THE OREGON SPORTSMAN 95 
shells, shells. He’d used over four hundred and was loading again. 
He proudly pointed to eight mud hens, the result of his great fusillade. 
But he was enjoying himself immensely. 
I led Harry away from this scene of slaughter, and Houston, who 
had shot his limit, joined us and we all retired to the houseboat. It 
was then only 10 o’clock and Hamblet alone was short of the limit, 
but then he had slain eight mud hens, which was a pretty fair record 
itself. 
It was raining hard, and the house seemed very comfortable after 
the long morning on the willow bottoms, but Hamblet decided that he 
and I should go and get the decoy ducks. Those tamed mallards, 
picketed with little collars about their necks, impressed Hamblet 
deeply. Nothing would do for it but that out into the rain we must 
go and turn loose the decoys so that they could get under the shelter 
of the barn roof. 
I pretended that I didn’t know where the decoys were, and 
Hamblet bravely started out to show me. He started out in the right 
general direction, but he soon lost the trail, and before long we were 
deep in the thicket, at least a mile beyond the covers. 
When we had gone far enough so I knew there was no hope of 
Hamblet’s knowing where we were I stopped and looked around. 
“Well, Harry,” I said, “Don’t you think we’ve come far enough? 
He said he thought we’d come a lot too far. 
I asked him why he didn’t say so before and he stood, first on 
one foot and then on the other, and didn’t answer. 
“Well,” I said, “Then let’s go home!” 
He took a wrong turn into the thicket, and away we went again. 
After we had gone about a mile he stopped and asked me for my 
knife. 
“Knife!” I ejaculated, “What do you want of my knife?” 
“We'll have to cut some willows to lie on; we’re lost!” he 
explained. 
“If we’re lost, we’re lost and that’s all there is to it. We stand 
up all night and we won’t get the rheumatism.” He didn’t say anything 
to that, but after a bit he asked me for a match. 
“A match! What in the world do you want of a match?” I 
asked him. 
“We might start a fire and keep warm,” he suggested. 
“Start a fire! Why, man, are you crazy? How are you going to 
start a fire when it’s raining like this, and only green willow for 
wood.”’ 
We were silent for awhile, and then Hamblet conceived the idea 
that we might find out where we were by the direction the ducks 
were flying. I pretended to grow very angry and pointed out that they 
were flying in all directions. ‘“We’re lost,’ I told him. “So don’t keep 
on telling me about it; I know we’re lost.” “Well, Frank, Ill stay 
with you anyway,” he assured me. 
“Wine!” I said; “You’re lost, too, so you've got to stay with me.” 
After we’d stayed there about an hour and I thought the joke 
had gone far enough, I took a swing through the thicket and swung 
around so as to bring us out into the clearing at the edge of which 
Hamblet had been shooting, 
