CHAPTER X 
WILD-GEESE IN SPAIN 
THEIR SPECIES, HAUNTS, AND HABITS 
To Spain, as to other lands that remain unaltered and “ unim- 
proved,” resort the greylag geese in thousands to pass the winter. 
‘In our marismas of the Guadalquivir they appear during 
the last days of September, but it is a month later ere their 
full numbers are made up, and from that date until the end 
of February their defiant multitudes and the splendid diffi- 
culties of their pursuit afford a unique form and degree of wild 
sport perhaps unknown outside of Spain. 
Ride through the marisma in November; it is mostly dry, 
and autumn rains have merely refreshed the sun-baked alluvia and 
formed sporadic shallows, or luczos as they are here termed. That 
lucio straight ahead is a mile across, yet it is literally tessellated 
with a sonorous crowd. With binoculars one distinguishes 
similar scenes beyond; the intervening space—and indeed the 
whole marisma—is crowded with geese as thickly as it is on 
our immediate front. To right and left rise fresh armies hitherto 
concealed among the armayo, till the very earth seems in process 
of upheaval, while the air resounds with a volume of voices— 
gabblings, croaks, and shrill bi-tones mingled with the rumble of 
beating wings. 
Amid the islands of the Norwegian Skaargaard one can see 
geese in bulk, but there their numbers are distributed over a 
thousand miles of coast. Here we have them all—or a large 
proportion—concentrated in what is by comparison but a narrow 
space. 
In their life-habits these geese are strictly diurnal, that is, 
they feed by day—chiefly in the early morning and again towards 
afternoon, with a mid-day interval of rest. The night they spend 
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