old Mallard was all alone. His mate had flown away 
during the night. She had gotten out of the little house 
into the cage that had been torn by the storm, but a drift 
had closed the entrance and locked the drake in. We felt 
pretty badly over it, but not nearly as much so as the 
drake. We fixed the cage and gave him food and water 
but he was uneasy and would not eat, and for two days 
and a half after his mate had gone kept up a continual 
pacing back and forth. Finally we placed him in the cage 
with the others, but he fought them all. Then we put 
him on the snow to see what he would do when he was 
free. He flapped his wings and flew about a hundred 
yards and alighted. His wings were weak from lack of 
use. We watched him all the morning as he flew about 
the farm each time going a little further than before. 
At last he came near his cage, took a sip of water and with 
a whirring of wings he was in the air. Up, up he went 
and then started to circle. Around he swung, then 
straightened out and was soon a speck in the distance. 
The old Mallard was gone and his mate was gone. We 
wondered if they would ever meet. We fixed the others 
as best we could and started on our regular morning work. 
In about an hour, as we were going to dinner, we saw a 
sight that gave us a thrill. There across the snow walked 
the old Mallard and behind him was his mate. We ran 
toward him with a shout, and the old fellow answered. 
The duck was tired and walked with her head down. 
Every few feet he would go back and talk to her and urge 
her along, then he would take the lead and strut along 
making a terrible racket. He did not stop until they 
were up to the coop. We lifted the cage and he urged her 
in under and then he looked up at us and talked and talked. 
But we could not understand. In fact there were many 
things that the Mallard drake did that day which we 
could not understand. 
David Stockbridge. 
