1890
May 25
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Mass           
Pout Pond Swamp                
Clear and warm with, however, the E wind which has been
so unusual [?] of late.
  To the swamps with Spelman at 10 a.m. driving 
up in a coup and returning the same way at 1 P.M.
  Although all the conditions seemed favourable it
proved a poor day for birds and we saw or
heard but few. On searching the swamp we took 
the usual stand at the ditch and spent the 
forenoon there watching for the Gallinules but
only one appeared and he swam directly accross
under cover of the bushes on the island. We
heard them call only three times in all. On
the way back heard a Gallinule call over in the
bog east of the causeway.
  Our ill success was doubtless due partly to the 
appearance of a boy and two men who stayed
with us most of the morning talking and moving
about. One of the men has lived on the edge of 
this swamp for three years. He has a large poultry
yard on the hill west of the pond. He told me
that [he] has seen broods of young Wood Ducks in the
swamp both of the past two summers. Last year
there was a brood of young Blue-winged Teal there.
They associated with his tarn ducks and came
ashore to be fed with them. He impressed me as
being a truthful person and he was certainly 
unusually intelligent and observing. He sees an
occasional mink in the swamp and there are
innumerable musk rats. Of the latter over 300 were
caught by two trappers of his acquaintance last autumn
and winter. His son, a boy of seven of* [or] eight years of age, 
[margin]Ducks breeding in Pout Pond[/margin].