36 NOTES ON NEW ENGLAND BIRDS 



clipping wings, over field and forest, meadow and flood ; 

 now here, and you hear the whistling of their wings, 

 and in a moment they are lost in the horizon. Like swift 

 propellers of the air. Whichever way they are headed, 

 that way their wings propel them. What health and 

 vigor they suggest ! The life of man seems slow and 

 puny in comparison, — reptilian. 



[See also under Herring Gull, p. 15 ; Wild Ducks, 

 pp. 50, 51 ; General and Miscellaneous, p. 423.] 



BLACK DUCK; DUSKY DUCK 



April 1, 1853. Saw ten black ducks at Clamshell. 

 Had already started two, who probably occupied an 

 outpost. They all went off with a loud and disagreeable 

 quacking like ducks in a poultry-yard, their wings ap- 

 pearing lighter beneath. 



March 21, 1854. At sunrise to Clamshell Hill. 



River skimmed over at Willow Bay last night. 

 Thought I should find ducks cornered up by the ice ; they 

 get behind this hill for shelter. Saw what looked like 

 clods of plowed meadow rising above the ice. Looked 

 with glass and found it to be more than thirty black 

 ducks asleep with their heads in their backs, motion- 

 less, and thin ice formed about them. Soon one or two 

 were moving about slowly. There was an open space, eight 

 or ten rods by one or two. At first all within a space of 

 apparently less than a rod in diameter. It was 6.30 

 A. M., and the sun shining on them, but bitter cold. How 

 tough they are ! I crawled far on my stomach and got 

 a near view of them, thirty rods off. At length they de- 

 tected me and quacked. Some got out upon the ice, and 



