CHAPTER XII 



SOME RECORDS IN SPANISH WILDFOWLING 



El Travierso, February 9, 1901. — An hour before dawn we 

 (five guns) lay echeloned obliquely across a mile of water, the 

 writer's position being the 



r ■ 





'"*^if 



second out. No. 1 squatted 

 (in six inches of water) 

 between me and the shore ; 

 but, being dissatisfied, moved 

 elsewhere shortly after day- 

 break, leaving with me two 

 geese and about a dozen 

 ducks. These, with thirty- 

 six of my own, I set out as 

 decoys. Shortly thereafter 



f heard the gaggle of geese, and two, coming from behind, were 

 already so near that there was only time to change one cartridge 

 to big shot. The geese passed abeam, quite low and within 

 thirty yards, but six feet apart — impossible to get them both. 

 Held on ; upon seeing that the decoys were a fraud, the geese 



spun up vertically, and 

 that one cartridge 

 secured both. The in- 

 (^ident gives opportun- 

 ity to introduce two 

 rough sketches pen- 

 cilled down at the 

 moment. During this 

 (lay there were recur- 

 rent periods when for 

 ten or fifteen minutes ducks fiew extremely fast and well — 

 revoluciones, our keepers term these sporadic intermittent 



133 



