234 THE BIG BLOW. 
looking figures—till he arrived at a stretch of 
marine grass. 
There were green-necked wild-duck here, 
and prettily pencilled wigeon, teal with green 
spectacles tied with gold ribbon, spidery curlew 
with beaks like inverted scythes, and little 
white-waistcoated ringed plover dotted all 
over the scenery. 
One rook dived down suddenly, and began 
to hammer at something that flapped among 
the grass; another party of four rooks dis- 
covered something else, which also flopped 
and quacked, in a deep gully; and our old 
friend himself was just in time to spot a red- 
shank vanishing under some hung-up sea- 
weed, and to haul him out again. They were 
wounded birds, all of them. Some one had 
been shooting in those parts, and these luck- 
less ones, that flapped so helplessly when they 
were caught slinking shyly into hiding-places, 
were what one might term the ‘ missing.’ 
After our old rook had dealt with his cap- 
ture, he rose once more, and was volplaning 
down to settle upon another part of the mud, 
when two things happened at once. One was 
a bitter wind from the north, which caught 
him that moment sideways, and canted him 
half-over. The other was a hissing noise close 
in the air above him. 
