usually looks very tame and 

 goose-like. Nature never meant the loon to stand 



