66 WILD FOWL SHOOTING. 



Do so, and listen. A flame shoots from the muzzle. 

 The noise startles you. Well it may, for it is like a 

 cannon between these bluffs. Loud thunder seems tame 

 compared with that report. And now, mark how it 

 bowls along the side of yon bluff, appearing to gather 

 renewed force as it travels ; echoing and re-echoing un- 

 til you feel that your gun has set the whole world in 

 commotion ; that a fierce storm is raging on the bluff 

 sides and in the ravines. You listen for the sighing of 

 the wind, the gentle patter of the rain falling on the 

 water, but the bright stars shining down on us dispel 

 the illusion. Wonderful, isn't it ? Yes, it is. I have heard 

 this same effect scores and scores of times, and I never 

 pass these bluffs at night without setting them off, loving 

 to hear their angry, growling mutterings. On your right 

 the city of Lyons is drowsily nestling amid her hills and 

 valleys, brilliant in her electric light, the tall chimneys 

 of the mills reaching toward the skies. Those deep red 

 lights are on her piers and rafts, warnings of danger to 

 the mariner. The green and red hang from the extreme 

 heights of a steamer, snugly lying at her dock. The 

 blinking lights just opposite are at Fulton, a pictur- 

 esque little town at the foot of rolling hills, where, in 

 day, or moonlight nights, milk white monuments show 

 up clearly in her cemetery on the hillside, thoughtful 

 remembrances of the departed dead. 



One more mile and we are home. Our game I count- 

 ed, just after you killed the goose, 65 mallards, 5 red- 

 heads, 6 blue-bills, one canvas-back, and one goose, a 

 splendid lot, but not unusual. 



We are now in one of the widest places in the upper 

 Mississippi River. A perfect sea of water encompasses 

 us on every side, and yet it is not deep here. Push 



