THE SCAUP-DUCKS 189 



gunner, to the best stand for the morning's shooting. 

 As we went out on the bay we heard the thump, 

 thump of an oar far away in the darkness, and my 

 bayman said : " That's Lane going out — ahead of us. 

 Perhaps he is rigged for geese," he added. Lane had 

 a flock of live decoys. We, too, used our oar to aid 

 the sail. Just before daybreak we reached the place 

 determined upon, and found it unoccupied. The bat- 

 tery was placed in the water, the decoys were arranged 

 about it within close range, and my gunner sailed 

 away to leave me lying below the surface of the bay in 

 the box with its wide rim floating on the water. As 

 the first light came in the east I could see the ducks, 

 mostly scaups and red-heads, flying swiftly across the 

 dim gray light. Soon there was a rush of wings quite 

 close to my head as a flock of black-heads swung in 

 to the decoys. Sitting up I fired two barrels at the 

 shadowy forms, but nothing struck the water, and the 

 noisy whistling of wings was soon lost in the darkness. 



As the sun came up the ducks came rapidly, some- 

 times one or two, more often a flock. I shot at every 

 one, with but poor success. The cramped position, 

 the hasty shot from a sitting position, were new to me 

 and strange, and it was some time before I began to 

 kill the ducks. 



A single bird coming head on was about to settle to 

 the decoys, when I fired at him at close range, and he 

 struck the water dead. Shortly afterward I made a 

 double from a flock, and with growing confidence my 

 shooting improved. I soon had a goodly lot of scaups 

 showing black and white upon the waves as they 

 drifted with the breeze! Meanwhile the bayman, who 



