144 



RECREA Tl 'ON. 



THE BLIND. 



by a cord twenty-five to thirty feet long. 

 He is generally one who has been shot 

 at and has been unfortunate enough to 

 receive wounds ; just sufficient to 

 prevent his escape. He is eagerly siezed 

 upon by the hunters, carefully nursed 

 until his wounds have healed, and then 

 taught to perform the treacherous task 

 of luring his companions to their de- 

 struction, which he does with ap- 

 parent relish. He seems to enjoy 

 seeing the same wounds inflicted on 

 others, from which he once suffered 

 himself. Food is placed on the bottom, 

 near where the decoy is stationed and 

 as the water is shallow, the geese can 

 reach it by thrusting their long necks 

 into the water. 



The sportsmen sit silently and pa- 

 tiently in the blind, guns in hand. 

 Occasionally one of them rises up and 

 looks cautiously over the tops of the 

 cedar boughs at the decoy, which, dur- 

 ing a greater part of his time, sits 

 motionless on the water beyond. 



Suddenly a sound breaks the stillness, 

 that brings every man to his feet in an 

 instant. It is the call of the decoy. 

 " Houk, houk, houk," he says. Every 

 ear is strained to catch the answer to the 

 call, but none is heard save the echo to 

 that strange cry, reverberating back and 

 forth between the adjacent hills. 



There is a silence of a few minutes, 

 and again the call breaks forth, '* houk, 

 houk, houk." 



Again the shooters listen to catch the 

 answer, and this time, from far in the 

 distance, comes an answering call. 



The geese are coming ! Every shooter 

 runs his eye over his gun, and again re- 

 sumes his watch. 



The decoy begins to get excited ; 

 louder and more frequent become his 

 calls ; he moves about in an excited 

 manner, now and then stopping to lift 

 his black head high above the water, as 

 if to get a better view of his surround- 

 ings. The calls of the approaching 

 flock are distinctly heard, becoming 

 gradually louder and louder, until sud- 

 denly, from beyond a distant point of 

 land, the flock bursts into view, coming 

 like the wind. 



Straight overhead they fly ; there is a 

 flash of white, a moment's glimpse of 

 their shining black heads, enormous 

 wings, working with lightning-like rapid- 

 ity, and — they are gone, far in the dis- 

 tance ! When almost disappearing on 

 the horizon they turn, make a deep 

 semicircle, and back they come again. 



Now the decoy works in earnest. His 

 former efforts were mere play com- 

 pared to his present ones. He calls 

 loudly and rapidly, at the top of his 



