440 
FOREST AND STREAM 
October, 19 
“Old squaws,” By Roland Clark, whose dry point interpretations of wild-fowl life have put him in the front rank of 
American etchers 
THE CALL OF MEADOW AND BA 
THE WILDFOWLER WILL SOON RESPOND TO THE LURE OF THE MARSH- 
LAND AND ONCE MORE KNOW THE BEAUTY THAT ATTENDS THE DAWN 
T HE fondest recollections a sports- 
man can command are of the days 
he has spent with his old-time 
associates, by fireside and camp 
stove, listening to the stories of the 
marsh or the woods, replete with laugh- 
ter and good fellowship. 
Among memories of shore bird hunts 
and days spent in the duck blinds on Bar- 
negat Bay, New Jersey, first and fore- 
most come the nights at the old home of 
the Allen boys when listening to the sea 
tales of Cap’n Allen, the father. We 
would gather in the sitting-room around 
the wood-burner stove piled high with 
red cedar billets which the Cap’n had 
brought down from the swamp up the 
creek in his “garvey.” 
Those moments, linked with the mem- 
ories of the days on the island out in the 
bay, with the red sunsets, the glowing 
painted globe of the late autumn sun 
sinking into the crimson and blue haze of 
the marsh meadows and the soft gloom 
of the meadow nights, create material 
for many and many a happy evening of 
retrospect. 
We were eating supper at the house on 
the creek the evening before the opening 
of the duck season when the Cap’n took 
his old muzzle loading ten gauge goose 
and duck gun from its cedar pins against 
the side of the kitchen wall. This was 
the gun the old gentleman had been tell- 
ing us about while relating the story of 
his competitions in glass-ball shooting 
matches with some of the champions of 
the state in days gone by. A heavy, 
brown-barreled gun with beautiful en- 
graved walnut stock it had been in it’s 
time an innovation among the guns of 
that section. In the old days nothing less 
than an eight gauge was counted worth 
while by the baymen. Now the old eight 
By BEN C. ROBINSON 
gauge cannon is ruled against and noth- 
ing larger than a ten gauge is permitted 
to be used. The majority of the guns 
used on the bay to-day are of the stand- 
ard twelve-gauge type, which, by the 
way, is far better than the heavier gauges 
for all around shooting. 
“When I load this old lady with a 
handful of powder and about that much 
shot,” the Cap’n explained, “and let fly 
into a bunch of ducks coming in to the 
stools — well, I’ll tell ye, lads, there is 
either something killed or dumed badly 
frightened !” 
I believed the old gentleman — for that 
matter there was no dissenting voice 
from any of the party as they laughed at 
the Cap’n’s explanation of his gunning 
methods as they were practised in the 
golden yesterdays. But those days are 
pretty well gone, with their myriads of 
ducks and brant, with the marshes alive 
with shore birds. Yes, those were indeed 
the golden days, but I am glad to say that 
I have found some things there of a later 
day that give me pleasant food for re- 
membrances. 
I AM led to believe that even Cap’n Ed’s 
1 enormous old ten guage loaded with 
the fistfull of powder and shot could not 
have boasted of any margin over the shot 
that I made on a bunch of yellowlegs 
down at the point on Dog Island one day 
during the ducking season. 
About noon the flight of black duck and 
mallards became slow and Howard ad- 
vanced the plan that we take the garvey 
and make a swing around the island, 
through the inlet and back and then up 
the creek which separated the eastern 
and western part of Sheep’s Leg Island, 
where the ducking shacks were located. 
This appealed to both Charlie and me 
as we were glad of the chance to vary th f 
sport for the day. j I 
We had passed the old four-mastel 1 
which was loafing in the bay waiting fcj ( 
the wind, just within the inlet and ha ' 
headed for the creek, a wide, sluggis i ‘ 
thoroughfare which at high tide was ac 
cessible by garvey or sail boat, whe 1 
Howard pointed the nose of the boat tc 1 
ward the reedy shore. 
Out in the meadows there was a grou ( 
of large salt pools with wide muck am ' 
sand bars, so characteristic of the shon 1 
meadows. Scattered about over the bar i 
was a large flock of golden plover an< | 
yellowlegs of the “greater” variety. W< ? 
unloaded as quickly as possible, filled ou " 1 
vests with No. 8 chilled shot shells am ! 
started in deployed formation to stalk thd s 
birds. It was a wary task as the bird: 11 
had been heavily shot over that seasorj ! 
and were wild. 
C 
Allen dropped on his hands and knee: j t( 
and motioning us to take stands in the j 
grass for the flight when they flushed 
he started crawling for the bar. The 
birds moved and it was some time before 
the bayman was near enough for a chance j 
at the flock, but eventually he raised up 
and made a double on the birds before i 
they were out of range. Instead of the j 
flock coming over our stands they took I 
a northerly course up the island and away 
from us. 
We were going back to the boat when 
another flock w'as heard w'histling high 
up, coming in from the south. They had ; 
evidently been to the beach and were re- ; 
turning to the meadows for the after- 
noon. We dropped down in the reeds 
and Howard commenced calling to them 
with the peculiar whistle the bird decoys 1 
to. The flock at last emerged from the 
