continued to poke at her with the gun they are able to fly, seek grassy lakes, 

 as she fluttered about my feet, but she seeming to feel much safer in the shel- 

 always managed to elude my strokes un- ter of such retreats. However, as soon 

 til just as the last of her brood climbed as they are able to fly, they seek the 

 out of the water, she slyly edged away river banks and other open places which 

 and suddenly flew off to another pond are the favorite resorts of their adult 

 some distance. I then ran as quickly as relatives. Colonel N. S/ Goss likens 

 possible to the point where the ducks their notes to the sound of "a sort of 

 left the water, yet, though but a few whew, whew, whew, uttered while feed- 

 moments had elapsed, the young had ing and swimming." This he says "en- 

 concealed themselves so thoroughly that, ables the hunter to locate them in the 

 in spite of the fact that the grass was thickest growth of water plants; and 

 only three or four inches high and when in the air the whistling noise made 

 rather sparse, I spent half an hour in by their wings heralds their approach." 

 fruitless search." The young, before 



* 



THE WILD DUCKS OF MARYLAND 



Q^u^'lu I adventurous Capt. John through the fragrant pines, and no 



bmith, the founder of the first English doubt the brave hearts aboard sighed in 



colony m America came in the year return. Wherever the sailors looked, on 



1005 it was the Chesapeake, signifying sea, or land, no sign of human habitation 



in the^^ Indian language, "mother of met their anxious gaze. No white sailed 



^ A^r^^^i-^^^^^"^^^ ^^^ ^^^^^ ^^y' ^^"^^ came flying like a winged crea- 

 ager. With his usual energy, this brave ture to meet them ; no white walled cot- 

 man explored all its tributaries, even a tage shone out from the green shore 

 little river, some fifty miles long, whose line, denoting the warm hearth stone, 

 ^Tfu ^r^^' uniting with it, form a part and the pleasant home. Only wild 

 ?. }f '^^{'. ^°^^ ^^" "^^^^s from the bay beasts gave an occasional glimpse of the 

 itselt. Ihis river, once a famous place teeming animal life that swarmed in the 

 tor wild ducks, he called Willobyre, on forests ; herds of deer glanced out of the 

 a quaint and remarkably correct map. woodlands, then vanished; wolves and 

 15yre, means in old English, "dwelling," bears prowled the shores for food; ot- 

 and^as grand old willows grow all along ters, muskrats and raccoons scampered 

 Its banks, it may be that the name is into holes in the banks. 

 for-^"Willow dwelling," or "Where But the birds seemed to welcome 

 dwelleth the willows." them, the beautiful, friendly birds, and 

 Verrozzano in a French ship in 1524, where they are, is beauty, and life, and 

 sailed up the coast, and seeing the great joy. Gulls followed the ship, darting 

 Chesapeake, believed it to be the Pacific through the rigging, encircling about 

 ocean, but he did not venture to explore, on untiring, and joyous wings; the great 

 bmith in his diary says, "Our barge was blue heron, the common heron, egret, 

 ot about two tons, and had in it but bittern, plover, and snipe wading in the 

 twelve men to perform this discovery." lowlands, looked on in innocent wonder; 

 One can picture the little boat feeling innumerable flocks of ducks scarcely 

 her uncertain way into unknown waters, turned aside ; vast armies of reed birds, 

 by unexplored forests, passing lonelv rails and blackbirds almost darkened the 

 marshes, and silent shores. Tne blue sky as they flew about, 

 waves danced in the sunshine ; the stars This was about three hundred years 

 shining down in the night were the only ago, and of all this bountiful animal an^? 

 familiar objects; the wind sighed bird life, there is only left in any num^ 



60 



