1888
(Dec. 16)
the water but the strong wind soon brought it ashore.
  As I lay in this ambush it was interesting to watch
the Ducks diving off shore. In one flock there must
have been fully two hundred Whistlers and small
bunches of Whistlers and little groups of Old Squaers
flecked the water in every directioon. Some of the latter
came within seventy yards or less of me.
  On my way back to the house I flushed a Passuculus
princeps from the crest of a ridge covered sparingly
with beach grass and Hudsonia. It flew over the
crest of an adjoining ridge and I failed to start it
again although I searched long and closely for it.
  In the afternoon we tried the Duck boxes again.
There were large openings in the ice to-day and about
one of them fully two hundred Black Ducks sat huddled
together. Four others were standing well out in
the marsh. The latter allowed us to drive past them
and slipping out I crept to the crest of a knoll and
fired a shot at them from C's 8 guage single barrel
at about 150 yards range. All four went off, however, as
did the big flock on the ice. We then took to the
boxes and spent two fruitless and very stupid hours
without getting a shot.
  Late in P.M. we crossed the marsh to the beach
ridge C. killing a Killdeer Plover by the way. On
the ridge we concealedf ourselves in some open boxes and
watched the bay side for an expected evening flight
of Whistlers. Four flocks passed us, two out of range,
one nearly over my stand but very high, one over C.
I missed my flock with both barrels. C. killed one bird from
his flock dropping it with the 8 gauge at about 80 yds. It was
a [female]. The floclk that passed over me was comprised wholly of adult males.
(We returned to Boston by the 7 a.m. train on the 17th.)