Concord, Mass.
1899
April 8
(No. 2)
  Between 1 and 3 P.M. Ducks were passing and repassing
Ball's Hill every few minutes in flocks of from five or six
to fifteen or twenty birds each. Most of them were Golden-eyes.
I could hear the silvery whistle of their wings with perfect
distinctness as I sat writing in the cabin with the door open.
They flew at a considerable height as a rule. The gunners 
were stirring them up as I learned a little later when
the Jones boys called and when Richardson & Hubert Holden
passed. The Joneses showed me a fine adult [male] Goosander
which they had just shot. They have a grass screen 
which they attach to the bows [sic] of their little canvas
canoe. They reported seeing a flock of eight birds which
they took to be Brant, in the river near Birch Island.
They paddled within about 80 yards when the birds
rose with a chorus of low honks. They had black heads
& necks and brown backs and were too small for
Canada Geese. Young Richardson afterwards told me
that the flock passed directly over him and that
he called them Black Ducks! Gilbert saw two Black 
Ducks pass the cabin and a flock of eleven Herring Gulls
below Davis's Hill. As I am writing this a pair of 
Gulls are circling over the river very near the cabin
making the air ring with their wild, shrill cries
(cle-ire, cle-ire, cle-ire). Altogether this has been
a great week for water fowl on the Concord. I
do not think I have seen as many there for the
past twenty years. Richardson tells me that he
came upon a flock of over fifty Goosanders this
morning below Carlisle Bridge. I must have
seen fully fifty Whistlers passing Ball's Hill. If
only the gunners would leave the Ducks and Muskrats alone.
[margin]Water-fowl.[/margin]
[margin]Whistlers.[/margin]
[margin]Geese?[/margin]
[margin]Herring Gulls[/margin]
[margin]Goosanders[/margin]
38