HUNTING BIRDS WITH A CAMERA 



195 



footing seemed safe, 

 for I did not sink in 

 above my shoes. One 

 needed a pair of snow- 

 shoes to walk on the 

 surface. 



By throwing myself 

 forward and gather- 

 ing under me an arm- 

 ful of buoyant tules, I 

 made my way for 20 

 feet, with the excited 

 pair of Rails leading 

 me on. Suddenly I 

 struck a weak place in 

 the tule floor and I 

 dropped into the muck 

 beyond my middle. 

 With the aid of an oar 

 that was thrown to 

 me, I struggled back 

 to the boat. 



We were now in 

 danger of losing our 

 way. A little farther 

 on I left my handker- 

 chief on top of a 

 bunch of tules for a 

 signpost. Still farther 

 I stuck up a pole to 

 mark our way back. 



"W'e'll pick these 

 up on our return," I 

 said. 



We swung around a 

 tule island, working 

 back in the direction 

 from which we had 

 come. 



"I am beginning to 

 lose my bearings," said 

 my companion. I had already lost mine. 



My first trip to Boston, that took me 

 underground, overground, and up and 

 down crooked streets, was as clear as 

 wandering do\\n a country lane in com- 

 parison to the embarrassment I felt when 

 I tried to find my way in the narrow, 

 walled-in, Venetian streets that circled 

 these islands like a maze for about 10 

 miles east and west. 



"The thing to do is to go back over the 

 same track we came," I ventured. So we 

 immediately turned about and spent the 

 rest of the afternoon in trying to do it; 

 but we never saw the handkerchief or the 

 pole again. 



© 1905 William I,. Finley and II. T. 



rut TUFTED PUFFIN, OR SFA PARROT 



He has developed a powerful bill in feeding on shellfish. His face 

 looks like the prow of a battleship. If you get too close, he will take 

 your finger as quickly as he takes a fish (see text, page 181). 



We had no food, nothing to drink but 

 alkali water, and were wet, with no chance 

 of getting dry; we had to find our way 

 out. The sun was setting, so we knew 

 east from west. We paddled as nearly 

 as possible in the direction in which we 

 had come. When at last we reached the 

 end of a blind channel, where the tules 

 seemed firmer, we decided to cut for shore 

 by the shortest route. We floundered 

 through the tules, sinking in the black 

 muck of the marsh for some distance, 

 and were suddenly confronted by a deep 



slough. 



"Even the old tub of a boat looks better 

 than this," said my companion. 



