-538 
October, 1920 
FOREST AND STREAM 
drake mallard decoyed beautifully and 
sTo? nft ded w the score ’ and 80 the y came > 
lOt attei shot, m quick succession. I had 
a rubber cap with me to keep over my 
gun locks, but the rain beat steadily 
down, and soon one barrel snapped; a few 
more shots and the other barrel snapped 
also, and there I sat in the rain, with a 
useless gun, and the ducks decoying- like 
e Dickens. . I watched them awhile, but I 
was getting- wet and uncomfortable so 
I pushed my sneak box from the bank, 
picked up my decoys, and started for the 
house with fifteen splendid ducks, and I 
had not been away over an hour. When 
reached the house Uncle, who had 
been watching from the window, was 
highly pleased at my success. As I took 
my cleaning rod from my gun case, Bill 
» s “ wi. “ w ? at al v°“ soin - *° d °. 
AeiL Why, draw the loads off my 
gun, I replied. “Don’t do that,” said 
he, hand her here, I’ll fix her so you 
can shoot her off.” Taking the gun he 
held it near the roaring fire a few min- 
utes until he had dried off the locks, 
then he reached up on the mantle piece 
to the match box, selecting two straight 
grained matches, and with his pen knife 
he carefully whittled them to a slender 
point. Then, inserting them into the 
nipple openings, he hammered them in 
firmly, cut them off smoothly, and hand- 
ed me the gun, saying: “There, put on 
your caps, take her outside and let her 
go.” I had watched him with many mis- 
givings, believing he had played a joke 
on me, but I did as he bade me and went 
outside. “Hold her up,” said Capt. Bill. 
I did so, and bang! bang! each barrel 
went clean as a whistle. I had learned 
a new wrinkle that I made use of many 
times thereafter. And now came a labor 
of love, the little Manton, a fourteen 
bore, was wiped dry, carefully oiled in 
all its parts, rubbed with a flannel cloth 
till it glistened in the firelight, then 
placed in the corner with the other guns, 
after which I sat at my ease before the 
fire with the comfortable feeling of a 
day well spent. After supper, Mike, at 
mj request, prepared a fire in the great 
fiieplace of carefully selected wreck 
timber that had been joined together 
with copper bolts and highly impreg- 
nated with verdigris, and I sat and 
watched, with great enjoyment, the great 
sheets of flame go rushing up the chim- 
ney in all the changing colors of the 
rainbow. This has always been a source 
of great pleasure to me and I have often 
selected the timber myself, always 
cnoosing the sticks with the greatest 
number of bolt holes. 
A S we sat before the fire the rain 
beat steadily against the windows 
and the talk naturally turned to 
storms and wrecks. I spoke of the col- 
ossal wooden figure of a Scotch High- 
lander in kilt and tartan I had seen in 
Uncle Jakey Herbert’s barn that sum- 
mer, and Mike spoke up and said: 
“That’s the figger head off of the Duke 
of Argyle, a big bark that went ashore 
just this side of Billy Shaddickls (Chad- 
wick’s) in a snow storm late one after- 
noon in February about twenty years 
ago. She struck on the outer bar and 
thera was sich a sea runnin’ that we 
couldn’t git out to her that night. There 
was no life savers then, only us fisher- 
men with our fishin’ boats. In the 
mornin’ the sea had gone down a little, 
so we went off to her, but it was very 
cold and the sea rough. When we got 
out to her she was listed over towards 
the shore, an’ the crew all lashed in the 
rig-gin, fifteen of ’em. Arter a hard 
struggle, in which we nearly capsized, 
we got alongside under her lee. The 
sea had been breakin’ over her all night 
and the hull and rig-gin’ was covered 
with ice. Arter several trials me and 
Josey Clayton got in the riggin’ and cut 
’em loose, and lowered ’em down in the 
boat. They was all cased in ice, poor 
fellers, and all dead but the captain. 
He was a man seventy years old, and 
how he lived through all that exposure 
while his husky young crew all froze to 
death, was alius a mystery to me. We 
brought the bodies ashore, and give ’em 
decent burial, but I tell ye it was a sad 
sight, and one I’ll never fergit if I live 
a thousand years. The big bark broke 
Pulling them down 
up the next day, and when the figger 
head came ashore, Uncle Jakey took it 
home with him.” 
N EXT morning it was drizzling a 
little with prospects of a westerly 
clear up, and Mike gave me a tip. 
“You let Uncle William go to West 
Point and you go to Muskrat Creek; 
tnere s a lot of black ducks feedin’ there 
and if it comes on to blow hard you’ll 
git em. So, following his advice, I 
rowed up the creek and pulled my box' on 
the bank facing the northwest. Just at 
the place where the creek narrows down 
I threw out a half dozen decoys and 
awaited developments. Gradually the 
drizzle ceased, a few cold puffs of air, 
and then the wind changed to the west 
and began to blow. I laid low in my 
boat and suddenly I heard the whistle 
of wings behind me; then over my head, 
close enough to reach up and touch with 
my gun, came a black duck, facing the ' 
wind. He flew on over the decoys and 
just as he put down his feet to alight 
I killed him. And so they came at long 
intervals, all through the day, mostly 
singles and pairs, decoying beautifully, 
and when night came I had not fired 
many shots but I had a string of fifteen, 
nearly all black ducks. 
From where I lay I faced West Point. 
There was a fringe of marsh elders 
around the entire shore in those days, 
but no reeds, excepting one small bunch 
directly behind Uncle’s blind, (the en 
ti^e shore line is covered with a dense 
growth of reeds at this writing), so T 
had a fine view of all his shooting. From 
time to time I would see the ducks set 
their wings and go to his decoys, then 
see the white puffs of smoke, see the 
ducks fall, and presently hear the faint 
report of his gun. Immediately behind 
Uncle s blind a narrow strip of meadow 
had been mowed which ended in a point 
at the bunch of reeds spoken of. In the 
afternoon at high water the heavy wind 
forced the tide on the meadows for a 
short time and covered this mown spot 
about six inches deep, making it look 
like a pond. As the wind increased in 
force it made the waves run high in the 
bay and many of the ducks sought 
smoother water. They would fly in over 
West Point to Crab Pond, sail around 
there for a while, then back again in 
the wind, to alight in the smooth water 
of the mown strip. Here was a golden 
opportunity. Soon I saw Uncle rise in 
his sneak box and take a look around; 
then he took a half dozen decoys, placed 
them in the lee of the reed bunch, fixing 
himself a rude blind in the reeds, and 
then I witnessed some fine duck shoot- 
ing. The birds would come in low over 
the meadow and work up to his decoys. 
I could see the ducks drop, then the flocks 
flare up and go whirling back before the 
wind, then they would work back to 
windward again, repeating this over and 
over, as the wind now was blowing a 
gale. The ducks came to Uncle as fast 
as he could load and shoot. He did not 
take time to pick up the dead ones, but 
attended strictly to his “knitting”. As 
he stood up to load his gun I could see 
his tall form bend to the blast, sometimes 
pushing him ahead a step or two. This 
continued about an hour; at the end of 
that time the tide had dropped off, leav- 
ing the meadow bare again. Then 
Uncle, having enjoyed such shooting as 
seldom falls to any duck shooter’s lot. 
picked up his dead ducks and found 
eighteen, all smees. Mv string of black 
ducks looked very small beside bis that 
night, for be had twenty-five all told, 
and he crowed quite a lot. 
T HE wind blew itself out that night 
and next morning brought a light 
southwester. About the middle of 
the forenoon, as we sat in our boats on 
West Point, a single drake smee came 
in and, passing high over us, flew in 
towards Crab Pond and circling lit on 
the meadow. After waiting a short time 
I left the blind and walked out after 
him. Uncle directed me by waving his 
hand to the right or left; presently he 
waved his hand up and down, which 
meant I had reached the spot where we 
had marked the drake down, but no duck 
was to be seen. Then I dropped my 
handkerchief on the grass and began to 
circle the spot. Finally Uncle could 
stand it no longer and came stalking out 
in a bad humor and “bawled” me out 
because I could not start the bird. “You 
walk out that way about ten yards,” he 
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