THE AMERICAN EIDER 375 



trappings jar discordantly on the silence as 

 they are tumbled into the boat. At last we are 

 off and are soon right willing to stand our trick 

 at the oars, pulling away with a good will, for 

 the air is pitilessly cold, and the black-looking 

 mass where we hope for our morning's sport 

 rises out of the sea a good four miles away. 

 After a long pull with oar blades made heavy 

 with their coating of ice, we find ourselves on the 

 barren, wave-washed ledge. The decoys are 

 quickly set and are soon floating in a life-like 

 bunch before a natural blind in the rocks. You 

 have come a long distance in the chill air of the 

 night and though half frozen with the winter's 

 breath are yet ready to brave rheumatism or 

 risk pneumonia in the pursuit of your game. 

 If so you are made of the stuff that succeeds 

 and deserve success. 



On every hand strange and fantastic shapes 

 loom up like ghosts, — the work of dashing spray 

 and the north wind. The rocks are clad in icy 

 armor and every salt stream trickling down 

 from the pools above marks its course with sil- 

 ver tracery. Long icicles hang pendant from 

 the beetling cliffs which overtop the waves, and 

 over all the moon throws a weird and fairy 



