308 Sport and Life in the Further Himalaya 



fidelity waited till we were quite close before 

 they, too, would stride along the surface of the 

 water, to lift themselves with laboured flaps into 

 the air and add their shrill, rasping cries to the 

 clamour. The duck, in the meantime, would have 

 been getting up on all sides with lesser roars, as 

 the sound of small-arm firing to that of heavy guns, 

 and would be flying swiftly to and fro over the 

 lake to find less disturbed corners. Here, while 

 the air is full of myriads of flying forms and re- 

 sounds with the music of reedy Indian lake-lands, 

 let the curtain fall over our canvas canoe. 



