150 WILD LIFE AND THE CAMERA 



photograph it, owing to the intervening brush. 

 No words can express my disappointment, for prob- 

 ably never again shall I have another opportunity 

 to photograph a goose at such a close range. 



I was mentally cursing my luck when Dame 

 Fortune smiled on me, and I forgave her the trick 

 she had just played. A pair of mallard drakes flew 

 past, stooping to the decoys, then rising again, 

 and after whirling around three times they finally 

 dropped just beyond the decoys, perhaps fifty feet 

 away. They were suspicious, and after sitting 

 still for a few moments began swimming away. I 

 quickly whispered to the guide, who had awakened, 

 telling him to make a sudden noise, while I trained 

 the camera on them. Up they flew, and I pressed 

 the button just in time to secure the photograph 

 shown in the frontispiece by far the most satis- 

 factory duck photograph I had ever made. 



All that day and for nearly a week I worked 

 hard at sitting still in a blind, but for some reason 

 the ducks were not flying, except in the late even- 

 ing, so I had no luck at all. Occasionally, to vary 

 the monotony, we would take a trip across the lake, 

 in the middle of which the geese were gathered in 

 large flocks. By bearing down on them with a 

 fresh breeze we sometimes were able to approach 

 within about 150 yards, and as the birds had to 

 rise against the wind they were compelled to come 

 toward us. In this way I secured some fairly satis- 

 factory shots at reasonable distances. 



Not having enough material in the way of illus- 

 trations to complete this article, I next decided to 

 try a trip to Montauk Point, Long Island, where 



