OF SHOOTING AND FISHING 73 
no delay. After breakfast next day, we started,— 
Y. going again to Klondyke—which was a long way 
off—and myself to a new overflow further down. 
As we were not so early, there was some light, so 
I placed my gun within reach and before going 
very far, saw a flock of ducks coming down the 
river. They were up to me at once, but I fired 
both barrels after them and brought down a couple, 
which proved to be red-breasted mergansers, or 
as they are locally called, ‘‘saw bills,’’? and of no 
use. Half a mile farther down, the Davis house 
was passed on the left bank. Davis was one of 
the best shots among the professionals on the 
swamps, and in the habit of killing thousands of 
birds every season, for the market. Just opposite 
the house a bufflehead dropped to my gun and 
every few minutes afterwards something came up, 
giving me a shot,-so that I had several redheads 
added to my collection by the time an overflow go- 
ing to the west was reached. 
The boat now passed between low mud-banks 
upon which hundreds of avocets and stilts were 
walking, but as the water rapidly became shallow 
and as the mud had a fair mixture of sand in it, 
I had hard work getting out. Several large flocks 
of glossy ibis passed close and some egrets, but the 
boat and the mud kept me too well employed to 
pay any attention tothem. A great stretch of shal- 
low water lay to the west and about a mile to the 
south the tuleys could be seen. I rowed to these, 
and finding a suitable point, pushed the punt into 
it and arranged some willows as a screen. 
